THE PORT WELSHPOOL HORSE TRAM
by
David Hennell
RRP $2.50
(ISSN 0813-6327)
Print Publication No.: 349069/00070
April, 1999 Issue No. 181 (Vol. 16 No. 4)
THE PORT WELSHPOOL HORSE TRAM
by
David Hennell
Shown above is page 69 of Victorian Railways circular W.T.T. 100/40 commencing 22nd May 1940 which shows one of the last timetables for the Welshpool – Port Welshpool 2’ 6" (762mm) horse line which closed on 1st January 1941.
When thinking about break of gauge in Victoria, we often overlook Welshpool on the South East line. The Welshpool - Port Welshpool 2' 6" (762 mm) horse line closed on 1st January 1941 and was the first of the five Victorian narrow gauge lines to close. As an Australian horse line, it was survived by the 3' 6" (1067 mm) Port Broughton - Mundoora and the 5' 3" (1600 mm) Victor Harbour - Granite Island horse tramways of the South Australian Railways.
This article deals with the last couple of years of operation of the line.
Illustration June 1938 public t/t
The service in paragraph form (see illustration above) is taken from the June 1938 Victorian Railways public timetable where it is shown as a footnote to the Melbourne - Yarram - Woodside - Port Albert table and shows 7 trips each way per week. Note that 'Daily' means Monday to Saturday in timetables of the period. Only the 12.45 pm ex Welshpool daily and the 8.30 am ex Welshpool Saturday connected with passenger trains (ex Melbourne and Yarram respectively), although the 10.00 am ex Port Welshpool Saturday made a 2¼ hour connection to Yarram. The 2.20 pm ex Port Welshpool would have connected with a goods train to Melbourne for fish traffic, the reason for the line's existence.
One of the last timetables for this line (see illustration on cover p.1) was shown in circular W.T.T. 100/40 entitled Country Train Services - to quote "Commencing on Wednesday, 22nd May [1940] the schedules set out herein embody the FULL Passenger, Rail Motor, Mixed and Car-Goods train services on the various lines on and after this date until further notice. Alterations to the Goods train services are also shown.", to which we should add horse trams.
This timetable refers to Port Welshpool only in the heading for the table - it is referred to as Jetty in the body of the table.
The service shows 8 trams each way per week
but no Saturday service. Note that the loaded trams were allowed 10 minutes
longer for the 3¼ mile trip. The circular includes many (all?) goods
services to Yarram and the connections that are made by the trams are interesting:-
|
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Connection(s) |
| 11.15 am down
1.10 pm down 2.45 pm down 12.20 pm up 2.00 pm up 3.30 pm up |
- nil -
pass. ex Melbourne pass. ex Melbourne; mixed ex Yarram mixed to Melbourne; mixed to Yarram goods to Melbourne; goods to Yarram - nil - |
The service indicates that the stables were at Welshpool.
Dear members and friends,
A temporary change: As indicated in the From the Editor section last month (The Times No. 180, March 1999 p. 3) my personal circumstances have recently changed which has now left me with less time to prepare The Times. To meet the situation this issue does not have any letters to the editor and concentrates on publishing articles that have been ready for some time. This will enable me to use a number of these articles and to save some time producing this issue. As I have previously stated if someone has spare time and would like to edit a timetable journal I’m only a phone call or email message away!
Yours in the cause of happy timetable collecting,
Graham Duffin.
Editor, The Times.
VICTORIA IN 1932: THE NOT SO GOOD OLD DAYS by Victor Isaacs
We often hear and read how good train travel was in the "Good Old Days". This is based on the wonderfully comprehensive railway networks that used to exist, including branches to some unlikely places. However I contend that for many passengers travel by train was not good. I do not consider the level of comfort – or lack of it – provided by the carriages, but I consider the level of services as indicated in the timetables.
While Victoria was blessed by a large number of branchlines covering all populated areas, the level of service on the mainlines connecting the main cities would have been of more concern to most passengers. It was a very basic service indeed.
Look at these examples from the Victorian Railways country public timetable of 7 November 1932.
The service between Victoria’s two biggest cities, Geelong and Melbourne was basic. For example, (please refer to Table 39 shown on page 5), there were only nine daily trains compared to 25 today. On most days the earliest arrival in Melbourne was not until 9.22 am (now 6.28 am). There was no departure from Geelong between 9.50 am and 12.20 pm (now two). This was, it should be recalled, just when bus operators were at their most aggressive, enterprising and innovative. No wonder, railways received a poor reputation.
A look at other Victorian mainlines from the same timetable shows the same trend. On the Ballarat line (please refer to Table 25 on page 6) just three trains conveyed passengers to Ballarat. Now there are ten trains and two buses. On the Bendigo line (please refer to Table 1 below) there were three trains. There are now nine trains to Bendigo. The service on the Gippsland line (please refer to Table 75 on page 7) makes a mockery of the term "mainline" – just three departures (now thirteen trains) – one of the "Daily" trains indicated by a "G" at Dandenong being a "Goods train with passenger accommodation attached".
To return to the Geelong line, a few other comments can be made. It seems to be presented very strangely. At this period, the VR was so committed to the "Read Up, Read Down" mode of timetable presentation that they even used it when the whole table was big enough to fill a page and thus had to be "read Up". The word "Daily" in the timetables did not mean daily, but Mondays to Saturdays. The comment at the foot of the page (see Table 39 which is shown on page 5) ‘THE "FLIER" STOPS AT BIRREGURRA’ is meaningless. In the down direction the Flier was extended as the stopping train to Warrnambool, but in the up direction it originated at Geelong, i.e. didn’t go through Birregurra. I’m not sure of the significance of Birregurra anyway – perhaps "Road Motors" connected there for the coastal resort of Lorne.
It does have to be conceded that soon after 1932 the Victorian Railways made huge improvements to their services under the leadership of the great railwayman Sir Harold Clapp. Sadly, these improvements were soon brought to an end by the total war situation that prevailed after Pearl Harbour in 1941. Victoria was not to obtain satisfactory mainline train services until the great reforms in country train operation of 1981.
AN ERIE RAILROAD FERRY TIMETABLE! by Tom Greco
In the pre mega-merger `old days’ the only railroads which actually entered New York City from points west were the New York Central and the Pennsylvania Railroads. Through the Pennsy’s largesse (and because PRR owned a large block of its stock!) the Lehigh Valley Railroad’s trains also operated into Pennsylvania Station, but all the others terminated at various New Jersey points, more or less across the Hudson River from downtown New York. These outsiders served New York via ferry connections (see map on page 11).
Illustration of Erie Railroad Ferry t/t May 29, 1915
Illustration of Erie Railroad Ferry t/t May 29, 1915
The Erie, in addition to its long-distance service to Buffalo, Cleveland and Chicago, operated a comprehensive commuter service in northern New Jersey. So there was a steady flow of Erie passengers wishing to cross the Hudson River. The Erie’s New Jersey City station was on the west shore of the Hudson at the foot of Pavonia Street and two ferry services operated from there to Manhattan.
The Chambers Street ferry was by far the busier. A passenger disembarking at the foot of Chambers Street would be close to the financial district around Wall Street. My employees timetable (or working timetable), issued by the Erie Railroad Marine Department and effective from 12.01am, Saturday 29 May, 1915, (shown on pages 8 & 9) details 103 weekday trips to New York with 108 trips returning. This seeming imbalance was created by the scheduling of several `Saturday only’ trips from New York to Jersey City. At that time Saturday was still half a day of work, and these midday trips were scheduled at `quitting time’.
The other ferry service operated from Jersey City to West 23rd Street, close to Pennsylvania Station and the New York downtown area. I was surprised to find only 58 weekday round trips scheduled to what I would have guessed would have been a busier part of town. And there were no ‘Saturday only’ trips.
As expected, schedules were reduced significantly on Sundays. 81 trips left Jersey City for Chambers Street with 80 returning. The West 23rd Street ferry operated 37 round trips.
The timetable shows only departure times from Jersey City and the two New York terminals. But some helpful information has been inked into the upper margin by the original owner. This shows the running time between Jersey City and Chambers Street was 7 minutes, while a trip on the 23rd Street Ferry took 15 minutes. Distances measured on my American Automobile Association map of New York City show the Chambers Street run to have been about a mile and the other approximately 1.75 miles.
This timetable is a single sheet, 11x17 inches printed only on one side. Trips that provided connections to or from scheduled trains are shown in "heavy face type". As with all my old timetables, I like to speculate about the person to whom it was originally issued. After 84 years, it’s getting a bit fragile, as it was folded in half, then in thirds by the railroader or mariner who undoubtedly carried it in a pocket of his overalls or uniform jacket. When folded this way, it is possible to read the back of the timetable which has written in the owner’s handwriting - Erie R.R. Ferry Timetable and Ferry Timetable No 8 Erie R.R..
It would be interesting to learn more about the history of this ferry operation, as my collection provides only a very basic picture. In the September, 1898, issue of the Official Guide, both the West 23rd Street and Chambers Street ferries are shown. That’s my earliest reference. Both services are still shown in the July, 1939, Guide. (Please see page 12 for the timetable dated September 29, 1929 and map from the Official Guide). However, my August, 1945 issue of the Official Guide mentions only the Chambers Street Ferry, but shows bus services between Jersey City and several downtown New York points.
The last reference I have to the Chambers Street Ferry is the March, 1956 Official Guide. My next issue, dated August 1957, neither mentions the ferry nor lists Jersey City. By that time – doubtless in preparation for the long-planned Erie-Lackawanna merger of 1960 – the Erie had moved in with the Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad at the latter’s Hoboken terminal, where the Barclay Street Ferry would land you on the east side of the Hudson.
Illustration of Erie Railroad Ferry t/t Sept 29, 1929 plus map.
Services provided by Forest Coach Lines have expanded in the past decade. Originally designated route 56 and feeding the "Forest" area of NE Sydney (Forestville, Frenchs Forest, Belrose) from Chatswood station on the North Shore (Hornsby) line, Forest Coach Lines have started other routes. The most significant and successful of these was the implementation of a City service from Belrose in July 1992 (some services are also provided from Terrey Hills and Killarney Heights).
The main current services operated by Forest Coach Lines (please see route map on page 14), with the new route numbering system, which was implemented in July 1992, are:
City Services (Mon - Fri):
The Route 270 City Service
With the commencement of four peak-hour services from the Belrose area
in July 1992 (see timetable on page 15), the service has rapidly
expanded as shown in the table below. Also with the issue of the October
1998 timetable (shown at the bottom of pages 14 & 15), there
is now at least an hourly day-time (non-peak) Belrose service to and from
the City Monday to Friday. With the popularity of the week-day City service,
patronage of the corresponding Chatswood services, particularly during
the peak period, appears to have fallen substantially.
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* Morning Peak: 06:00 - 09:00
** Evening Peak: 16:00 -19:00
QVB: Queen Victoria Building
Shown above is a map of the main current bus routes operated in
the Warringah area by Forest Coach Lines.
Above is the current Forest Coach Lines City inbound timetable for
Route 270 dated 28th October, 1998.
Shown above is the first Route 270 timetable dated 27th July, 1992
Above is the current Forest Coach Lines City outbound timetable for Route 270 dated 28th October, 1998.
This month, Graphic Insight takes a look at the number of railway stations served by each of Australia's major passenger railway operators. The data is taken from the public timetables published by each railway operator current as at March 1999.
The graph shows for each railway operator the number of different stations served by that operator. A station is counted once only irrespective of the number of trains stopping each week. The operators are arranged in descending sequence so that their relative significance is more easily seen.
Not surprisingly, Cityrail (Sydney and environs) serves more stations than any other operator. The very large geographic area served by Cityrail (encompassing Nowra, Goulburn, Lithgow, Scone and Dungog) contributes to its top ranking.
The recent splitting of Melbourne's "Met" trains into Hillside and Bayside trains has promoted Queensland Rail to second position. Interestingly, even if Hillside and Bayside were re-amalgamated this would not surpass QR (remembering that stations served by both Hillside and Bayside are counted against each operator so it is not accurate to simply add the two numbers together). However, if the trading arms of QR were to be considered separately (i.e. Traveltrain and CityTrain) it would be a different story.
The fragmentation of Victoria's country services into Hoys, West Coast
Rail and V/line similarly relegates those operators below TransAdelaide
and Countrylink.
