The West Coast Heritage Railway at Last!

The train chugs into the station*  It's a shame you can't hear the sound

*Apologies for poor images too. This is a screen shot from a small video that I couldn't upload. Others are a bit blurry because of the vibration of the train

I love the smell of railway stations in the morning, especially when it's accompanied by the hiss of steam and a whiff of coal dust. Today it’s my turn on the West Coast Heritage Railway. Even though the destination is known and not that far, there is still that sense of anticipation -of an unknown adventure waiting -and of comings and goings.  Not relishing the idea of expired milk in my coffee, I had come early to have breakfast at the Tracks Café at the station. The coffee was excellent and not over -priced, the croissant with butter and jam was just right and the big fire was a bonus.  

Great care has been taken with the station's restoration. Local rainforest timber has been used throughout - from the elaborate ticket office and the café to the attached museum and gift shop. On the platform I run into two of the ladies I met in the Op -shop. Others mill about waiting to see if there are any No -shows, hoping they can still buy a ticket. You are advised to book six to eight weeks ahead to make sure of a seat. Given that there was a run the day before and it’s almost winter this train is still busy but not packed.

The train puffs slowly into the station and it sits, pulsating and throbbing like a living thing. The carriages gleam. Its windows sparkle. While waiting to board, I sneak a quick look inside the First Class carriage, where refreshments are included in the higher ticket price. The timber interior is bathed in the warm amber glow of the carriage lights and there’s a little bar in one corner. The upholstery may be a bit plusher than in ours – I didn’t test it, but otherwise the décor is the same. It’s warm and comfortable and should you feel the slightest chill, there are woollen blankets at the ready in the luggage racks above. Then the whistle blows and we roll slowly out of the station.

Interior of the First Class carriage looks much the same as ours except for the bar

How the West Was Won, Tasmania’s West that is

As we rumble through the outskirts of town, Lily, our uniformed guide, tells us a bit about the history of the place, about how Cornelius Lynch found a cricket ball -sized gold bearing nugget near the junction of the King and Queen Rivers while looking for gold and exploitable stands of Huon Pine - that most favoured timber for ship building. In time, much richer finds were discovered further up the Queen River between Mt. Lyell and Mt. Owen in what was later to become the “Iron Blow” -one of the richest copper mines in Australia. 

Lily tells some of the stories and explains how the train mechanism works. Note the beautiful woodwork  

 
In 1893, noticing the abundance of copper,  Anthony Edwin Bowes – Kelly together with partners from Broken Hill Proprietary Limited (BHP as it is known, long one of Australia’s largest companies and now a global mining giant), quietly bought up leases and called the new company The Mount Lyell Mining and Railway Company. His timing couldn’t have been better. The late 19th century saw an enormous surge in copper demand driven almost entirely by electrification. Vast quantities of copper were needed for the rollout of electric lighting, electric trams, industrial machinery, the telephone and even the telegraph which now connected continents. [For the story of what happened to Bowes -Kelly’s arch rival, James Crotty, click here]. 

Despite the great riches to be found – copper, silver and gold, there was no easy way to transport them to Strahan where ships could take them to the wider world. A train line was the usual choice for mines on the West Coast, but the terrain here was so harsh and had grades as steep as 1:16, that ordinary trains would not be able to negotiate them. This led to the adoption of the newly developed rack rail system designed by Swiss engineer, Carl Roman Abt in 1882, which involved a third rail on the steepest sections which locked into pinion wheels on the underside of the carriages.  It had only been used once before and that was in Germany’s Harz Mountains. 

The first section of the train, from Queenstown to Teepookana opened in 1896 and the second part through to Regatta Point at Strahan, in Macquarie Harbour  in 1898, though the official opening was delayed until the following year when the Marion Sticht, the newly minted wife of mine manager and metallurgist, Robert Sticht, was there to hammer in the final dog spike.

Bowes -Kelly was also concerned about the welfare of his workers, so in 1897 he organised the first picnic train to the King River, later to be followed by an annual visit to the seaside at Strahan. Nor were these Bowes -Kelly’s only innovations.

Power to the People 

To run its giant crushers and smelters, the company badly needed energy, but with no coal at hand and timber fast diminishing, Bowes -Kelly had the Lake Margaret Power Station built in 1914, becoming the third of its kind in Tasmania.  Electrification began in 1883 when the Mount Bischoff Mine at Waratah, also on the West Coast, put a Pelton wheel on its small waterfall to power its crushers. The City of Launceston was next in 1895, using electricity from its newly built power station at Duck Reach to light up its streets. Not to be outdone, Waratah added a power station in 1906 to serve the whole township and not just the mine.  When Lake Margaret came on stream in 1914, every one of Queenstown's modest worker’s cottages had hydro -electricity and long before most people in Tasmania did. Lake Margaret continues to operate to this day. 

Lynchford  

After a pleasant trundle through the rainforest with dramatic scenery on either side, the train stops at Lynchford where the original workings were. There is great excitement as people rush to the panning tables to try their luck. Three are lucky enough to find a bit of ‘colour.‘ Others wander the green expanse to explore the mine shaft with its primitive ore truck, or just to stretch their legs. Meanwhile, the train gulps 3000 litres water at the moss -covered tank in preparation for the next leg. We are now on our way to Rhinadeena and this is one of the rack and pinion sections.  

Sorry kids. I did ask Mum and Dad for permission to take a photo, but forgot to get your names. Hope you found something

The Train is a thirsty beast, taking on 3000 litres of water at this tank

Ore truck and a drive at Lynchford - note how low the ceiling is and imagine working here in incessant rain and mud without a washing machine and a dryer nearby

A better shot of the train at Lynchford

Back on board Lily explains the Abt mechanism as we trundle along. It doesn’t feel that steep, but we pass at least one deep gorge. There are 48 bridges along this route which are being progressively restored, with about 23 still to go and it's the reason why we can’t go all the way through to Strahan. In the meantime, there is another train from there to Dubbil Barril, a stop just short of the second and much longer rack and pinion section on the other side of Rhinadeena.  

Here's a glimpse of the third rail at the top of the hill at Rhinadeena which I learned today means rain in the original Aboriginal language. Note the people on the footbridge above watching the train backing in and out

Rhinadeena has a small station with amenities just like the one at Lynchford, but also boasts a little café and a chocolate tasting – tiny portions of Federation chocolate with Tasmanian flavours such as white chocolate with pepperberry. Here too, there is a mine to explore. Neither this one nor the one at Lynchford go very far, but they will give those who've never had to work underground with picks and shovels in the eternal wet, an idea of what back breaking work it must have been.

Cosy café at the end of the line (for now)

... And Tassie Chocolate Tasting too

A final check before we depart

Back on the train, Lily tells the story of the great mine fire in 1912 at the 700 feet(210 metre) level in which the Abt railway also played part. Because would -be rescuers were repeatedly overcome by carbon monoxide fumes, breathing apparatus was hastily sent along with rescuers from the Bendigo goldmines in Victoria to keep the remaining miners alive until they could be rescued. 

After the steamship S.S. Loongana made its 13 hour 35 minute record –breaking dash across Bass Strait to Burnie, the Emu Bay Railway rushed them to Zeehan at speeds not yet equalled. Next the Zeehan -Strahan Line dispatched them to Strahan and the Abt railway carried them onward to Queenstown, much faster than it should have. Although 42 miners lost their lives, another 100 were finally rescued in an operation which took several days. Questions remain about the cause of the accident, with the company blaming faulty equipment and a prominent union member for starting the fire but a Royal Commission returning an open finding. It also brought occupational health and safety into sharp focus and galvanised an emerging union movement. 

We also hear the stories of the various engines.  Number 2  for example, went down with the steamship  S.S. Grafton at the treacherous Hell’s Gates* at the entrance to Macquarie Harbour. The Mount Lyell Mining and Railway Company retrieved the wreck and restored and assembled the engine which served the line faithfully from 1899 until  its closure in 1963. After a stint in the Tasmanian Transport Museum it was again refurbished and returned to passenger service in 2024. Today it is one of the two engines at each end of the train. By all accounts, all the engines had distinctive  personalities, with temperamental Number 4, being left to rot ignominiously at the bottom of a gully. 

I was musing later with Claude AI, my late night companion, about how fortunate it was that there were volunteers like those at the Tasmanian Transport Museum, at the Zeehan Museum and in Tullah, who had kept these wonderful machines going in the meantime, even when their immediate purpose was not immediately clear, so they could now have second lives.  

*Initially Hell's Gates was so named, not because of all the shipwrecks, but because even by convict standards it was regarded as the most brutal and isolated place on earth. The shipwrecks came later. 

The Beginning of the End  and New Beginnings

Until 1932, when the Lyell Highway was pushed through from Hobart to Queenstown, the Abt Railway provided the only connection to the outside world, but by the 1960s maintaining the railway lines became too costly and there many more private cars. In the 1960s the Murchison Highway was extended from Burnie on the North West coast to Queenstown and by 1963, the faithful Abt railway was shut down. Queenstown’s fortunes also began to change. 

The closure of the railway, followed by closure of its smelter in 1969, led to continued decline of the workforce. There was a brief rally during the dam -building era in the 1980s, but in 1994 the Mt. Lyell Mine itself closed. Despite reopening under new ownership, it now employed far fewer people and closed again in 2014 after two accidents in which three workers were killed. 

The latest news is that the mine has again changed hands and is now owned by South African company Sibanye-Stillwater. It is currently waiting on a board decision giving it the all clear to restart. The delay is in part because of concerns over safety and lack of maintenance which a coroner's enquiry in 2021, found to be at least partially responsible for the 2014 accidents. However, assurances have been given that underground infrastructure is now in excellent condition and safety issues are being addressed.  

Meanwhile, Queenstown has been looking elsewhere for salvation. In 1998, the Prime Minister's Federation Fund enabled a team to undertake the restoration of the historic Abt Railway which proved almost as difficult as the first time, but in December 2002, the first passenger train set off once more through the rainforest between Queenstown and Strahan. It's a great trip, even if if it hasn't yet fulfilled the commercial aspirations of its backers. Things do take a bit longer in the West.

All too soon we are back in Queenstown. It’s been quite a journey through time as well as place and I can’t believe three hours have gone by. My travelling companions proved to be good company too. Indeed, I was to meet one of them again on the bus back to Hobart the following day. The weather has been kind –much kinder than it was in Hobart apparently, so that’s another win, despite my misgivings on leaving home. Back at the pub, I get so engrossed in my Op -shop book that I almost miss out on the counter meals. The place is well patronised on this night. It's lucky I only want soup after eating all that chicken for lunch and the staff goes to great lengths to make sure I still get some. And so ends my last night in Queenstown.  

Big thanks to Claude AI for  help with facts, figures and references and also ChatGPT about the plans to reopen the mine, though much of this is also based on oral histories, gossip and rumour as well as local knowledge. Historical sources include the WCWR website, Wikipedia and other sites in addition to the on -board commentary 

PS. The ABt spelling is not a typo, but the designation given by train buffs to the Locos used.