Inch Valley

Last updated April 09, 2019

Inch Valley

Inch Valley is a lightly populated rural locality in the Otago region of New Zealand's South Island.^[1] It is northwest of Palmerston and Glenpark, east of Stoneburn, on the banks of the Shag River. Economic activity around Inch Valley is agricultural.

Otago is a region of New Zealand in the south of the South Island administered by the Otago Regional Council. It has an area of approximately 32,000 square kilometres (12,000 sq mi), making it the country's third largest local government region. Its population was 229,200 in June 2018.

New Zealand is a sovereign island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. The country geographically comprises two main landmasses—the North Island, and the South Island —and around 600 smaller islands. New Zealand is situated some 2,000 kilometres (1,200 mi) east of Australia across the Tasman Sea and roughly 1,000 kilometres (600 mi) south of the Pacific island areas of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga. Because of its remoteness, it was one of the last lands to be settled by humans. During its long period of isolation, New Zealand developed a distinct biodiversity of animal, fungal, and plant life. The country's varied topography and its sharp mountain peaks, such as the Southern Alps, owe much to the tectonic uplift of land and volcanic eruptions. New Zealand's capital city is Wellington, while its most populous city is Auckland.

The South Island, also officially named Te Waipounamu, is the larger of the two major islands of New Zealand in surface area; the other being the smaller but more populous North Island. It is bordered to the north by Cook Strait, to the west by the Tasman Sea, and to the south and east by the Pacific Ocean. The South Island covers 150,437 square kilometres (58,084 sq mi), making it the world's 12th-largest island. It has a temperate climate.

Transport

Inch Valley is between Glenpark and Dunback on State Highway 85.

Dunback, formerly Waihemo, is a small town in the Otago region of New Zealand. It is located between Palmerston and Ranfurly on Highway 85. It has a population of about 200 people. Most of these people live in the rural areas near the town. The only remaining buildings now that still stand are the church, the Highwayman Hotel, the coronation hall and the Dunback school. All of these buildings are over 100 years old. There is also the domain which includes a cricket field, camping ground and bowling green. Locals and campers both enjoy the facilities that it has to offer. Along Murphy Street also stands the swing bridge which was built in the early 1900s for pupils to cross the Shag River for easier access to the school.

New Zealand State Highway 85 road in New Zealand

State Highway 85 is a South Island state highway in New Zealand, servicing the Maniototo Plains and the North and Central Otago regions of the South Island between the major settlements of Alexandra and Palmerston. It is wholly two lane and passes through some of the most extreme climatic regions in New Zealand. The highway is known colloquially as "The Pigroot". Though there is no definitive explanation for this name, A. W. Reed, in his book Place Names of New Zealand, mentions an incident during John Turnbull Thomson's survey of inland Otago in which local wild pigs were so unafraid of humans that a huge boar approached his party and rubbed its nose against that of Thomson's horse.

For 104 years, a branch line railway passed through Inch Valley; for 68 of these years, it served as a railway junction. The Dunback Branch from the Main South Line through Inch Valley to Dunback opened on 29 August 1885, to open up the country and serve farming interests. On 31 March 1900 the short Makareo Branch from Inch Valley northeast to a limeworks in Makareao opened. Passengers in Inch Valley were served solely by mixed trains that ran between Palmerston and Dunback. Due to declining patronage these were cancelled on 10 August 1930 and replaced by goods-only trains.^[2] Inch Valley's railway station had a small shelter shed for passengers, a loading bank for freight and a loop for 15 wagons; 100 metres away was a ballast siding.^[3]

A branch line is a secondary railway line which branches off a more important through route, usually a main line. A very short branch line may be called a spur line. David Blyth Hanna, the first president of the Canadian National Railway, said that although most branch lines cannot pay for themselves, they are essential to make main lines pay.

The Dunback and Makareao Branches were two connected branch line railways, part of New Zealand's national rail network. Located in the Otago region of the South Island, both lines were 15km in length and shared the first 11km. The Dunback Branch, also known as the Waihemo Branch, opened in 1885 and closed in 1968; the Makareao Branch, also known as the Inch Valley Railway or the Inch Valley Branch, opened in 1900 and operated for 89 years.

The Main South Line, sometimes referred to as part of the South Island Main Trunk Railway, is a railway line that runs north and south from Lyttelton in New Zealand through Christchurch and along the east coast of the South Island to Invercargill via Dunedin. It is one of the most important railway lines in New Zealand and was one of the first to be built, with construction commencing in the 1860s. At Christchurch it connects with the Main North Line to Picton, the other part of the South Island Main Trunk.

On 1 January 1968 the Dunback Branch was closed due to substantial financial losses. Local freight was no longer carried; trains ran through Inch Valley without stopping thrice weekly to serve the Makareao limeworks. On 1 June 1989 this line closed. The railway formation is visible around Inch Valley; at the old station site, a set of points and the loading bank are still in place. A 15-span trestle bridge that took the Makareao Branch over the Shag River was destroyed in the mid-1990s as a military training exercise.^[4]

The track bed or trackbed is the groundwork onto which a railway track is laid. Trackbeds of disused railways are sometimes used for recreational paths or new light rail links.

A railroad switch (AE), turnout, or [set of] points (BE) is a mechanical installation enabling railway trains to be guided from one track to another, such as at a railway junction or where a spur or siding branches off.

Related Research Articles

The town of Palmerston, in New Zealand's South Island, lies 50 kilometres to the north of the city of Dunedin. It is the largest town in the Waihemo Ward of the Waitaki District, with a population of 890 residents. Palmerston grew at a major road junction: State Highway 1 links Dunedin and Waikouaiti to the south with Oamaru and Christchurch to the north, while State Highway 85 heads inland to become the principal highway of the Maniototo. The Main South Line railway passes through the town and the Seasider tourist train travels from Dunedin to Palmerston and back once or twice a week. From 1880 until 1989, the town acted as the junction between the main line and a branch line that ran inland, the Dunback and Makareao Branches.

The Shag Point Branch was a short branch off the Main South Line on the east coast of the South Island of New Zealand. It left the main line about nine kilometres north of Palmerston at the small settlement of Shag Point to provide railway access to a nearby supply of coal. It was built in 1879 and ran until 1934.

The Tokanui Branch, also known as the Seaward Bush Branch, was a branch line railway located in Southland, New Zealand. It diverged from the Bluff Branch south of the main railway station in Invercargill and ran for 54 kilometres in a southeasterly direction. Construction began in 1883 and it operated until 1966.

The Foxton Branch was a railway line in New Zealand. It began life as a tramway, reopened as a railway on 27 April 1876, and operated until 18 July 1959. At Himatangi there was a junction with the Sanson Tramway, a line operated by the Manawatu County Council that was never upgraded to the status of a railway.

The Ngapara and Tokarahi Branches were two connected railway branch lines in northern Otago, New Zealand, part of the national rail network. The Ngapara Branch opened in 1877 and almost all of it closed in 1959; the remaining few kilometres, called the Waiareka Industrial Line, were removed in 1997. The Tokarahi Branch branched off the Ngapara Branch. It operated from 1887 until 1930 and was originally known as the Livingstone Branch, though it never progressed beyond Tokarahi to Livingstone. In early 2008 there is a proposal to reinstate the first 4.5 km of the Ngapara Branch.

The Mount Somers Branch, sometimes known as the Springburn Branch, was a branch line railway in the region of Canterbury, New Zealand. The line was built in stages from 1878, reaching Mount Somers in 1885. A further section to Springburn was added in 1889; this closed in 1957, followed by the rest of the line in 1968. A portion has been preserved as the Plains Vintage Railway.

The Fairlie Branch was a branch line railway in southern Canterbury which formed part of New Zealand's national railway network. Construction began in 1874, and at its farthest extent, it terminated just beyond Fairlie in Eversley. Its closure came in 1968, but a portion remains open in Pleasant Point as the Pleasant Point Museum and Railway.

Ngapara is a locality in the north Otago region of New Zealand's South Island. It is located in a rural setting 25 km inland from Oamaru. The name of Ngapara is derived from the Māori word for the "tables" or plateaus of limestone in the area.

The Kurow Branch was part of New Zealand's national rail network. In the North Otago region of the South Island, it was built in the 1870s to open up the land behind Oamaru for development, and closed in 1983.

The Te Aro Extension, also known as the Te Aro Branch, was a short branch line railway in Wellington, New Zealand continuing the Wairarapa Line southwards. It operated from 1893 until 1917.

Anama is a sparsely populated locality in the Canterbury region of New Zealand's South Island. It is on the Hinds River, with the Ashburton River not far to the north in nearby Mount Somers. Other nearby settlements include Valetta to the east, Mayfield to the south, and Montalto to the west. Anama School celebrated its centenary in March 2002.

Weston is a township situated 5 km (3.1 mi) inland from Oamaru, South Island, New Zealand. It is regarded as one of the more affluent townships of the Waitaki District and had a population of 730 in the 2006 census.

Glenpark is a lightly populated rural locality in the Otago region of New Zealand's South Island. It is northwest of Palmerston and is on the banks of the Shag River. To the west is the locality of Stoneburn.

Makareao is a lightly populated rural locality in the Otago region of New Zealand's South Island. To the west is Dunback and to the south is Inch Valley and the nearest significantly populated town, Palmerston.

The Marton–New Plymouth line (MNPL) is a secondary main line railway in the North Island of New Zealand that links the Taranaki and Manawatu-Wanganui regions. It branches from the North Island Main Trunk Railway (NIMT) at Marton and runs near the South Taranaki Bight of the west coast before turning inland, meeting the Stratford–Okahukura Line (SOL) at Stratford and running to New Plymouth. Construction of the line was completed in 1885, and along with the SOL it provided an alternate route to the NIMT from the SOL's completion in 1933 until the latter was mothballed in 2010. In its early days it was plied by the North Island's first regional express, the New Plymouth Express, but it has been freight only since the cancellation of the last passenger services in 1977.

The Wanganui Branch is a 5.00 km branch line railway in the Manawatu-Wanganui region of New Zealand's North Island. It links Wanganui with the Marton - New Plymouth Line (MNPL) at Aramoho and has been open since 21 January 1878, although solely for freight traffic since 7 September 1959. Another branch line diverged from the Wanganui Branch near its terminus, the Castlecliff Branch.

The Opunake Branch, later the Kapuni Branch, was a branch railway in North Island, New Zealand. It opened in 1924, and ran 36.4 km across the southern slopes of Mount Taranaki to link the rural town of Opunake with the Marton–New Plymouth Line at Te Roti. With the decline of rural freight, part of the line was closed in 1976, but the 10.9 km section to Kapuni was retained and upgraded to service traffic to the Kapuni natural gas field.

References

↑ "Place name detail: Inch Valley". New Zealand Gazetteer. Land Information New Zealand . Retrieved 17 March 2018.
↑ David Leitch and Brian Scott, Exploring New Zealand's Ghost Railways, revised edition (Wellington: Grantham House, 1998 [1995]), 88.
↑ Patrick Dunford, "Dunback & Makareao Branches" Archived 2007-09-29 at the Wayback Machine ., accessed 12 October 2007.
↑ Leitch and Scott, Exploring New Zealand's Ghost Railways, 89.

Coordinates: 45°24′S170°38′E / 45.400°S 170.633°E / -45.400; 170.633

Geographic coordinate system Coordinate system

A geographic coordinate system is a coordinate system that enables every location on Earth to be specified by a set of numbers, letters or symbols. The coordinates are often chosen such that one of the numbers represents a vertical position and two or three of the numbers represent a horizontal position; alternatively, a geographic position may be expressed in a combined three-dimensional Cartesian vector. A common choice of coordinates is latitude, longitude and elevation. To specify a location on a plane requires a map projection.

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.

[1] "Place name detail: Inch Valley". New Zealand Gazetteer. Land Information New Zealand . Retrieved 17 March 2018.

[2] David Leitch and Brian Scott, Exploring New Zealand's Ghost Railways, revised edition (Wellington: Grantham House, 1998 [1995]), 88.

[3] Patrick Dunford, "Dunback & Makareao Branches" Archived 2007-09-29 at the Wayback Machine ., accessed 12 October 2007.

[4] Leitch and Scott, Exploring New Zealand's Ghost Railways, 89.