Don Area railway history 1854 - 1963
In about 1854 a mill and wharf were built on the
west bank of the River Don about 2 km upstream from the Don Heads.
To get the timber out of the bush a tramway was built up the valley and
from 1862 the line also served a small coal mine, situated about 3 km
above the mill.
This tramway was replaced in 1873 when the Don
River Company started to build a new line of 4'6” (approx. 1137 mm)
from the wharf, just inside the Don Heads, along the west bank of the
river and up the valley. By May 1879 the tramway was completed to
Barrington a distance of 21 km from Don Heads.
As timber was removed pioneer farmers settled in
the region and in 1873 a portable steam engine worked the railway.
However, in 1884 the line was worked entirely by horses although 11 of
the 21 kilometres were then laid with iron rails. Timber supplies
diminished and in the late 1880's the tramway was abandoned.
In 1904, a royal commission considered the Don
Valley as a route for a branch to the Sheffield district but decided in
favour of a shorter line from Railton to Roland.
The Don would probably never have seen another railway if Broken
Hill Proprietary had not decided to work the large limestone deposits
about 10 kilometres up the valley.
As the company planned to take a very large
quantity of Limestone to supply its Newcastle steelworks with flux a
railway was necessary to bring it down to Devonport and the government
agreed to build a branch to the quarry site near the village of Melrose.
Settler’s Further up the valley successfully asked
for the line to be extended to Paloona, a more convenient point for
landing produce. The public works department began work in 1915.The new
line kept to the east bank of the Don the whole way Melrose unlike the
old tramway, which crossed and re-crossed the river several times.
Beyond Melrose, however the old formation was followed to Paloona.The
line was opened on 27-5-1916. Traffic from the quarries developed far
beyond original expectations and reached a peak of 161,135 tons in 1926
- 1927, requiring the running of three or four trains from Devonport to
Melrose and back each week day.Passenger and general goods traffic
however were very light.
Between August 1922 and September 1923 the P.W.D.
extended the line to Barrington but this section was uneconomic and was
closed on 17-8-1928.Regular services on the Melrose Paloona section
appear to have ceased about this time and the section was officially
closed on 16-7-1935.
Limestone traffic declined during the depression
and increased to a peak of 279161 tons in 1937-1938.Thereafter, it
gradually declined and in 1947 B.H.P gave up taking stone from the
quarries altogether. The line remained open for local traffic in
agricultural lime but by 1957 there were only three trips per
week.
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From 1955 the branch became even more uneconomic
and complete closure took place in 1963. A year later the track was
lifted between Melrose and Don Township crossing before the rebuilding
of the Bass Highway. The remaining 3.5 km.of line back to Don Junction
was left in place but became increasingly overgrown and derelict.
Based on an article by Mr. H.J.W. Stokes.
