Rail wagons off the Ross-Ruatapu railway (now the West Coast Wilderness Cycleway)

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DescriptionA few days ago my wife & I rode the bike trail from Ross to Ruatapu. We noticed a collection of rusting railway wagons and a few wooden coal-wagons that had been tipped over the bank a couple of hundred netres north of the Totara River bridge. Presumably as embankment protection. We didn’t see any old locomotives among the wreckage. Was this done as a dumping exercise when the line closed … or was it an earlier protection project ?Map^[1]ContributorRob Elwood

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CommentsTed Brennan
They are old ballast wagons used to lay the material the lines were placed on .. but ended life as river protection

David Maciulaitis
Ted Brennan They're old Q type wagons, were used for carrying coal.

Alec Birch
Not uncommon. Usually done as low cost embankment protection with the dual purpose of getting rid of end of life assets. Was some real ancient wagons at the north end of the old Arahura bridge.

Ashton McGill
Cant speak for that site specifically but they were used at end of life as a structural component in many instances. In my current role we still use old railway bogies as anchor blocks for nagivation buoys.

Lindsay Thompson
Biked that route before it was a bike trail. Knarly at the rail bridges.

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Rail wagons off the Ross-Ruatapu railway (now the West Coast Wilderness Cycleway)