The Morgan railway line or North-West Bend railway was a railway line on the

South Australian Railways South Australian Railways (SAR) was the statutory corporation through which the Government of South Australia built and operated railways in South Australia from 1854 until March 1978, when its non-urban railways were incorporated into Austr ...

network.

History

Gawler River Railway Bridge, Roseworthy Line (7364049606)

Morgan, railway next to River Murray(GN14113)

The first section of the line opened from

Gawler Gawler is the oldest country town on the Australian mainland in the state of South Australia. It was named after the second Governor (British Vice-Regal representative) of the colony of South Australia, George Gawler. It is about north of ...

. It was built to service the copper mining at

Kapunda Kapunda is a town on the Light River and near the Barossa Valley in South Australia. It was established after a discovery in 1842 of significant copper deposits. The population was 2,917 at the 2016 Australian census. The southern entrance ...

, opened on 13 August 1860. It was extended to Morgan on 23 September 1878 to provide a more efficient freight and passenger connection between the Murray

paddle steamers A paddle steamer is a steamship or steamboat powered by a steam engine that drives paddle wheels to propel the craft through the water. In antiquity, paddle wheelers followed the development of poles, oars and sails, where the first uses wer ...

and both the city of

Adelaide Adelaide ( ) is the list of Australian capital cities, capital city of South Australia, the state's largest city and the list of cities in Australia by population, fifth-most populous city in Australia. "Adelaide" may refer to either Greater A ...

and

Port Adelaide Port Adelaide is a port-side region of Adelaide, approximately northwest of the Adelaide CBD. It is also the namesake of the City of Port Adelaide Enfield council, a suburb, a federal and state electoral division and is the main port for the ...

for ocean transport. The

Eudunda Eudunda is a rural town in South Australia, roughly 103 kilometres northeast of Adelaide, established in 1870 after settlers began moving into the area in the 1860s. As of the 2006 census, Eudunda had a population of 640. Eudunda is in the R ...

to Morgan section closed on 2 November 1969, and Morgan residents requested that the line was preserved to Mount Mary, though this was rejected, with the line being removed not long after. In 1975, the remaining line to Eudunda and the Robertstown branch came under the ownership of Australian National as part of the SAR's sale to the Federal Government. The Kapunda to Eudunda section was closed on 11 March 1994 by AN, with the deterioration of the River Light bridge at Hansborough being cited as a reason for closure. This section was pulled up the following year. The remaining Gawler to Kapunda section was leased by the South Australian Government to Australian Southern Railroad (later known as ORA) in 1997 as part of AN's SA freight asset sale to Genesee and Wyoming. The line's last documented use was on 21 May 2003 by Australian Railroad Group locomotive CK4, though grain services had ceased years before. One Rail Australia continues to clear vegetation on the line to help meet the lease agreement with the SA Government, although the track itself has not been maintained since the last train passed.

Route

Railway bridge over Light River at Hansborough, South Australia

The Kapunda railway was the first extension of the line from

. It passed through Roseworthy from where the Peterborough line later branched. The line headed northeast from Roseworthy to reach Freeling, then the line crossed the River Light just south of Kapunda. The extension continued through Hansborough, running across the River Light once again and Pine Creek before reaching Hampden, then turning south and going through a steep descent into

. From there, the line curved northwards towards the junction for the Robertstown line, then heading west across the plains adjacent to what is now the Thiele Highway to Morgan. The Robertstown line branch opened in 1914 from Eudunda to Robertstown, passing through Point Pass along the way.

Possible extension

There were proposals to extend the line to connect to

Wentworth, New South Wales Wentworth is a small border town in the far south west of the state of New South Wales, Australia. It lies at the confluence of Australia's two most important rivers, the Darling and the Murray, the latter forming the border with the state of ...

, and even to

Hay Hay is grass, legumes, or other herbaceous plants that have been cut and dried to be stored for use as animal fodder, either for large grazing animals raised as livestock, such as cattle, horses, goats, and sheep, or for smaller domesticate ...

to provide a more direct rail route to Sydney.

References

{{Reflist

External links

Gallery
Closed railway lines in South Australia Railway lines opened in 1860