Taupō railway proposals

The TTT Co line was constructed as a contour railway, with tight curves designed for later alignment improvement and a ruling grade of 1 in 35.

As time passed, the proposal for the TTT Co scheme was eventually shelved, largely due to the outbreak of World War I and the considerable objections made by the Rotorua Chamber of Commerce.

The line would have required considerable improvements to bring it up to NZR standard as it was only built to carry timber and it consequently had very tight curves, narrow cuttings and light rails.

This section of line opened again on 9 June 1947 under the control of the Public Works Department using steam locomotives purchased from the TTT Co. Around the same time plans were being made for a large pulp and paper mill to be constructed at Kinleith.

The line with its sharp curves, steep grades and light rails, needed to be significantly upgraded to enable heavy traffic.

The principal route ran south from the railhead at Kinleith following a route similar to State Highway 1 through to Atiamuri, then followed the western side of the Waikato River through Ohakuri and Orakei Korako to Aratiatia, where the line would cross the river over the rapids, before descending in an arc like curve heading north, then south in the vicinity of View Road and Broadlands Road, to terminate at the Fletchers Taupō Mill on Centennial Drive.

It had long been intended that the Rotorua Branch would be extended into the Bay of Plenty to connect with the line being built from Gisborne.

In 1921 the commission brought forward a unanimous finding "There is urgent necessity in order to avoid great national waste, for an extension of the Rotorua Government Railway to Waiotapu with as little delay as possible".

Its terms of reference were to access anticipated traffic and profitability and assess the area's settlement potential and a possible route.

Work began almost immediately with teams of construction workers transferred from the extension of the East Coast Main Trunk from Taneatua to Ōpōtiki, which had been stopped.

For approximately one year from the date of approval by cabinet, men worked on constructing embankments and cuttings along the proposed route a short distance out of Rotorua between Waipa and Waiotapu.

In 1968 NZR announced a proposal to construct a new line to Rotorua from Paengaroa on the East Coast Main Trunk, with an extension to the Waipa State Mill.

However an equally great number of people in Rotorua supported the railway proposal and consequently it became a hot political debate.

By 1973 NZR started to back down on the proposal and stated that the scheme would only proceed if the people of Rotorua agreed upon where the marshalling yards would be located.

In 1980 NZR carried out a number of investigations into possible rail routes to Taupō, one of which was a route between Tarukenga on the Rotorua Branch, via Paradise Valley and the western side of Pukehangi Road through to the Waipa State Mill, and then onwards south to the Fletchers Taupō Mill via the Reporoa dairy factory.

In 1989 the central city station and railway yard at Rotorua closed, and along with the last 2 km of the line were lifted and relocated to Koutu.

A proposal to construct a railway between Kakahi on the North Island Main Trunk and Pukawa on the shores of Lake Taupō, near Tokaanu, was made by a group of three people - Te Heuheu Tukino, Paramount chief of the Ngati Tuwharetoa iwi (tribe); Lawrence Grace, who was closely related through marriage to the tribe; and Tudor Atkinson, the founder of the TTT Co.

Once the railway was built the company would carry freight other than timber, such as dressed flax and grain, and passengers at Government rates.

However, with World War I by now claiming many of the necessary fit and able men needed to do the job, work began to slow and it was becoming increasingly difficult to obtain materials, though cuttings and embankments had been built by 1916.

This meant that the Egmont Box Company would need to spend a very large amount of money to change the route to that now required to join up with the NZR line at Kakahi.

Other parties tried to carry out and construct the railway, but all failed to do so with either not being able to obtain the necessary capital or the economic viability of the scheme prevented them making any progress.

A 1921 Order in Council said the line was to be completed within 7 years,[12] money was raised in 1922[13] and there was a report of a £500,000 contract for Cammell Laird to build it in 1924,[14] but which was then said to be only at the negotiating stage.

The principal reason for extending this line has been to tap into the plantation pine forests in the central North Island and in particular those in the Taupō region.

The principal route of the line was to be constructed from the railhead at Murupara by way of two possible routes to address the steep climb up onto the Kaingaroa plains, where it would cross towards the State Highway 5 Napier-Taupō Road, then sweep around the southern flank of Mt Tauhara in an arc like shape and then head north towards the Taupō industrial area before sweeping around in another arc in the Broadlands Road area and terminating at the Fletchers Taupō Mill on Centennial Drive.

The line was to be constructed from the present railhead at Murupara, across the Kaingaroa plains where it would sweep around the southern flank of Mt Tauhara in an arc like shape and then head north towards the Taupō industrial area before sweeping around in another arc in the Broadlands Road area and terminating at the Taupō Mill on Centennial Drive.

The line was to be a forestry style railway similar to the Murupara Branch, with its key role being to transport timber.

[21] It was also intended for the line to be electrified from Taupō through to Mt Maunganui, once men who were at the time working on the electrification of the North Island Main Trunk, could be transferred on completion of the project.

The report said that it would be unlikely that rail connections would be made at National Park or Waiouru as the distance to forestry ports and processing plants would increase.

A recommendation was made that a log-processing yard be built at the junction of these two roads in conjunction with the rail line extension from Murupara.

The line would extend from the proposed log-processing yard around the southern flank of Mount Tauhara and head north towards Broadlands Road before completing a horseshoe like curve south into the Taupō Mill on Centennial Drive.