Roxburgh Branch

Milton-Roxburgh
Route length:	95 km
Gauge :	1067 mm ( cape track )
Legend Main South Line Milton Milton Junction Duplicated with Main South Line 0.0 Clarksville Junction Clarksville Main South Line 5.0 Glenore 8.0 Mount Stuart 11.0 Manuka 16.0 Round Hill 20.0 Johnstone 24.0 Waitahuna 29.0 Forsyth 35.0 Lawrence 41.0 Evans Flat 44.0 Bowlers Creek Big Hill 434m 52.0 Craigellachie 56.0 Beaumont Clutha River 68.0 Craig Flat 71.0 Rigney 76.0 Mint 79.0 Miller's Flat 88.0 Teviot 95.0 Roxburgh

The Roxburgh Branch was a branch line in 1067 mm gauge ( Cape gauge ) in the Otago region on the South Island of New Zealand and part of the New Zealand rail network . It was owned and operated by the New Zealand Railways Department . Originally called the Lawrence Branch , the line was one of the longest-running construction projects in New Zealand's railway history. Construction began in the 1870s and wasn't finished until 1928. The entire line closed in 1968.

construction

The original reason for building the line was to create a better transport route to Lawrence , then Tuapeka , where New Zealand's first major gold deposits were discovered. Contracts for the construction were signed in mid-1873 and work began the following year. A connection to the Main South Line was created in Clarksville . Landslides and contractor bankruptcies caused delays. On January 22, 1877, the first section to Waitahuna opened , followed by Lawrence (35.27 kilometers from Clarksville) on April 2 of the same year.

There were calls to extend the route, with some suggestions favoring a route via Roxburgh to Alexandra and Central Otago . However, the Otago Central Railway preferred the longer route via Taieri and the Maniototo . Decades passed before expansion beyond the Lawrence endpoint was approved. The next section to Big Hill , where there was a tunnel between the Bowlers Creek and Craigellachie stations , opened on October 4, 1910. After the completion of the 434 m long Big Hill tunnel, the route reached Beaumont on December 15, 1914 . The First World War delayed the construction, so that the next section to Millers Flat was not completed until December 16, 1925. The line was completed with the opening of the section from Millers Flat to Roxburgh on April 18, 1928. A modified form of the proposal to use Roxburgh by extending it to a connection to the Central Otago Railway in Alexandra as a route to Central Otago came up again, but was not implemented.

The Roxburgh Branch junction on the Main South Line was not always in Clarksville. In 1907 a 2.8 km line was built parallel to the main line to Milton to improve rail operations. Until this section was closed on September 19, 1960, the connection point was Milton rather than Clarksville.

Train stations

The line had the following train stations (the distance from Clarksville in brackets):

• Glenore (5 km)
• Mount Stuart (8 km)
• Manuka (11 km)
• Round Hill (16 km)
• Johnstone (20 km)
• Waitahuna (24 km)
• Forsyth (29 km)
• Lawrence (35 km)
• Evans Flat (41 km)
• Bowlers Creek (44 km)
• Craigellachie (52 km)
• Beaumont (56 km)
• Craig Flat (68 km)
• Rigney (71 km)
• Minzion (76 km)
• Millers Flat (79 km)
• Teviot (88 km)
• Roxburgh (95 km)

Six of the stations had storage sheds and eight had stockyards.

business

Like other branch lines in rural New Zealand, the route was served daily in each direction by a mixed train. Roxburgh is located in an important growing area for stone fruit . During the season large quantities of fruit were transported away with special trains. The construction of Roxburgh Dam in the 1950s also caused high traffic. At this time, numerous special trains were used, but due to the inclines and the limited pulling power of the locomotives available on the route, they were of modest size by today's standards.

The number of passengers was low, so passenger traffic was stopped on September 4, 1936 and the line was only served by freight trains. However, this attempt to improve the profitability of the route failed. Since the opening of the end of the line to Roxburgh, the line has been a losing business, as a lot of traffic was lost to road traffic before the entire line was completed. Large inclines and sharp bends limited the speed of travel and thus reduced the competitiveness of the railway line.

In 1959/60 the line transported 9,900 tons of goods towards the Main South Line and 24,400 tons towards the interior, as well as 16,000 cattle and 51,800 sheep. Losses increased and on June 20, 1961 the line was closed. Citizens' protests were strong enough that the line's closure was postponed, and pledges of additional cargoes led to an increase in transport volumes in 1965. By 1967, however, annual losses had risen to NZ $ 100,000 and April 1, 1968 was announced as the line's closure date. The closure was again delayed. However, when a timber export business failed to materialize, fruit transport shifted to the streets, closure became inevitable and the Roxburgh Branch closed on June 1, 1968.

The route was almost exclusively served by steam locomotives . When the line was still called Lawrence Branch, tank locomotives of the W ^D class were used, which were based in Lawrence in the early 20th century. When the line became the Roxburgh Branch , the A and A ^B class locomotives with tender were mainly used.

Diesel locomotives , mainly of the DJ class , only operated the route during its demolition in order to move the trains used to dismantle the route.

Web links

• The Roxburgh Branch . Brian Greenwood, archived from the original on March15, 2007; accessed on September 9, 2014(English, original website no longer available). 

Individual evidence

1. ^ ^{A b c d} Geoffrey B. Churchman, Tony Hurst, The Railways of New Zealand: A Journey Through History HarperCollins, Auckland 1991, p. 204.
2. ↑ ^{a b c d e} David Leitch, Brian Scott, Exploring New Zealand's Ghost Railways , Grantham House, Wellington 1998, p. 100.
3. ^ JA Dangerfield and GW Emerson, Over the Garden Wall: Story of the Otago Central Railway Otago Railway and Locomotive Society, Dunedin 1995, p. 9.
4. ^ Roxburgh Branch . New Zealand Rail Maps , archived from the original on September 10, 2014 ; accessed on May 11, 2019 (English, original website no longer available).  
5. ^ Joe McNamara, Gordon Whiting, "Southland Locomotive Memories," New Zealand Railway Observer (April-June 1958), p. 59