Otago Rail Trail
| Otago Central Rail Trail | |
|---|---|
On the Otago Central Rail Trail
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| Length | 150 km |
| Location | Otago region, New Zealand |
| Trailheads |
Middlemarch 45°30′11″S 170°07′33″E / 45.50293°S 170.12594°E Clyde 45°11′41″S 169°20′08″E / 45.19476°S 169.33562°E |
| Use | Walking Cycling Horse riding |
| Elevation | |
| Highest point | 618 m (2,028 ft) |
| Hiking details | |
| Trail difficulty | Moderate |
| Season | Year round |
| Sights | Otago Central landscape, railway viaducts |
The Otago Central Rail Trail is a 150-kilometre walking, cycling and horse riding track in the South Island of New Zealand. A pioneering project for New Zealand, the successful cycle trail joined the New Zealand Cycle Trail umbrella organisation in 2012, having been one of the inspirations for it.
The trail runs in an arc between Middlemarch and Clyde, along the route of the former Otago Central Railway. The trail has become a popular tourist attraction, with 10,000-12,000 users per year as a conservative estimate, and yearly (and ongoing) user increases for 6 out of the last 7 years (as of 2011). The trail is also accepted as being, by a large margin, the biggest non-farming economic factor in the Maniototo-Alexandra area.
The original railway line was completed at the turn of the 20th century, and provided a link between Central Otago and Dunedin until closure in 1990. The first 64 km from the junction with the Main South Line in Wingatui remain operational; the initial 4 km form KiwiRail's Taieri Industrial Siding and the remaining 60 km through the Taieri Gorge to Middlemarch is operated by Dunedin Railways as a tourist attraction. The New Zealand Department of Conservation recognised that the remainder of the route to Clyde had potential as a recreational facility, and bought the formation after the rails and sleepers had been salvaged.
Since, the trail has come to be recognised as an important feature of the region, highlighted for example by strong interest from numerous groups in a 2011 workshop, where 120 people attended to discuss the further future of the trail, and how to encourage users to stay in the area for longer.
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Wikipedia