Re: Old Millewa South Loco

["Gavin Potter" <gavpot@ozemail.com.au>]

Eddie Oliver <eoliver@efs.mq.edu.au> wrote in message
37CBE698.C9D2805F@efs.mq.edu.au">news:37CBE698.C9D2805F@efs.mq.edu.au...
: Not re the loco, but the line generally:
:
: Congratulations to Gavin on his web page.
:
: What is left there now? In particular, does the road (adjacent to the
: line in the photos) still exist?

The last time I was down that way would have been around 1990/91. The road
was still there and parts of the rail line had been covered with moving
sands and other parts ripped up by persons unkown. The rail line around the
mining area had been removed and the mining buildings were becoming fairly
deralict.

: Why was the line labelled originally as "towards Millewa South"? What
: was/is at Millewa South (or Millewa North or Millewa)?

The line was originally planned to be built to a location in the middle of
no-where called Millewa South.  Millewa South as such does not exist. If you
want a land mark, then rocket lake which is a giant sand dune surrounded
depression would be the closest place. Rocket Lake is marked on some maps
and I have photo's of it. The line was originally planned as part of a
soldier settlement program after the first world war. The idea being that
they would settle and clear the area with returned diggers on 50 acre
alotments. This is basically how the Meringur/Morkella line came into being.
Construction was started on the line with the earth works being completed
about three quarters of the way. I don't know when rail laying began and I
don't know why the earth works weren't completed the whole way. More than
likely the money was never allocated for the job and the returned diggers
were haveing a fairly hard time of it around the Meringur area. All I do
know is that it only ever ran to about 100 yards past the mining area.
:
: Eddie Oliver

------------------------------------------------------
Gavin Potter.
e-mail:
(home)  gavpot@ozemail.com.au
(work)   gavin.potter@agric.nsw.gov.au
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"Planning without action is futile. Action without planning
is fatal."  -Alan Speigel.