Grandchester railway station is a heritage-listed former

railway station Rail transport (also known as train transport) is a means of transport that transfers passengers and goods on wheeled vehicles running on rails, which are incorporated in tracks. In contrast to road transport, where the vehicles run on a pre ...

at Ipswich Road, Grandchester,

City of Ipswich The City of Ipswich is a local government area in Queensland, Australia, located within the southwest of the Brisbane metropolitan area, including the urban area surrounding the city of Ipswich and surrounding rural areas. Geography The Ci ...

Queensland ) , nickname = Sunshine State , image_map = Queensland in Australia.svg , map_caption = Location of Queensland in Australia , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = Australia , established_title = Before federation , established_ ...

, Australia. It was built from 1875 to 1876. It is also known as Bigge's Camp. It was added to the

Queensland Heritage Register The Queensland Heritage Register is a heritage register, a statutory list of places in Queensland, Australia that are protected by Queensland legislation, the Queensland Heritage Act 1992. It is maintained by the Queensland Heritage Council. As a ...

on 21 October 1992.

History

Grandchester, originally known as Bigge's Camp, is the western terminus for the first railway in Queensland and the first section of the

Main Line Mainline, ''Main line'', or ''Main Line'' may refer to: Transportation Railway * Main line (railway), the principal artery of a railway system * Main line railway preservation, the practice of operating preserved trains on an operational railw ...

Toowoomba Toowoomba ( , nicknamed 'The Garden City' and 'T-Bar') is a city in the Toowoomba Region of the Darling Downs, Queensland, Australia. It is west of Queensland's capital city Brisbane by road. The urban population of Toowoomba as of the 2021 C ...

, opened from

Ipswich Ipswich () is a port town and borough in Suffolk, England, of which it is the county town. The town is located in East Anglia about away from the mouth of the River Orwell and the North Sea. Ipswich is both on the Great Eastern Main Line r ...

on 31 July 1865. Works were carried out to the station building in 1875 and 1876. The goods shed was also built in that year. T. Neville signed a contract to undertake work on the station buildings on 19 December 1878. The tank was relocated from Laidley in 1876 and a locomotive stationed here from 1885 to assist trains over the

Little Liverpool Range The Little Liverpool Range is a mountain range of the Scenic Rim and Lockyer Creek valley, part of the Great Dividing Range, which is located in the South East region of Queensland, Australia. Location and features The range extends from the ...

. James Stewart signed a contract on 14 March 1885 to build an engine shed, and Worley and Whitehead signed a contract to build a second goods shed on 15 June 1885. The station master's house was built in 1910 and alterations carried out to the station building around that time. By 1961 the complex consisted of a station building with signal cabin, two tanks, cream shed, closet, pumphouse, station master's house, forkline to cattleyards, engine shed and coal stage. The engine shed had been demolished by 1963 and the trucking yards were discontinued in 1991. The station buildings are now operated by the Queensland branch of the

National Trust of Australia The National Trust of Australia, officially the Australian Council of National Trusts (ACNT), is the Australian national peak body for community-based, non-government non-profit organisations committed to promoting and conserving Australia's Ind ...

. It is open to the public once a month, with volunteers offering guided tours.

Description

StateLibQld 1 111036 Grandchester railway station, ca

Grandchester is in a predominately rural setting in a bend on the Western Creek. The station building is situated on a timber platform and adopts a unique architectural form with a

hipped roof A hip roof, hip-roof or hipped roof, is a type of roof where all sides slope downwards to the walls, usually with a fairly gentle slope (although a tented roof by definition is a hipped roof with steeply pitched slopes rising to a peak). Thus, ...

and peripheral verandah to all elevations, posted on the ends and roadside and carried on later plain

brackets A bracket is either of two tall fore- or back-facing punctuation marks commonly used to isolate a segment of text or data from its surroundings. Typically deployed in symmetric pairs, an individual bracket may be identified as a 'left' or 'r ...

over the platform. There is a prominent central

chimney A chimney is an architectural ventilation structure made of masonry, clay or metal that isolates hot toxic exhaust gases or smoke produced by a boiler, stove, furnace, incinerator, or fireplace from human living areas. Chimneys are typic ...

stack with arched cowls (compare with the surviving station master's house at

Wallangarra railway station Wallangarra railway station is a heritage-listed railway station at Woodlawn Street, Wallangarra, Southern Downs Region, Queensland, Australia. It was built in 1877 along the state border of Queensland and New South Wales It was added to the Q ...

(1887) and the former at Esk (1886)). External linings are rusticated with exposed faces and double hung windows without horns having glazing bards. Internal alterations have been extensive although evidence of the original two bedrooms, living room, waiting room and office is presumed to exist, especially in the form of early timber ceiling linings and

cornices In architecture, a cornice (from the Italian ''cornice'' meaning "ledge") is generally any horizontal decorative moulding that crowns a building or furniture element—for example, the cornice over a door or window, around the top edge of a ...

. There is a roll of honour board inside, painted by Hugh F. O'Brien, Toowoomba. There is a signal cabin with a 22 lever T-bar machine in the down end of the building, placed out of service presumably in 1988 with the introduction of

centralized traffic control Centralized traffic control (CTC) is a form of railway signalling that originated in North America. CTC consolidates train routing decisions that were previously carried out by local signal operators or the train crews themselves. The system cons ...

(CTC). The tank is a two tier

cast iron Cast iron is a class of iron–carbon alloys with a carbon content more than 2%. Its usefulness derives from its relatively low melting temperature. The alloy constituents affect its color when fractured: white cast iron has carbide impuriti ...

tank altered from a single tier tank at an unknown date. The linings to the stand are recent and the shaped ends to the main beams project through the linings. There is an associated dam which is presumed to supply the tank, also a brick well and associated pumphouse. The station master's house is a standard elevated second class house with a

pyramidal roof A hip roof, hip-roof or hipped roof, is a type of roof where all sides slope downwards to the walls, usually with a fairly gentle slope (although a tented roof by definition is a hipped roof with steeply pitched slopes rising to a peak). Thus, ...

, peripheral verandah and (possibly later) ventilator. The verandah post enrichment may be uncommon, but the overall form is not uncommon.

Heritage listing

Grandchester Railway Complex was listed on the

on 21 October 1992 having satisfied the following criteria. The place is important in demonstrating the evolution or pattern of Queensland's history. Grandchester Railway complex has historical importance as the western terminus of the first railway in Queensland, opened on 31 July 1865. Grandchester as a place is commonly acknowledged to be an historical railway site of State significance. It was the first railway station built in Queensland using local materials. The place demonstrates rare, uncommon or endangered aspects of Queensland's cultural heritage. The survival of a station building incorporating quarters is also rare (compare

Clifton Clifton may refer to: People *Clifton (surname) *Clifton (given name) Places Australia * Clifton, Queensland, a town **Shire of Clifton *Clifton, New South Wales, a suburb of Wollongong *Clifton, Western Australia Canada *Clifton, Nova Scotia ...

Springsure Springsure is a town and a Suburbs and localities (Australia), locality in the Central Highlands Region, Queensland, Australia. It is south of Emerald, Queensland, Emerald on the Gregory Highway. It is the southern terminus of the Gregory Highwa ...

and Pentland). The place is important in demonstrating the principal characteristics of a particular class of cultural places. The station building and tank are key elements demonstrating its early date and are understood to have existed on this site from the mid-late 1870s, predating other railway buildings in Queensland with the possible exception of Gracemere ( Central Line), Murphys Creek (Main Line),

Nobby {{Unreferenced, date=December 2009 Nobby is the diminutive form of the name Norbert. It is also a nickname most commonly used in English for those with the surname Clark or Clarke. Origins as a nickname A number of possible explanations exist fo ...

and Clifton ( Southern Line).

References

Attribution

External links