Murupara Branch
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The Murupara Branch is a long branch railway line from the East Coast Main Trunk (ECMT) at
Kawerau Kawerau is a town in the Bay of Plenty Region on the North Island of New Zealand. It is situated 100 km south-east of Tauranga and 58 km east of Rotorua. It is the seat of the Kawerau District Council, and the only town in Kawerau Distr ...
to Murupara, built to serve a new pulp and paper mill harvesting the radiata pine trees of the Kaingaroa Forest on the Kaingaroa Plateau in the
Bay of Plenty The Bay of Plenty () is a large bight (geography), bight along the northern coast of New Zealand's North Island. It stretches from the Coromandel Peninsula in the west to Cape Runaway in the east. Called ''Te Moana-a-Toitehuatahi'' (the Ocean ...
,
New Zealand New Zealand () is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and List of islands of New Zealand, over 600 smaller islands. It is the List of isla ...
. The line was the last major extension of the
New Zealand Railways Department The New Zealand Railways Department, NZR or NZGR (New Zealand Government Railways) and often known as the "Railways", was a government department charged with owning and maintaining Rail transport in New Zealand, New Zealand's railway infrastruc ...
(NZR) network, of from Hawkens Junction, west of Edgecumbe, to Kawerau and 57 km from Kawerau to Murupara. The portion from Hawkens Junction to Kawerau was known as the Kawerau Branch until 1978, when it became part of the ECMT, and the former ECMT from Hawkens Junction to Taneatua became the Taneatua Branch.


History

Construction of the line began in 1951, but in March 1953 it was decided to build the mill at Kawerau not Murupara, because Kawerau had geothermal steam for energy, and the climate of Murupara in winter is misty, so was less suitable for a large town. The branch was built via Kawerau to Murupara rather than directly from Hawkens Junction near Edgecumbe. The Kawerau to Murupara section required major earthworks to limit the ruling grade against loaded log trains to 1 in 60. The easy grades between Kawerau and the port of Mt Maunganui allow very long trains of over 2,000 tonnes. Work on the section to the mill started on 12 April 1953; the rails reached Kawerau in August and the first train arrived at Kawerau on 26 October, six months after work started. The major earthworks on the Kawerau to Murupara section were completed rapidly with heavy earthmoving machinery, then prefabricated track sections were laid at the rate of 3 km a week. The first logs were loaded at Galatea (48 km from Kawerau and 9 km from Murupara) on 4 April 1955. A regular service to Murupara operated from 15 January 1957, although the line to Kawerau and Murupara was operated by the Ministry of Works (the successor to the PWD or Public Works Department) until 1 July 1957.


Motive power

As the line ran through forest areas, steam locomotives were not used on the line, and motive power has only ever been provided by diesel engines. Initially, the DE class were used for construction then for log trains on the still unsettled track bed; this has given the DE class an unofficial status of the first mainline diesel-electric locomotive in NZR service. The DE class were then replaced by DG class locomotives in 1957. From October 1963 a pair of DA class diesel locomotives were used, hauling 1,500-tonne log trains. From the 1980s to early 2000s the standard train was a trio of DC class locomotives hauling a gross load of 2,400 tonnes on 53 USL bogie log wagons. The primary motive power is now a pair of DL class locomotives. The annual tonnage of logs increased from 730,000 tons in 1960 to 1,126,000 tonnes in 1965. After the opening of the
Kaimai Tunnel The Kaimai Tunnel is a railway tunnel through the Kaimai Range in the North Island of New Zealand. Since it was opened in 1978, it has held the title of longest tunnel, at , in New Zealand, assuming this distinction from the previous title ho ...
in 1978 the section to Kawerau from Hawkens Junction was formally incorporated into the East Coast Main Trunk designation, with the line to Taneatua downgraded to branch status. The section from Kawerau to Murupara became the ''Murupara Branch'', and then the ''Murupara Line'' from 2011.


See also

*'' East Coast Main Trunk'' *'' Mount Maunganui Branch'' *'' Tāneatua Branch'' *'' Whakatane Board Mills Line''


References


Citations


Bibliography

* * Hermann, Bruce J; ''North Island Branch Lines'' pp 42,43 (2007, New Zealand Railway & Locomotive Society, Wellington) * {{NZR Lines Railway lines in New Zealand Rail transport in the Bay of Plenty Region Railway lines opened in 1955 3 ft 6 in gauge railways in New Zealand 1955 establishments in New Zealand