So as of today we are back to doing the Main South Line and we are doing it for the same reason as the MNL corridor we just did the aerial imagery of. To free up some disk space with a lot of downloads, and also to have the complete corridor and set of aerial imagery for as many stations as we can find them for. Now we have three useful series of aerial images going south. The NZR corridor surveys, in this case, are from 1984 which is a bit late for many stations that closed before then. We referred to some of these surveys in previous posts about the MSL around Dunedin. So in addition to those we have SH1 surveys for the parts of the MSL corridor that were close enough to SH1. That should be nearly all the way to Timaru with some possible gaps. From Timaru to Pareora is likely to be fairly patchy, and then from Studholme to Glenavy could be tricky as well. South of Oamaru is fairly patchy as well, with the best section being from Hillgrove to Palmerston. So highway surveys have limited utility and we will have to lean heavily on the NZR corridor surveys, but them being from the 1980s rather than the 1970s or earlier is limiting.
So we are just downloading stuff at the moment and extracting the base imagery for the corridor going south from Christchurch. Mosaic projects are not happening immediately because just getting the aerial photography is a big effort and that's where the work is going into, to complete all this as quickly as possible.
RNZAF Weedons Air Force Base was established for stores during World War II and had a railway siding off the Main South Line a little north of the Weedons railway station. Seen here in 1950.
Weedons AFB site seen in 2018, the last remaining hangar at the site has been recently demolished.
Rolleston in 1972. Apart from the train with apparently a pair of DG locomotives coming off the Midland Line (the lead locomotive is so dark in colour it's difficult to be sure exactly what type it is), the sidings going into the trees opposite the station are interesting because of the wagon turntable in the middle of one of them.
Another shot of Rolleston in 1972 and this one shows the start of the Midland Line and what appears to be the site of a former building (on the RHS) and water vat (on the LHS). The water race across the middle of the photo could have supplied water to the vat. So we assume this could have been a locomotive depot, but if it was, then it must have been about 100 years ago, since the 1942 aerial photo shows perhaps a concrete foundation similar to the above - no actual building.
