Monorail A monorail (from "mono", meaning "one", and "rail") is a railway in which the track consists of a single rail or a beam. Colloquially, the term "monorail" is often used to describe any form of elevated rail or people mover. More accurately, ...

s were used to transport

timber Lumber is wood that has been processed into dimensional lumber, including beams and planks or boards, a stage in the process of wood production. Lumber is mainly used for construction framing, as well as finishing (floors, wall panels, wi ...

from the forests of

Central Java Central Java ( id, Jawa Tengah) is a province of Indonesia, located in the middle of the island of Java. Its administrative capital is Semarang. It is bordered by West Java in the west, the Indian Ocean and the Special Region of Yogyakarta in t ...

Dutch East Indies The Dutch East Indies, also known as the Netherlands East Indies ( nl, Nederlands(ch)-Indië; ), was a Dutch colony consisting of what is now Indonesia. It was formed from the nationalised trading posts of the Dutch East India Company, which ...

(now

Indonesia Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania between the Indian and Pacific oceans. It consists of over 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi, and parts of Borneo and New Guine ...

) located in the mountains to the rivers.

History

In 1908 and 1909, the forester H. J. L. Beck built a manually operated monorail of limited but sufficient capacity for the transport of small timber and

firewood Firewood is any wooden material that is gathered and used for fuel. Generally, firewood is not highly processed and is in some sort of recognizable log or branch form, compared to other forms of wood fuel like pellets or chips. Firewood can ...

in the northern

Surabaya Surabaya ( jv, ꦱꦸꦫꦧꦪ or jv, ꦯꦹꦫꦨꦪ; ; ) is the capital city of the Provinces of Indonesia, Indonesian province of East Java and the List of Indonesian cities by population, second-largest city in Indonesia, after Jakarta. L ...

forest district. In later years, this idea was further developed by L. A. van de Ven, who was a forester in the

Grobogan Grobogan Regency ( jv, ꦒꦿꦺꦴꦧꦺꦴꦒꦤ꧀) is a regency ( id, kabupaten) located in northeastern part of the Central Java province in Indonesia. Created on 4 March 1726, the Grobogan Regency has an area of 2,022.25 km2, and is ...

forest district (north of Poerwodadi ) around 1908–1910.Ch. S. Lugt: ''Het boschbeheer in Nederlandsch-Indië.'' 1933, S. 75–76. Zitiert in: Rob van de Ven Renardel de Lavalette
''De Monorail van Grobogan.''
/ref> He devoted himself to the planning, construction and operation of monorails,Augusta de Wit: ''Een bevloeiingswerk''. In: ''Natuur en menschen in Indië'', 1921, page 125. First published in ''Nieuwe Rotterdamsche Courant, Avondblad A,'' 30 November 1911. Referenced in: Rob van de Ven Renardel de Lavalette
''De Monorail van Grobogan.''
/ref> especially monorails with larger capacity for heavier transport. His consideration was that the construction and maintenance of monorails in hilly terrain, apart from saving one rail, would be considerably cheaper than the usual two-rail tracks, such as those of the

Cepu Forest Railway The Cepu Forest Railway (officially branded as Loco Tour Cepu) is a narrow gauge light forest railway, logging railway that runs through teak plantations to the northwest of the town of Cepu (town), Cepu, in Cepu, Blora, Cepu district, on the boun ...

. As a result, monorails were built by plantation operators and wood processing companies throughout the mountains of Central Java. There were monorail lines in Grobogan, Undakan (in Kudus Regency), Monggot (in Grobogan Regency), and Cepu (in Blora Regency) forest administrations, as well as in Djombang-Babat forest administrations in

East Java East Java ( id, Jawa Timur) is a Provinces of Indonesia, province of Indonesia located in the easternmost hemisphere of Java island. It has a land border only with the province of Central Java to the west; the Java Sea and the Indian Ocean bord ...

. In 1919/1920, however, the hand-operated monorails gradually disappeared and were replaced by

narrow-gauge railway A narrow-gauge railway (narrow-gauge railroad in the US) is a railway with a track gauge narrower than standard-gauge railway, standard . Most narrow-gauge railways are between and . Since narrow-gauge railways are usually built with Minimum r ...

s with

steam locomotive A steam locomotive is a locomotive that provides the force to move itself and other vehicles by means of the expansion of steam. It is fuelled by burning combustible material (usually coal, oil or, rarely, wood) to heat water in the locomot ...

s as forest utilization changed.''Pernah ada Monorel hutan (forestry monorail) di Jawa.''
Ziarah Spoor, 13 December 2012.

Operation

The metal rail of the monorail at Babat (Lage) was laid at a height of about 3 metres on sawn-off tree stumps or on buried posts. On the rail, W-shaped carriages with an extremely low centre of gravity were moved by gravity or by hand. Even in the sharpest curves the swinging carriages could not get out of balance. Even in the rainy season, when the forest roads turned into swamps, the timber transport went undisturbed at lofty heights on the sawn-off trees. Monorails in Central Java (9).jpg, Typical monorail rolling stock Monorails in Central Java (1).jpg, Monorail at Grobogan Monorails in Central Java (6).jpg, Monorail for or approx 5 tonnes timber Monorails in Central Java (3).jpg, Monorail near Tjepoe (Cepu)

References

{{Commons category, Monorails in Indonesia Monorails in Indonesia Rail transport in Indonesia Transport in Central Java