I originally sent this to my Australian History lecturer.
Martin,
May I suggest that you may like to consider asking the Library to include "Australian Railway History" on their purchase list/ The magazine is published by the Australian Railway Historical Society (NSW) (www.arhsnsw.com.au) at $7.50 per issue over twelve months. This magazine covers historical issues nationwide, there is also a magazine produced by the ARHS (QLD) called The Sunshine Express, but I have never seen it in a newsagent.
I am told by my father who was a former editorial board member of "Australian Railway history" that the ARHS are presently digitising past issues of "The Bulletin" (the magazines former name) and Australian Railway History from 1937., so the gaps are coverable in any potential collection.
The ARHS (NSW) also produces another magazine Railway Digest which covers contemporary issues in the rail industry, it is published monthly at $9.00. This magazine would seem to me to be a far better fit for the university than the US magazine "Trains" which tends towards US issues only and the SSHS Library currently subscribe to.
The ARHS(NSW) website is at www.arhsnsw.com.au there are also a fairly broad range of Australian and other rail history books avaiable from their bookshop.
Next is a rail industry focused magazine entitle "Rail Express" which I imagine they would be happy to mail out to UQ and could be useful for the GeoSciences, Engineers, Demographers and so forth.
I also note that with the Libray of Congress indexing system, the UQ Librarian has not Australianised some American words and phrases - the one that leapt out at me was "Railroad" instead of "Railway". I know, a small tilt at the wind mill, but us Gentleman from La Mancha need to do these things.
Kindest Regards,
Chris