Orbost to Nowa Nowa by rail

EMD · Posted: Fri Apr 01, 2005 4:06 pm

Hey guys....not sure if this site has been discussed here before but I found it very amusing. About a guy that builds a homemade loco and attempts to travel on the closed orbost nowa nowa rail line. Makes a very interesting and sometimes funny story with some great pics and lots of mpeg footage of the journey.

http://www.bluehaze.com.au/mmedia/rtrain/rtrain1.html

B 67 · Posted: Thu Apr 07, 2005 11:39 am

Yes, this site has been mentioned here once or twice before. Interesting site, but don't take too much notice of the locations in the captions. Many of them are wrong. For instance, he mentioned the Stoney Creek trestle (which is straight) and some of the photos show a curved bridge. And it appears to be 2 different curved trestles.

The comment about the Boggy River bridge having been recently rebuilt wasn't true either. Early photos show it was constructed that way.

Here's B 67 on the Boggy River bridge at Nowa Nowa in 1993.

I was with a railway employee who had gained permission to run his trolley on the closed line.

B 67

Melbournesparks · Posted: Thu Apr 07, 2005 6:14 pm

Such a pity you could never get away with such a thing today. It looks like great fun.

This may be a silly question but is there any official way to get permission to do this sort of thing? Say if you wanted to do Heywood to Mt. Gambier?

I suppose you would need to be an accredited operator or something before you are allowed to run on any line, closed or not.

"I thought plan B was set something on fire..."

DavidB · Posted: Thu Apr 07, 2005 7:41 pm

Brassy · Posted: Thu Apr 07, 2005 7:51 pm

I'm really glad I did not purchase one of those "2nd-hand 42 ton T-Class diesel locos at $2500"

According to my calculations, there would have been about 29 tons of important bits missing. With my luck, that would have included the engine, generator, traction motors.........

B 67 · Posted: Thu Apr 07, 2005 8:44 pm

18A · Posted: Sat Apr 16, 2005 9:04 pm

See also
http://www.railpage.com.au/modules.php?&name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=11301286
http://www.railpage.com.au/modules.php?&name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=11301294
for how to get a 20% warning

Dreams are like rainbows, Only idiots chase them

"Are you the police? No Ma’am, we're musicians"

B 67 · Posted: Sat Apr 16, 2005 9:56 pm

I'd already seen those threads. Very Happy

For anyone else still considering running on closed lines, take a close look at the front outrigger wheel in the photo of me on the trolley 6 posts back. You will notice the wheel is at an angle. This happened whilst running through the overgrown Nowa Nowa yard. The trolley derailed on an out of gauge point and forced the front wheels between the rails. It also brought us to an abrupt halt. If the trolley had been travelling much faster there may have been some injuries. Fortunately we were doing about walking pace as the track was known to be poor - plus we could not see the rails for the weeds. The trolley was well and truely wedged between the rails and it took 3 of us a lot of effort to free it.
As stated before, the owner of the trolley was a railway employee and did have permission to be there.

B 67

michaelgreenhill · Posted: Sat Apr 16, 2005 11:01 pm

trainfreak · Posted: Sun Apr 17, 2005 7:40 pm

What year was this line ripped up? Also, if there was a accredited driver driving the trolley with the relevent authority permission on a 'closed' or out of service line with permission from the relavent authoritys, would it be legal or not?

Owen
Railpage Australia™ Admin
Rules for Posting | Help for Beginners | FAQ | Helpdesk

moderators@railpage.com.au

B 67 · Posted: Sun Apr 17, 2005 11:29 pm