Hi folks, in this video we're going to take a quick break from Australian content and head
across the Tasman, to Aotearoa/New Zealand. At the southern end of the North Island is the beautiful
city of Wellington, which features a really remarkable suburban railway network.
There are lots of things that make this system unusual, and I'm going to chat about those things in a moment,
as well as highlighting some of the interesting geographic and scenic features of the network.
But firstly, there's one thing about Wellington that really stands out as far as rail transport is concerned.
In the western world in general, it's usually considered a given that only large,
heavily populated cities deserve serious, heavy-rail passenger transport systems.
Despite being the nation's capital, Wellington is.. tiny. If you google the population, you'll get a remarkably
small figure of just over 200,000 – however that's actually just for the inner suburban area,
and if you include the greater metropolitan area served by suburban trains which I'm going to
discuss here, the figure is closer to 500,000. But either way it's not a big place, and to put
it in perspective the inner city area is quite comparable in size to somewhere like Hobart,
Geelong or Woolongong. Oh and I'm just going to apologise in advance to my Kiwi friends if
I mispronounce any place names, because I'm sure that I will. Before we look at the actual lines,
it's worth taking a quick look at the geography of the area, because that is what has really
made this city perfectly suited to good rail transport. The CBD is located on the western edge
of Wellington Harbour. The surrounding area is quite mountainous, and you can clearly see on the
satellite imagery how the suburban development has essentially spread in two long corridors, filling
the low altitude areas between the mountains. This means that with just two main lines,
a really high percentage of Wellingtonians live in close proximity to a suburban railway station.
As a side effect, there are also some really beautiful and isolated feeling places close
to the city, because the suburban development tends to skip any patch of really steep terrain.
Ok so let's look at the basic form of the network. Like all railways in New Zealand,
the trains operate on 1067mm (3'6”) narrow gauge. The suburban area is electrified at 1500v DC, the same as Melbourne and Sydney.
In a slightly unusual arrangement,
suburban trains, busses and ferries are managed by the Greater Wellington Regional Council under
the trading name Metlink – no, not that Metlink. Although under that umbrella the services are
still operated by private franchises. All trains operate out of Wellington station,
which is a big 9 platform terminus at the northern end of the CBD. The network consists
of four electrified lines, two very long ones that follow the two main suburban corridors',
and two short lines that branch off close to the city. For the most part these lines are served
by a comprehensive timetable starting early in the morning and running late into the night,
with good frequencies and peak hour express trains – just like you'd expect in a big city.
Diesel commuter trains also continue some distance beyond the wires on the two main lines.
The Kapiti line is interesting in that it connects several patches of disconnected suburbia to the
north of the city, rather than travelling though continuous suburbs. This is the southern part of
the North Island Main Trunk, the main line which ultimately leads all the way up to Auckland.
Because of this, suburban trains share this line with fairly regular freight trains, as well as the
Northern Explorer – the long distance passenger train that connects Wellington with Auckland.
Shortly after leaving Wellington, the line climbs a ramp and plunges into the hillside,
entering Tunnel No.1. Tunnel 1 is just over 1.2km long, after which trains emerge for a quick 250m
of fresh air before entering the epic tunnel No.2, coming in at a little over 4.3km.
As far as I'm aware this is the longest double track railway tunnel in the Southern Hemisphere by quite a large
margin, not including urban underground commuter lines of course. These tunnels are part of the
Tawa Flat deviation, which I will talk more about in a minute. Beyond the tunnels we reach the first
station - Takapu Road – having already travelled about 12km from the city. The line then continues
along a valley to Porirua, then runs along the edge of the very scenic Porirua Harbour.
The bridge at Paremata is the only place I've managed to photograph a dolphin with a suburban train. So Far.
Continuing north, the line winds gently through open countryside, climbing to Pukerua Bay.
This is where the double track ends, and the line then makes a very steep, and very scenic
descent along the edge of the escarpment down to sea level at Paekakariki. There's a magnificent
walking track above the railway along this section with spectacular views out to Kapiti Island.
Just, don't fall off. From Paekak' the line follows a less thrilling alignment to Waikanae,
the terminus of electric operation. From there a peak-only diesel hauled train known as the Capital Connection
operates as far as Palmerston North. This train operates with a single set of cars,
with just one return trip each weekday. This train is obviously aimed entirely at 9-5 city workers,
and is operated by Kiwirail rather than Metlink – in fact it doesn't seem to even get a mention on the Metlink website.
The other main line is the Hutt Valley line, which initially skirts
the edge of Wellington Harbour for about seven and a half kilometres out to Petone.
The line is very close to sea level, and in rough weather it's not uncommon for trains to
experience pretty heavy spray from the nearby waves. The line then follows the Hutt River,
crossing it several times, through fairly dense suburbia to Upper Hutt where the electrification ends.
Beyond there is the Wairarapa line, which dives through the Remutaka range in the 8.9km long
Remutaka tunnel. This was built in 1955, bypassing the former steep winding route over the top of the
mountain with grades as steep as 1 in 15, assisted by a Fell rail system. Once through the tunnel the
line continues more sedately though a number of small rural townships before reaching the terminus
at Masterton. Unlike the peak-only Capital Connection, the Wairarapa timetable features
three peak direction trains, plus a few others scattered throughout off-peak times and weekends,
and seems to be a very popular service. Back close to the city, the Johnsonville line is extremely
scenic, winding up into the hills immediately out of Wellington. It's single track for its
entire length, and travels through dense leafy suburbia. The main scenic feature is the climb
through the Ngaio Gorge, which feels quite remote despite being just a few minutes from the city.
There's a nice walking track along the gorge, which provides many places to photograph trains
clinging to the forested hillside. This was actually the original main line out of the city,
which was bypassed in 1937 by the construction of the Tawa Flat deviation which I mentioned earlier.
Most of the original alignment was fortunately retained for this local service, which is a great transport asset today.
The final line is the Melling line, which is a short two
station branch off the Hutt Valley line from Petone. The Melling line only operates roughly
between 6am and 6pm on Weekdays, with a sparse off-peak frequency and nothing on weekends.
It doesn't really have any interesting features, and it's also the only Wellington line I haven't
travelled on or photographed, so I don't really have anything else to say about it.. Sorry Melling.
However it does have essentially the same origins story as the Johnsonville line
it was originally part of the main alignment up the Hutt Valley, but was made
redundant after a major deviation, again being smartly retained for the purpose of local trains.
Speaking of trains, let's take a look at them – When the network was first electrified in the late
1930s, services were operated by a mix of electric locomotive hauled trains, and Electric Multiple Units.
The EMUs were these distinctive looking steel-bodied cars ordered from English Electric,
and amazingly some remained in service until 2012. For electric traction enthusiasts these
were awesome trains to travel on, with growling DC traction motors. In their later years of service,
the English Electric sets were split into two groups – one group was captive on the Johnsonville line,
and these were all two car sets with a Motor Car at the Wellington end and a Driving Trailer at
the Johnsonville end. The second group were used for peak services only on the Hutt Valley line.
These were three car sets, consisting of a cabless Motor Car, sandwiched by a pair of Driving Trailers.
In the 1980s a new fleet of EMUs was ordered from Hungarian manufacturer Ganz Mavag.
These trains were all in fixed two-car sets, comprised of a Motor Car at the Wellington end,
and a Driving Trailer at the suburban end just like the two-car English Electrics.
I quite liked the Ganz sets, and thought they were very nice to travel on, with a real 80s feel.
At the end of 2010 a brand new fleet of trains began entering service to sadly replace the
now-ancient English Electric sets. These trains were built in South Korea by Hyundai-Rotem,
and named 'Matangi' trains, which means wind – something Wellington trains experience a lot of!
I was quite impressed by the Matangis, and you can tell they were a highly customised design,
achieving a distinctly Wellington look. They still have that distinctive
New Zealand Railways 'barrel' shape, and to me they have a real functional and rugged look,
with the exposed MU cables, brake pipes and handrails. They were originally delivered
with conventional knuckle couplings – hence all the exposed cables – but the later series
sets were delivered with Scharfenbergs, and the earlier ones were later retrofitted.
Continuing the tradition of earlier trains, the Matangis are also marshalled as two car
Motor-Driving Trailer pairs, except, flipped around with the Motor at the suburban end.
The original plan was to refurbish the Ganz Mavag fleet and get a few more years of service
out of them, and a single set was upgraded as a prototype. It looked really, really, nice..
but ultimately the decision was made that it would be more economical to just replace them,
and the Matangi order was extended – they are now the only type of EMU in Wellington,
which does make things a bit more boring for enthusiasts. The prototype refurb Ganz set was
saved from the scrappers, and is now in storage at the Ferrymead Heritage Park in Christchurch.
A conventional Ganz set has also been set aside for preservation in Wellington by the Wellington Heritage Multiple Unit Trust.
The two diesel operated routes use trains comprised
of heavily refurbished second hand British Rail Mk11 passenger cars, usually hauled by a DF class locomotive.
This is a good demonstration of just how tiny trains are in the UK,
that these cars fit the rather tight loading gauge on New Zealand's narrow gauge network.
Jumping back briefly, in the late 2000s before the arrival of the Matangi sets, the network was
really desperate for rollingstock, and when I first visited in 2010 they were using some very
creative solutions to fill those gaps. A trio of 1970s built Eo class locomotives from the
South Island Otira tunnel electrification were reactivated, and used to run peak hour suburban
trains – top and tailing a set of the ex-British cars. Three previously withdrawn English Electric
sets were also returned to service in the historic red livery – although they received yellow fronts
to meet modern visibility requirements. These consisted of a three car set named 'Cyclops,'
so named because it still had the original single headlight – and a pair of two cars sets,
one named 'Phoenix' which had been retrieved from storage at Hutt Workshops, and another known as
'Red Robin' which had been preserved at Ferrymead. During my visit they were all running together
as a seven car set on the Hutt Valley line, although sadly I didn't get a chance to ride it.
All three sets were preserved once no longer required, with Phoenix accompanying Red Robin
back to Ferrymead, and Cyclops going to the Wellington Heritage Multiple Unit Trust.
Jumping back to the map now, there is one remaining significant area of Wellington that
isn't served by the rail network. Wellington station is really on the northern outskirts of
the CBD, then there's this whole area to the south of the city – including the airport – which isn't served.
The conspicuous absence of a railway line in this area is for the same reason that
Sydney has large conspicuous unserved areas – that is, it used to be served by trams.
Sadly, Wellington made the same mistake as Sydney and most other English speaking cities and closed
its tram network in the 50s and 60s. In an ideal world, I'd suggest building a new railway line
that drops down from the existing main station, build an underground station more centrally under
the CBD, then swing around to the airport and maybe terminate out on this peninsular.
But then again, let's remember this isn't actually a very big place, and the area is served by a
pretty comprehensive bus network. But you know, if this was Transport Tycoon I'd definitely build it.
So there you go, if someone ever tells you a small city can't have a good heavy rail suburban system,
point them at Wellington. If you want to learn everything else there is to know about
this lovely network, I suggest getting a copy of 'Wellington's Railways' by David Parsons, although
from a quick search it looks like it might be hard to come by these days. Incidentally that's
my picture of Wellington Station on the front, which was the first time one of my photographs
appeared on a proper book cover. So there's a fun fact for you. Anyway, thanks for watching!