This is a photo that was considered for, but not used in the book New Zealand 1950s Steam in Colour as the colour shift was just too severe. It shows a JA class 4-8-2 with a goods train including livestock wagons. Napier to Gisborne is another railway line that Steven Joyce, the Minister for Roads with Big Trucks, wants to close.
Photo from the Derek Cross collection, other details not recorded.
2 comments:
these lines would probably cost a fortune to maintain and keep up to standard so im sure they have good reasons for closing some of these lines and posibly using money saved on lines that dont get much use on those that do.
But wherever these trains go trucks will be used to carry the freight to and from stations for them so theres also the issue of double or triple handling and the cost involved maybe thats why toll was happy to sell the rail back to the government
Actually according to Kiwirail the Napier to Gisborne line costs between between $2 and $3 million a year in maintenance and renewals.
How much does your mate in the Beehive spend and plan to spend on the accompanying SH2 road? Well, we will put in a request under the Official Information Act to find out.
However in the meantime, here's an interesting statistic for you: under the present Government's policy statement on land transport funding from two years ago, the aggregate planned allocation for spending on the State Highways this year is $1,725 million. And how much is planned to be spent on rail and sea freight? A mere $1 million. Look for yourself on page 13 of this pdf:
http://www.transport.govt.nz/news/newsevents/Documents/Final-GPS-May-09.pdf
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