Oatley Station - NSW - Australia

[The_Ghan]

This one is aimed squarely at Mark Newton, who is the most knowledgeable person I know with regard to NSW railways.  Mate, can you tell me when and why the Oatley Station was re-aligned.  I believe it was sometime between 1893 and 1926.  The original station was where the park is now, running past what is now Oatley Hotel, through where the Oatley Memorial Clock now stands to (roughly) the war memorial.  I have land sale documents from 1893 showing this.  The railway today is, of course, on the opposite side of Oatley Parade and occupies what was the Yarran Road road reservation, north of the intersection with Mimosa Street. There is also this map.

 

The original Como railway bridge was constructed in 1872, so the original grades must have been good enough for steam.  Electrification to Oatley was completed in 1926.  Was the station moved for this?  Could electric trains not make the grades down from Mortdale?  I'm curious to know what went on here.

 

Cheers

 

The_Ghan

[marknewton]

Ghan, thanks for the compliment, but I'm not that knowledgable - I just have a good library at home!  

 

The Oatley deviation was part of a big program started by Chief Commissioner Eddy, which included other major deviation works such as the Ten Tunnels that replaced the Lithgow Zig Zag, and between Waterfall and Helensburgh.

 

The new line at Oatley was built all the way back in 1905, to ease the grade against heavily loaded freight trains headed for Sydney. The grade on the old line was 1 in 60, whereas the new line is 1 in 80. As you probably know, the majority of coal and ballast traffic on the Illawarra in those days was Sydney bound. That's why Waterfall developed into the big yard it became, so that short trainloads could be staged up the 1 in 40s from Stanwell Park through the Otford Tunnel, then amalgamated at Waterfall into longer trains for the (relatively) easier grades from there on into the various yards in Sydney.

 

I was told by John Oakes that the original platforms at Oatley are still there, buried under the park. Be very interesting to have a bit of a dig around there one day!

 

BTW, love the maps. Beautiful draughtmanship and typography.

 

All the best,

 

Mark.

[Mudkip Orange]

What's the source of that odd little cul-de-sac thing at the intersection of River Road and the Parade? Is it an old streetcar turnaround? A roundabout that got paved over?

[The_Ghan]

I don't know where you mean Mudkip.  Are you looking on Google Earth or one of the maps I linked?  If you can give me a better reference I'll let  you know.

 

Cheers

 

The_Ghan

[westfalen]

I think he means here, 33° 58.794' S 151° 4.793' E on Google Earth.

 

Too far south for trams, a turning area for buses perhaps?

[Mudkip Orange]

I think he means here, 33° 58.794' S 151° 4.793' E on Google Earth.

 

Yup.

[marknewton]

Mudkip, it's just a parking bay at the entrance to the park. There's a flight of stone stairs leading up from here. As Westfalen noted, the tramway network didn't come this far south. The Nightride buses used to stop and turn here, but after a couple of collisions with cars coming out from under the railway bridge, they no longer go there.

 

Cheers,

 

Mark.

[The_Ghan]

OK!  Got it!  You mean the u-turn bay east of the underpass, right?  Well since I've lived in Oatley for 41 of my 45 years I have a reasonably sound knowledge of the suburb.  Here's the deal on this area:

 

1. The area you mention is really a u-turn bay.  Until about 15 years ago there was a bus company based in Oatley, servicing the suburb.  Originally the Oatley Bus Co. and later the Yellow Band Bus Co, the company used to park 2-3 busses in Boorara Ave at the intersection with Southern St.  They ran suburban routes to the station and timed them nicely with peak hour trains.  They stopped just north of the pedestrian crossing on Oatley Pde.

 

2.  The terrain in Oatley is quite steep.  The park west of the station is actually an unrelieved sag, ie: water would pond there naturally.  The u-turn bay east of the underpass is almost up at the level of the railway, so its quite a steep hill down to the underpass.  I've not known of any accidents with nightride busses but I've seen several removalist trucks jammed under there.

 

3.  If you follow the railway line south you will find Yarran Road running parallel to the line on the west side.  Before the station was relocated Yarran Road continued north to meet up with the part of River Road that runs north-south and continued all the way to where Boundary Road now crosses the railway line.  The railway line now occupies parts of the northern end of the Yarran Road road reserve, as does the bowling greens and the little park in the unrelieved sag.

 

4.  I had a look at where the old platforms might have been this afternoon.  I think the original platform heights were much lower than they are today and, if so, it is reasonable that the old platforms remain.  I'd like to know who John Oakes is. Is he an Oatley local?  I knew a Mr Oakes from church but I'm sure he passed away ... he was about 70 when I was 10!!!

 

5.  The heavily treed area north-east of the u-turn bay is also a bit of a sag and must have had a bridge or other civil works to correct grades which have since been dismantled.

 

6.  There used to be a runaround down the east side of Oatley station with points both north and south of the station.  This was, I think, to enable steam engines to turn around on terminating trains.  However, I was once told that this was also used for local freight on a separate platform area which is now occupied by shops and the service station.  I've never been able to verify this with any photo, map or other oral history.

 

Mark, thanks for the info about the grades.  If you have any graphic evidence I'd like to see it.

 

Cheers

 

The_Ghan

[marknewton]

Ghan, just a quick one before I head off to work. I can recall two nights when I was on the standby train at Mortdale and we got sent out to replace the nightride bus after a prang at Oatley, but that would be at least 10 years ago or more. I'd forgotten about the Oatley Bus Co.!

 

As far as I recall, the siding at Oatley was a carriage siding, only used to stable suburban trains, I don't think Oatley ever had goods facilities. I can check that later and give you a more detailed answer.

 

John Oakes is a railway historian and author, he's had a number of books published by the ARHS, including the title "Sydney"s Forgotten Illawarra Railways". See the ARHA catalogue here: http://www.arhsnsw.com.au/current/cat.pdf

 

Somewhere I have a very old curve and gradient diagram book, dating from 1895, if I can find that I'll scan the relevant page.

 

Cheers,

 

Mark.

[The_Ghan]

Hi Mark,

 

I'd forgotten about the AHRA shop.  Thanks for the link.

 

I should clarify "local freight".  I'm trying to remember what I'd been told as a boy by a neighbour, old Mr Bushay.  I'm sure he told me that the post office received deliveries from that siding and that newspapers and beer were delivered to the siding.  Is that possible? 

 

I *know* for sure that there was an electric mail train of some sort because I remember going with my father to collect freight directly from the station rather than the post office.  But I must admit, I never saw the siding get used.  It is on my list of things to research about Oatley in general.

 

To my knowledge, the only industries that might have exported produce out of the suburb by rail were the brick pits, Hoopers paper factory (later Quill), and the oyster farmers.  The population of Oatley was never large enough in the early days to warrant importing large quantities of anything, except beer!  But then, I wonder how a piano or sofa might have been delivered to a house or church in Oatley in, say, 1915?

 

Cheers

 

The_Ghan

[marknewton]

G'day Ghan,

 

It's possible that the carriage siding was once used as a goods siding, but I'd need to do some research. The oldest publication I have here at home is a local appendix to the working timetable dated 1952, which only refers to the carriage siding. An older LA, or an older goods and coaching instruction book might shed further light on the subject. There are a lot of suburban stations that once had goods sidings and sheds, but in many cases they were closed fairly early, or the sidings were converted to other uses once the lines were electrified. Only the largest and busiest suburban goods yards remained operating into the 1980s. On the Illawarra, Wolli Creek, Rockdale and Hurstville were all still going into the 80s - I've worked trip trains into all these places. The trip trains were goods trains that ran around the suburban network late at night or early in the morning, serving various goods yards and private sidings.

 

As far as I'm aware, the carriage siding at Oatley was a dead-end road, I can't find any reference to there being points at the down/south end of the platform. I can only ever recall a crossover at the up or north end of Oatley. But again, further research may show otherwise.

 

Your recollection of the "electric mail train" is spot-on, that was the "Fast Electric Parcel Van" service. The parcel vans operated out of the old Mortuary station at Regent Street in Sydney yard, and were arranged to cover the entire suburban network. Every station had at least one trip scheduled per day, the busier locations often had two or three. Like the suburban goods trains, the vans were running until the mid 1980s. The difference being that almost every station in the network could receive and dispatch parcel traffic. The vans would simply pull up on the platform, and the crew and station staff would get stuck into it and load and unload the parcels between scheduled passenger trains.

 

The parcel van crews usually consisted of a driver, guard and a porter/station assistant to speed up the process. I well recall beer and newspapers as typical consignments, but what really sticks in my mind were the crates of live, day-old poultry, mainly chickens. The noise and the smell was unforgettable! The parcel van rosters were very popular with some crews, as there was always the promise of an early finish if there wasn't much traffic on offer.

 

St Marys

 

Bansktown

As for getting a piano or a sofa delivered in 1915, there would be two options. One would be to the goods siding and shed, if it existed. The other would be to send it on a goods train as less-than-carload freight, which on the NSWGR was known as "out-ofs", as they were items delivered out of the guard's van straight onto the platform at locations were there were no goods facilities. I suspect that's probably how larger items would have been consigned to Oatley in those days.

 

If you're keen, we could always arrange a visit to the ARHS resource centre at Redfern and do a bit of joint research...

 

All the best,

 

Mark.

[The_Ghan]

Hey Mark,

 

Thanks for the update.  I remember those parcel vans.  That is exactly what delivered boxes to Oatley that were sent from Queensland back in the early 1970's.  There was also some kind of small van that ran down the line in those days.  I used to imagine that it delivered the weekly pay packet to workers, or maybe someone told me that as a kid.

 

As for the Oatley siding being a true run around, I'm only going by what old Mr Bushay had told me.  He was a local who was about 80 when I was about 8!  He would tell me different stories about Oatley.  Some I've been able to corroborate, some I haven't.  I said in my earlier post I've never seen it in operation but I do have a memory of visiting a steam train parked at Oatley in the late 70's.  It seemed to be at Oatley for a very long time and would have disrupted regular services if it wasn't on the siding but my memory has faded too much to be sure.  Back to the siding ... I have no memory of points at the south end either.  If steam ever terminated at Oatley they could have simply run the engine down to the bridge and used those points.  Again, I'm only going by what I was told.

 

I am interested in meeting to do a bit of research on this subject.  My primary interest at this time is Oatley Station and the railway between Mortdale and the bridge.  I'm free between Christmas and New Year but could also spare half a day in January if you're busy over Christmas.  Keitaro and I were thinking of meeting up for a drink sometime anyway.  Perhaps we could invite all Sydney-siders and meet up with them after we've done some research.  Your thoughts?

 

Cheers

 

The_Ghan

[marknewton]

It would great to meet up some time in January, I've been working nearly every day over Christmas and the New Year. Sorry about the delay in replying, BTW!

 

Cheers,

 

Mark.

[The_Ghan]

It would great to meet up some time in January, I've been working nearly every day over Christmas and the New Year. Sorry about the delay in replying, BTW!

 

Cheers,

 

Mark.

 

Mark, I think I sent you a pm about this a while back.

 

Cheers

 

The_Ghan