Blackball Branch

The Blackball Branch was a branch line railway of New Zealand's national rail network on the West Coast of the South Island and worked from the 1900s to 1966. It included the Roa Branch, also known as the Roa Incline. Roa was sometimes known as Paparoa.

The Blackball Coal Company's mine near Blackball was on the opposite side of the Grey River to the Stillwater - Westport Line, and in the late 19th century an aerial cableway was used to transport coal from the mine across the river to a railway station in Ngahere. This did not prove to be as efficient or desirable as a railway, so in 1901 a branch line across the Grey River from Ngahere to Blackball was approved.

The Public Works Department began building the 5.5-km line in 1902, but it was plagued with difficulties. Construction of the Grey River bridge suffered from delays, a contractor for a trestle bridge further along the line went bankrupt, and torrential rain made working conditions hard and problematic. As construction slowly progressed, work on an incline from Blackball into the Paparoa Ranges was commenced by the Paparoa Coal Company. This line was ultimately taken over by the State Mines Department and involved a Fell centre rail for braking due to grades as steep as 1 in 25. This was not a full incline like its North Island counterpart, the Rimutaka Incline.

During 1909, the Public Works Department began carrying coal along the Blackball Branch, and in September that year, the State Mines Department began operating the Roa Incline. The Blackball Branch was not handed over to the New Zealand Railways Department and officially opened until 1 August 1910. The Roa Incline was owned by the State Mines Department for its entire life.

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