Wairarapa Line [7B]: Rimutaka Incline Section [1B]: Upper Hutt - Mangaroa Tunnel [2]: Mangaroa Station-Mangaroa Tunnel

So here we are with the second part of a two part series on the Upper Hutt to Mangaroa Tunnel segment of the "Rimutaka Incline Section". In this part we look at the part of this route from the Mangaroa station to Tunnel 2 (the Mangaroa Tunnel). We will follow this with the first article on the present day route from a historical perspective as there is still 65 years of history that has unfolded since the opening of the Rimutaka Deviation.

One of the challenges for researching Mangaroa station is that Cameron's book hardly mentions it. It may be that we have missed some detail in the book having not read it for some considerable time, but there is no entry for Mangaroa in the index section for stations, so it is difficult to find the detail for it in the book.

Generally for the coverage of this article, we can refer back to the yard diagrams and aerials published in the previous article and general data from the gradient diagram in Cameron. So for a general description let us refer to this diagram from the series introduction.

The general description of this route is there is an initial traverse of the Cruickshank Saddle or Mangaroa Hill from Upper Hutt with very steep gradient of 1 in 35 and very sharp curves down to 100 metre radius. The line then enters the Mangaroa Valley. It climbs more gently and straightly, with a long straight portion between the two former stations, both of which were called Mungaroa at one time or other, the average grade being around 1 in 100. It then starts to climb off the plains into the hills around Kaitoke and at this point the corridor becomes publicly accessible, being used for various cycle trails as it enters "Tunnel Gully Reserve". The map finishes at the Mangaroa Tunnel which is publicly accessible as part of Tunnel Gully and the cycle/walking trails of the area. Gradients on the climb to the tunnel are around the 1 in 50 mark until Kaitoke itself is reached.

Aerial and diagram for the first section of the route past Mangaroa. At upper left is the World War II army base that was established at Mangaroa. As of 2015 this was still defence force land with housing along Alamein Ave, which was mostly built postwar, but the rest of its functions have long since ceased, and it looks very different nowadays, although the circular road is still in place. We don't know if they had their own siding into this base or if they used the RNZAF sidings or the yard. At lower left, Seeds tramway can be seen coming into Mangaroa along Flux Road.

This aerial and diagram cover our next point of significance which is the original Mungaroa station. There's not a lot of documentation on why this was chosen to be the site of a station; Cameron isn't any help on this at all. It was at about 23 miles 20 chains from Wellington. There seems to have been a sawmill and brickyards both on the south side of it at various times and the brickyards might have had their own siding. The yard definitely ended before the bridge. The sawmill had its own short tramway to bring product into the railway yard for loading onto trains.

Mungaroa (according to Juliet Scoble's work "Dates And Names") was operated as a station from 1878 to 1891. The station was then relocated to Flux Road where it stayed until the line closed in 1955. However, in the early 1910s, a company called May Morn Estates was set up with the involvement of Arthur Seed (part of the Seeds referred to previously) and a siding was installed for their use. They had a sawmill in Maclaren Street at about the marked point. The tramway which was worked by a steam engine ran all the way up past Twin Lakes crossing the Hutt River on a large wooden bridge into Akatarawa Forest. It was operated for a relatively short period, closing down at the advent of World War 1. During 1915, part of the site and some buildings were leased by the NZ Army to establish the Maymorn Camp. It is important to note this was a different and separate site from the World War II Mangaroa army camp which we referred to at the top of this article. The history of May Morn Estates can be found in the research notes published on the Valley Signals website.

This location is about where the straight and flat part of the line ends and where it starts to climb into the hills towards the Mangaroa Tunnel. To the right on the diagram you can see the connecting siding into Maymorn Station (it was also called Mangaroa for the first few years) that was put in during the construction of the Rimutaka Deviation. We will look more into this when we talk about Maymorn Station in another article about the current railway from Upper Hutt to Featherston.

 This is a 1957 aerial map of the next piece of the railway line climbing towards the tunnel and of particular interest is the siding we referred to going up to Maymorn, which can be seen heading into what was part of the Rimutaka Deviation works construction camp. Of which more later. In the top right corner we can see the present Wairarapa Line going into the entrance of the Remutaka Tunnel, also covered later (both topics in another post, not this one).

1943 aerial and a diagram of the last bit of the route covered by this article, as the line crosses a bridge and reaches the Mangaroa Tunnel. Referring to the diagram, you can see "Tunnel Gully Access" coming in next to the bridge upper left, and that is a cycle/walking trail built in recent years from Maymorn Station up to the existing Tunnel Gully tunnel trail which passes through Mangaroa Tunnel, as the diagram shows. The bridge was sometimes referred to as "Dry Creek" and according to Cameron on page 276-277 it was built after a track subsidence there in 1903. There may be some remains of this bridge still at the site but having visited there in the late 1990s, we did not then attempt to locate the bridge as the trail at that point simply ended there and the bridge site was well hidden in the scrub. The access from Maymorn appears to have been cut in the 2000s.

There is one other point of interest in this map just past that bridge and that is whether a siding has been put in to some location along the railway. We have not found any records of any railway siding being there but what can be seen on the aerials at this point should be looked into further at some point of time. 

Tunnel Gully is an interesting location in its own right and is separate from the main area of the Remutaka Rail Trail, because of the privately owned land section around Kaitoke Station that has not been opened up along the old corridor. We will look into these topics in more depth in the article about Kaitoke (WL [7B] RIS [2]).

Wairarapa Line [7B]: Rimutaka Incline Section [1A]: Upper Hutt - Mangaroa Tunnel [1]: Upper Hutt-Mangaroa

So here is the first in a series of 5 articles looking at the "Rimutaka Incline Section", which is an NZ Rail Maps name for the route from Upper Hutt to Featherston via the Rimutaka Incline. In this first pair of articles we are looking at the part from Upper Hutt to the Mangaroa Tunnel, which includes several station sites.

If one visits the Valley Signals site, there are several relevant sections for this area, among them Upper Hutt History, Maymorn Estates and Cruickshanks Tunnel. These are comprised of indepth research undertaken by David Castle over the past 20 years into the general area which incorporates the historical railway that closed 65 years ago. David has supplied additional material not on the site which has been added to maps as well. The full set of production maps for the Rimutaka Incline Section will be published in full when Volume 6 is released but for now you will have to rely on the albums that appear on our Facebook page or group if you want to see the complete set of them. 

Depending on which part of the section we are looking at, we have coverage available from 1943, 1951, 1957, 1963, 1970, 1980, 2016 or 2017. Only Google Photos will let you see the original filename of each map, which includes in it the year that the aerial photos were taken. Unfortunately there is no other simple way of indicating this date, since it is impractical to label the map itself with this information. Once we get out of the immediate Upper Hutt residential area the coverage is almost all 1943, 1951 or 1957. with just a little bit from 1980 at Maymorn.

One part of the additional information from Valleysignals is the existence of sidings near the 21 mile peg just north/east of Upper Hutt. These are marked as "refuse dump" and there were two of them as the diagram shows. The aerial photo is from 1943 when the line was still in operation, and the plan from which the information comes is around that date. Note the prominent embankment to the left. Unfortunately this was bulldozed with the recent development of housing in the area. However the rest of the formation is substantially complete and it can be accessed from the end of King Charles Drive to reach the tunnel. The refuse dump siding is shown in the NZRLS 1947 working timetable reprint.

It is not too much further on that the first tunnel is reached (this would be called No.1 Tunnel in the official records, but as many tunnels also had a name, Cruickshanks Tunnel is also well known). The diagram shows a bridge crossing the cutting just west of the tunnel; this was part of the route of a logging tramway for Cruickshanks Sawmill, which was located in Cruickshanks Road in Upper Hutt. The location of that mill appears on the Wairarapa Line maps being adjacent to the present railway rather than the former one. According to Cameron ("A Line Of Railway") a siding was built just "a few chains" north of the tunnel to load timber from the tramway, known as "Cruickshanks" but was lifted in 1889. However, Castle's more recent work published on his VS website does not, as far as I can tell, confirm this in any way. In our previous maps we suggested an approximate location for "Cruickshanks" but being now less certain, we have removed it from the map, and have elected not to draw any possible route for the sawmill tramway at this time. Those who are more interested in this subject may elect to look up the detailed research information on the VS website. There is a whole lot more history than a simple rail history map like this could show but it is still possible we may add the tramway route before publishing the final maps.

For operational purposes the line from Upper Hutt to Mangaroa was split into two parts, divided by the short section of track between No.1 Tunnel and the Mangaroa River bridge. This single diagram and 1943 aerial map show the second part of the section, from the Mangaroa River bridge (far left) to Mangaroa Station (just out of view to the far right) including the second major bridge across what is currently known as Cooleys Stream. The first part of the section, including the tunnel itself, had a continuous gradient of 1 in 35 uphill from Upper Hutt, which is very severe by railway standards and is uncommon on any major route. It was unusual in the case of the Rimutaka Incline Section that this gradient was left in place for such a long time when it could have easily been lowered with a longer tunnel through Cruickshank Saddle. 

 

This meant trains had to be banked over the hill with extra locomotives. As the line was tablet controlled, bank engine key working was provided for. The bank engine on the rear of the train as it left Upper Hutt would carry this key, and would be coupled onto the train all the way up to the bridge. The train would then be stopped for long enough to uncouple the bank engine, which would then run back down to Upper Hutt, whilst the rest of the train continued on the much easier climb to Mangaroa at 1 in 167, which steepened to 1 in 115 on reaching the station. The bank engine key had to be returned to the Upper Hutt stationmaster before the tablet carried on the train engine when it reached Mangaroa could be put back into the machine and any new tablet issued for the section.

 

Apart from the gradient, the other defining characteristic of the Upper Hutt to Mangaroa Bridge section, was its numerous sharp curves with a radius of about 100 metres. These are also very sharp by mainline standards and limit a train to a maximum speed of only 30 km/h. But because of the gradient, some commentators have suggested a train was unlikely to be moving much faster than 15 km/h when going uphill anyway. In order to ensure the braking system on the train could cope when the train was running south, downhill, in this section, there would be a limit on the size of the train, maybe about 200 tonnes. All these factors together made this part of the railway have a very limited load capacity. But the real defining factor was of course the Rimutaka Incline itself with its 1 in 15 gradient. As long as that was limiting the whole section, there was never any real incentive to make any improvements anywhere else and that's why there was only ever one realignment at Summit when more space was needed for the yard. Then in 1955 the Rimutaka Deviation fixed everything in one go with a completely new route and much easier gradients.

In the last four years of the Rimutaka Incline Section, diesel traction started to be introduced on the NZR, so some trains were worked by DE class locomotives. These were primarily designed for yard and mainline shunting use - that is to say, shunting in yards as well as roving shunts that travel between stations. They did not have multiple unit capability and only had 660 hp engines, so there was still a requirement for double heading with a crew in each cab. In any case, steam was still in use as well, partly because the DEs did not have the braking systems needed for heavy freight trains. The opening of the Rimutaka Deviation was at least dictated by the availability of enough mainline capable diesel locomotives because it was planned that it would never be operated by steam engines. At the date it opened there were just three DG class locomotives in NZ as a whole, and all of them were put into service to run its trains, but these also went from Upper Hutt to Summit on a number of occasions in the last year of the Incline's operation. It was definitely preferred to run diesels on passenger excursions on the Incline section (except for the Incline itself), probably for greater passenger comfort by eliminating smoke nuisance. The regular passenger services since 1936 were mostly handled by the Wairarapa railcars, but very occasionally Standards were used for operational reasons. Many excursion trains were run in the last months of the Incline's operation and there are numerous photos of these trains running with DEs and DGs, as well as DEs hauling the Royal Train of 1953/54. We don't really know how much diesel and how much steam was used without further research but there are plenty of pictures of steam hauled trains on the line in 1955 to know that steam locomotives continued to operate on this section until closure.

These two diagrams and one aerial (from 1943) are of Mangaroa Station. The key feature seen in that era was the RNZAF Stores Base which was in use till the late 1940s, after which it would have been offered to other Government agencies. Some commentators have suggested the Army may have taken up use of the buildings at that time. It appears they are privately owned today. It was served by two railway sidings shown on the second diagram. The first diagram shows the location of the concrete edged loading bank which is the only remaining trace of the station currently. There may have been other tracks in the yard but without obtaining a track diagram from Archives, we are limited to what can be picked up from the aerial photos.

Mangaroa was established in 1885 and was at first called Cruickshanks Siding. It seems to have been the second place on the line that was connected to Cruickshanks timber milling operations and a tramway ran into the station yard at one time. There was also another tramway run by Seeds which ran along Flux Rd and which can be seen in one of the diagrams. This also went into the station yard at one time or another. Seeds operation was to the south of Mangaroa and had a mill in Colletts Road. The name of the station was changed to Mungaroa in 1891 and Mangaroa in 1909. After 1955, the name of Mangaroa was transferred to the new station near the Rimutaka Tunnel, which was then renamed Maymorn in 1959.

Well that's the completion of the first part of these two articles on the first piece of the "Rimutaka Incline Section". As soon as we have the next lot of maps ready we will publish the second part.

Wairarapa Line [7B]: Rimutaka Incline Section [0A]: Introduction

In the midst of NZ going to level 4 of COVID-19 lockdown we have continued with our progress on Volume 6 and the past few days has been spent on the "Rimutaka Incline Section" (unofficial name) from Upper Hutt as far as the second tunnel (shown as T2 on the maps and generally known as the "Mangaroa Tunnel". We have looked at a number of sources provided by David Castle, who is perhaps better known as the webmaster of the Valley Signals site, and distilled into the maps as much information as appears relevant and which we can be reasonably confident of, in the time available, and it is now time to move forward to the next section so undoubtedly there are going to be some questions over what to include or not but it is assuredly time to push things forward.

We have decided that owing to the immense historical significance of this line and the high level of interest, that instead of publishing just progress updates, we will produce a research series of articles for this section. At the same time the previous research article series has been renumbered to reflect a more structured system of article production. Hence the base series number for this article is that it is part of WL series 7 which is the series number for the Rimutaka Incline section. We have previously had WL [7A] RIS [1] which is the series of articles published in 2018 for part of this route. Now we are starting a new series, which will be WL [7B], and this is the introduction for that series. The breakdown of each area is shown in the diagrams below.

 

This particular post is an introduction to the Rimutaka Incline Section. The diagram below shows the entire section from Upper Hutt to Featherston both for the original route and the current route. We use a terrain relief background and contour lines to show what the topography of the area looks like, and you'll appreciate that it is very hilly. 

The research article series will be broken down into:

Rimutaka Incline Section [1] covering from Upper Hutt to Mangaroa Tunnel.

Rimutaka Incline Section [2] covering from Mangaroa Tunnel through what is now known as "Tunnel Gully", Kaitoke station, and near the entrance to the Rimutaka Incline Rail Trail as it presently exists.  (Note this map is rotated 90 degrees compared to the previous one to make the best use of the layout)

Rimutaka Incline Section [3] covering from the present day public entrance to the rail trail, into the Remutaka Range, as far as the true southern end of the Summit Tunnel, incorporating Summit station. In railway topography, this would have been called the "northern" end of the tunnel, owing to it being being a greater mileage from Wellington than the portal at the end of the Summit yard, which they would have called "southern"). Again this is rotated 90 degrees, so that true north is more or less the right hand side of the map rather than the top.

Rimutaka Incline Section [4] covering most of the Incline itself (from the true southern end of the Summit Tunnel) as well as Cross Creek station and the exit of the line from the Remutaka Range out into the South Wairarapa plains.

Rimutaka Incline Series [5] covers the last piece including Pigeon Bush station, up to Speedys Crossing just south of Featherston. In railway terminology this was called the 3431 Service Siding and was in use from the time the Rimutaka Deviation opened, until early 1957, once the track on the RIS had been removed. The diagram below doesn't actually show Pigeon Bush station.

 

So that sets out the series of articles. There will be one single article for each of WL [7B] RIS [1] to WL [7B] RIS [5] as we haven't got a lot of time to write articles and they are going to come out very quickly. In fact WL [7B] RIS [1] will be published very shortly after this introduction. The only holdup in reality is updating the maps and pushing them out, and the posts will be published as soon as the maps they include are produced.