Ohai Town & District - Business & Industry, Ohai Railway Line in use and after closure

Shared by Central & Western Murihiku Southland Archive

Ohai Rail line, from the past and present: Images - by Glynn Nuthall and kindly shared with us at the CWA. No's 1-4 are from the mid 1990's, No's 5-10 are from December 2023. These images are shared under a CC BY Licence, which means attribution to the photographer must be used if sharing them. The loco pictured here is likely to be DJ3303 according to a southern rail enthusiast and research by us into its life story, backs this theory up. The difference in the town of Ohai from the mid 1990's to today can be seen sharply in the two photos above sitting side by side, each taken from the Main Road at different times. NOTE: more photos of this line and loco's operating on it over the years will soon go up into our archive. We are currently collecting local images. If you can help share and preserve this history, please get in touch with us. HISTORY IN BRIEF: Coal was found in the Ohai area in the 1870's and many private mines started operating, but most of these built their own 2 ft gauge railways to carry coal. It would be 1920 before the Ohai Railway Line was opened, and there was much acrimony towards its inception by the adjacent Nightcaps Coal Company's line, as they saw it as being unfair competition. Papers Past, for those who are into reading history, has pages and pages of news reports of the fight between the eventual ORB or Ohai Railway Board and the Nightcaps Coal Company over construction of the new ORB line. According to Heritage NZ, The Wairio to Ohai line was the only private railway built under the 1914 Local Railways Act. Their List Entry Report for the Ohai Rail Board line buildings at Wairio north of Ōtautau, now a Historic Place, List No. 9715 declares, "it has special value as it was one of only two financially successful privately operated lines in the country. It was also the longest running passenger and coal transport private line in New Zealand... The Ohai Railway Board Offices and Depot form a rare set of railway structures, dating from around 1882 to 1947. They stand as a testament to a community.'' At one point the Ohai Railway Board Heritage Trust attempted to save the buildings and rolling stock, but this was later abandoned and the trust wound up. Much of its assets were purchased by other Rail Heritage groups and some of these loco's still survive today. In fact three of old ORB ballast waggons, classified as YA, sit outside the Tūātapere Railway Station currently, for anyone interested. Photos of these will be posted up in these Community Archives in the near future. Wikipedia has a well referenced article that states, "The first section of the line, including the part serving Morley Village, opened on 1 September 1920. Ohai was reached four years later. The Nightcaps Coal Company ceased to operate, and they handed over their railway line to the Railways Department, who dismantled it in 1926 as the Ohai branch line was capable of catering for traffic from Nightcaps." For more information on past this, see the website link posted in the 'Place Notes' section below. The demise of the ORB was begun by a series of economic reforms. In the 1989 local government shake-up, the WCC or Wallace County Council amalgamated into the Southland County Council with others, forming the Southland District Council. From this point the SDC had management of the ORB. On 1 June 1990, ORB's operations were incorporated into the national rail network, so from this point, New Zealand Railways operated it. Then comes 1992 and the SDC sells the ORB to New Zealand Rail Limited, with the proceeds of this sale forming the new Ohai Railway Board Trust, that now provides grants to locals and projects from within its local area. The State owned Ohai Mine was closed down for some years, but then reopened again for a time to extract the last of the easily accessible coal. If anyone has exact dates or years of these operations, please let us know. The old ORB line still serves coal trains between Invercargill and Nightcaps, although currently (Jan 2024) it is out of action after flooding washed out a bridge during September 2023, but this is currently on schedule for being repaired. This rails coal from the current Nightcaps Bathurst Mines and the Clandeboye Dairy Factory, with whom they have a supply contract. The line is now called the Ohai Line, and also according to Wikipedia, it is one of the very few survivors of a formerly extensive rural branch line network. The original Ōtautau branch line had its terminus at Wairio, but the Nightcaps Coal Company built a private line from there. Ohai used to be a bustling coal town with many mining workers and their families living there. It had pubs, grocery stores, a motor garage and service centre, more about this can be seen in these community archives under entries: CWA.072.130.004 and CWA.072.130.005 plus others; and it also boasted a school, police station, a well used public hall and other amenities. Most of these are sadly now closed. But the town has seen an upsurge in popularity as a place to live with the cost of housing making it one of the most affordable places in Aotearoa NZ to live now. Many older people have taken early retirement from more expensive towns and cities, selling up with money to spare and moving to retire into the township, this has given the town a new lease of life in recent times. THE LOCO IN THE PHOTO: Taken from Wikipedia, the history of the loco most likely to be the one in the photos above, states: "One locomotive, DJ3303 (DJ 1229) was given a reprieve on withdrawal in March 1988 after it was sold to the Ohai Railway Board (ORB) for use on their line between Wairio and Ohai. At the time the DJ was the largest industrial locomotive in New Zealand and was repainted in the ORB's yellow livery as their No. 3." After New Zealand Rail Limited took over running of the ORB line in 1991, DJ3303 was placed in storage before being sold for preservation to Mainline Steam." COMMUNITY MEMORIES: One Rail Enthusiast recalls, "I remember Ohai when it was a thriving mining town with a great community and sporting clubs plenty of shops etc. They used to have a school carriage on the back of the coal train for the kids to go to school, that was back in the 1950's." If you can share further memories about the town or the trains and rail, coalmining or other, please let us know in comments or send us an email. Sources used for the above are the excellent book on the ORB History, plus published news items from Papers Past, local Stuff News Reports, referenced articles from Wikipedia, Railway Enthusiast Facebook Groups, other heritage railway collectors and societies and local news bulletins. FURTHER INFORMATION: Hopefully this entry will be added to as more information comes to hand. If you or anyone you know has any more information or photos to share or accounts of the Ohai Railway or Ohai mines during the years, please do share this with us in the comments section. You can do this by making a comment in the space provided under the image page. Or you can make contact with us as per the archive front page, by email or our FB page.