Katamatite railway line

The Katamatite railway line is a disused railway located in northern Victoria, Australia. It was built as a tramway, running from Dookie to Katamatite, and opened on 11 August 1890. When it was taken over by the Victorian Railways (VR) in 1892 sections of the track were upgraded and it was reclassified as a railway. The line was formally closed on 13 January 1987.

In 1886 the Parliament of Victoria passed the Country Tramways Act (Act No.915), which gave shire councils access to loan money to allow them to construct light railways, known as tramways. Money was to be provided to councils through the Country Tramways Trust Fund, which was in turn part of the budget allocation to the VR. Ultimately, the local ratepayers bore the burden of repaying the loans.

On August 11, 1890 the Yarrawonga Shire Council was successful in obtaining money for the construction of a tramway from the town of Dookie, where it connected with an existing railway line from Shepparton, to the town of Katamatite. Yarrawonga (later Tungamah Shire Council, now Moira Shire Council), appointed Thomas Walker Fowler as chief engineer for the construction and operation of the tramway. The intention was that the shire would build and operate the line, with some supervision from the VR.

Fowler had arrived in Australia from Ireland in 1876, and gained a degree in engineering from Melbourne University. He worked with the Victorian and New South Wales railways departments for a short time before entering private practice, being employed by a number of councils around Victoria. After working on the Katamatite line he went on to design water and electricity supply systems for a number of Victorian country towns.

The tramway was constructed using the same sleepers as those used by the VR, but only 10 miles (16 km) of the track used the same weight rails, the remainder being laid with a lighter 50 pounds per yard (25 kg/m) steel rail. The formation of the track itself was narrower than that used by the VR, being 12 ft 6 in (3.81 m) wide as compared to 15 ft 6 in (4.72 m). The lighter construction, which included using less track ballast, imposed restrictions on the weight of used on the line and the speed at which it was allowed to travel, which was initially limited to 20 mph (32 km/h). The steepest gradient was calculated to be 1 in 69, and the largest bridge, where the line crossed Broken Creek, was 200 feet (61 m) long.

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