Projects
Location of the Rimutaka Incline Railway, 40km north-west of Wellington.
The Trust has a fleet of thirteen YC-class ballast wagons for future use on the Rimutaka Incline Railway.
Around 200 wagons of YC, YF and YH classes were withdrawn from service during 2007, replaced by a fleet of 40 modern YJ-class bogie hopper wagons. The Trust’s plans to construct and maintain the heritage railway will require a ballast wagon train. This was a rare and not-to-be repeated opportunity to acquire a fleet of suitable ballast wagons. The Trust is grateful to the many individuals and organisations that have sponsored a wagon or transport thereof, including New Zealand Community Trust, Pelorus Trust and Winstone Aggregates; and also to ONTRACK for the opportunity to...
We've made a start on building our future mainline track at Maymorn. Track has reached the 150-metre mark and plans are afoot to extend it to the Kaitoke end of our Maymorn site.
The rail vehicle shed at Maymorn has been one of the primary projects for the Trust over the last few years. A huge amount of design work, engineering consultation, planning and project management has gone into the structure. The vast majority of the foundation work, component fabrication and final construction has been undertaken by volunteers working in their spare time. The decision to replicate an original 1911 New Zealand Railways 2-road engine shed design has paid dividends in that the Maymorn station has a real railway depot “feel” about it. The building will also complement future heritage railway operations.
Our first complete locomotive -Tr189 - arrived at Maymorn on Friday 30th July 2010. The locomotive will be used for shunting and track construction work at Maymorn, and will play a key role in future reinstatement of the Rimutaka Incline Railway.
Tr189 was one of nine 20-tonne shunting locomotives built to this design at the New Zealand Railways Hillside Workshops in Dunedin during the 1970s. It was renumbered 937 in 1979, and was repainted with the 'fruit salad' livery midway through its working life. Working in the Manawatu for much of its life, it had been stored out of service in Wellington for over a year before being purchased by the Trust.
An authentic heritage station building is planned to be built at Maymorn, replicating the Waimate station of 1907 designed by George Troup. It is a medium-sized design, being 108' (32.9m) long by 20' (6m) wide, having most of the features and ornamentation of stations designed by Troup. Marseilles tiled roof, half-timbered construction and decorative multi-post entrance porch set the building apart from other designs.
It is anticipated that the station building will be used:
- as the starting and finishing point for visitor experience
- as the booking and information centre
- for customer services - franchises, e.g. café, souvenirs
- as a...