Outram Branch

Map

The Outram Branch was a

In 1930, two services ran return daily, but this was seen to be excessive and trains were cut to run once daily. These services were mixed trains and they operated until 13 January 1950, when the passenger component was cancelled and the line became freight only. The line was proving uneconomic and the cessation of passenger services could not save its poor financial state. By the early 1950s, traffic was almost non-existent: 107 tonnes of agricultural lime and fertiliser were railed in a week, with a meagre seven tonnes of freight railed out. Outram was very adequately served by road transportation and the railway was overdue for maintenance - it was clear it would not be beneficial to keep it open any longer. Accordingly, the line was closed to all traffic on 5 December 1953.^[2]

Today

It is typical for both nature and human activity to reduce or wholly destroy traces of closed railway lines, and little remains of the Outram Branch. In Outram itself, the goods shed has been incorporated as part of a road transportation company's depot, and outside of the town, across the Taieri River, School Road uses the old route of the railway for nearly three kilometres. Concrete abutments at the location of a long-gone bridge over a small creek are still present, as are some traces of the line's formation at points along its former route, and the site of the Dukes Road station still possesses its concrete platform.^[4]

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