Rapahoe Branch
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The Rapahoe Branch is a branch line railway that forms part of New Zealand's national rail network and is located on the West Coast of the South Island. It has been operational since 1923 and was named the Rapahoe Industrial Line until 2011.
The line was built as a sub-branch of the now-closed Rewanui Branch, with the junction in Runanga. Approximately four kilometres in length, it was opened on 3 September 1923 to serve the Strongman Mine. When the Rewanui Branch closed on 19 August 1985, the Rapahoe Branch gained the six kilometres from Greymouth to Runanga that was opened 1 December 1904.
The most recent significant upgrade on the line involved the replacement of Bridge No. 1 in 2006. The original 'S' shaped wooden structure, built by the Greymouth Point Elizabeth Coal Company in 1896, was considered to be structurally unsound.
The new bridge, using a concrete channel design with a ballasted deck, was built by contractors HEB Smithbridge Limited using designs drawn up by ONTRACK in consultation with their building contractors. The $15m project was funded largely by state coal miner Solid Energy and took 18 months to build. Located upstream from the original bridge, it is slightly longer than the original at 285 meters. Its southern end has also been reorientated away from Greymouth to a new junction at Omoto, a move designed to eliminate the need for trains to and from the branch to need to enter Greymouth to reposition the locomotives and the attendant road and rail disruption this caused.
The last northbound train to cross the old bridge was empty coal shunt X-1 on 28 May 2006. The following day, track at the Cobden end of the old bridge was severed and a day later, the track at the Greymouth end was also cut. Over the next four days, work was carried out on switching the line over to the new bridge. The first revenue train over the new bridge was No. 834, a Christchurch-bound coal train, on 2 June 2006.
Despite being offered by ONTRACK to the Department of Conservation for preservation, the old bridge was demolished in July. The Department cited the unsound nature of the structure and noted that the funds that would be required to restore it would exceed its budget for the area. One truss section from the old bridge has been retained on the southern bank of the Grey River.
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Wikipedia