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Roxburgh Branch
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Roxburgh Branch
The Roxburgh Branch was a branch line railway built in the Otago region of New Zealand's South Island that formed part of the country's national rail network. Originally known as the Lawrence Branch, it was one of the longest construction projects in New Zealand railway history, beginning in the 1870s and not finished until 1928. The full line was closed in 1968.
The original reason for the line's construction was to provide better transport access to Lawrence, then known as Tuapeka, the site of New Zealand's first significant discovery of gold. Contracts for construction were let by mid-1873, and work on the line was well under way by the next year, with a junction with the Main South Line established at Clarksville. Slips and contractor bankruptcies presented delays, but on 22 January 1877, the line opened to Waitahuna, followed by Lawrence on 2 April 1877, 35.27 km from Clarksville.
Calls were made to extend the Lawrence Branch further, with some proposals suggesting a route via Roxburgh could serve as the railway to Alexandra and Central Otago in general (instead, the Otago Central Railway followed a more circuitous route via the Taieri and Maniototo). Decades passed until approval was granted to extend the line beyond its Lawrence terminus, with the next section to Big Hill (location of a tunnel between the Bowlers Flat and Craigellachie stations) opened on 4 October 1910. Upon completion of the 434-metre-long (1,424 ft) Big Hill tunnel, the line was opened to Beaumont on 15 December 1914, but World War I delayed construction and the next section to Millers Flat was not opened until 16 December 1925. The line was finally completed when the section from Millers Flat to Roxburgh was opened on 18 April 1928. A modified form of the proposal to use Roxburgh as the route to Central Otago resurfaced, proposing that the branch be extended to meet the Central Otago Railway in Alexandra, but this did not come to fruition.
The junction of the Roxburgh Branch with the Main South Line did not always remain in Clarksville. In 1907, an extension of 2.8 km was built alongside the Main South Line into Milton to provide for better operation, and until this extension was closed on 19 September 1960, Milton rather than Clarksville acted as the junction.
The following stations were located on the Roxburgh Branch (in brackets is the distance from Clarksville):
Six of these stations possessed goods sheds and eight had cattle and sheep yards.
Like many other branch lines in rural New Zealand, the line typically operated with one mixed train of passengers and freight each way per day. Roxburgh is located in an important stone fruit growing region, and during the appropriate season, special trains would run to carry the large quantities of fruit. The construction of the Roxburgh Dam in the 1950s also provided much traffic for the line. Many extra trains were run during this period but train sizes by today's standards remained constrained due to the steep grades and restrictive locomotive power able to be used on the branch.
Passengers were not plentiful and the line became freight-only from 4 September 1936. This was an attempt to improve the profitability of the line, but it did not work; from the opening of the final section to Roxburgh, the branch always made a working loss, with much traffic lost to road transport operators even before the line reached its greatest length. Steep grades and sharp curves that limited speeds further served to lessen rail's competitiveness.
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Roxburgh Branch
The Roxburgh Branch was a branch line railway built in the Otago region of New Zealand's South Island that formed part of the country's national rail network. Originally known as the Lawrence Branch, it was one of the longest construction projects in New Zealand railway history, beginning in the 1870s and not finished until 1928. The full line was closed in 1968.
The original reason for the line's construction was to provide better transport access to Lawrence, then known as Tuapeka, the site of New Zealand's first significant discovery of gold. Contracts for construction were let by mid-1873, and work on the line was well under way by the next year, with a junction with the Main South Line established at Clarksville. Slips and contractor bankruptcies presented delays, but on 22 January 1877, the line opened to Waitahuna, followed by Lawrence on 2 April 1877, 35.27 km from Clarksville.
Calls were made to extend the Lawrence Branch further, with some proposals suggesting a route via Roxburgh could serve as the railway to Alexandra and Central Otago in general (instead, the Otago Central Railway followed a more circuitous route via the Taieri and Maniototo). Decades passed until approval was granted to extend the line beyond its Lawrence terminus, with the next section to Big Hill (location of a tunnel between the Bowlers Flat and Craigellachie stations) opened on 4 October 1910. Upon completion of the 434-metre-long (1,424 ft) Big Hill tunnel, the line was opened to Beaumont on 15 December 1914, but World War I delayed construction and the next section to Millers Flat was not opened until 16 December 1925. The line was finally completed when the section from Millers Flat to Roxburgh was opened on 18 April 1928. A modified form of the proposal to use Roxburgh as the route to Central Otago resurfaced, proposing that the branch be extended to meet the Central Otago Railway in Alexandra, but this did not come to fruition.
The junction of the Roxburgh Branch with the Main South Line did not always remain in Clarksville. In 1907, an extension of 2.8 km was built alongside the Main South Line into Milton to provide for better operation, and until this extension was closed on 19 September 1960, Milton rather than Clarksville acted as the junction.
The following stations were located on the Roxburgh Branch (in brackets is the distance from Clarksville):
Six of these stations possessed goods sheds and eight had cattle and sheep yards.
Like many other branch lines in rural New Zealand, the line typically operated with one mixed train of passengers and freight each way per day. Roxburgh is located in an important stone fruit growing region, and during the appropriate season, special trains would run to carry the large quantities of fruit. The construction of the Roxburgh Dam in the 1950s also provided much traffic for the line. Many extra trains were run during this period but train sizes by today's standards remained constrained due to the steep grades and restrictive locomotive power able to be used on the branch.
Passengers were not plentiful and the line became freight-only from 4 September 1936. This was an attempt to improve the profitability of the line, but it did not work; from the opening of the final section to Roxburgh, the branch always made a working loss, with much traffic lost to road transport operators even before the line reached its greatest length. Steep grades and sharp curves that limited speeds further served to lessen rail's competitiveness.