The Stockade railway station, the terminal station of the then Stockade railway line (later the

Northfield railway line The Northfield railway line (formerly Stockade railway line) was a railway in northern Adelaide running Dry Creek and Northfield. The line branched east from the Gawler railway line just north of Dry Creek station. In earlier years, it saw ...

), was opened on 1 June 1857. It was built to service the colony's prisoner camp, and to transport

bluestone Bluestone is a cultural or commercial name for a number of dimension or building stone varieties, including: * basalt in Victoria, Australia, and in New Zealand * dolerites in Tasmania, Australia; and in Britain (including Stonehenge) * felds ...

mined by convicts to building projects in downtown Adelaide. After a century of service, it was closed in 1961, and the quarry area was later redeveloped as a park.

Development

The station and single line were opened in 1857 to carry prisoner-mined stone from the quarries behind

Yatala Labour Prison Yatala Labour Prison is a high-security men's prison located in the north-eastern part of the northern Adelaide suburb Northfield, South Australia. It was built in 1854 to enable prisoners to work at Dry Creek, quarrying rock for roads and con ...

(itself originally known as "The Stockade"). It was also used to transfer prisoners and supplies to the prison, which was first opened in 1854. The station was built as the terminus of a branch of what is now the Gawler railway line, making it one of South Australia's oldest rail lines. It was originally planned to extend the line eastward beyond the Stockade to Modbury, passing through the suburb of Valley View, though this never came to fruition. By the 1870s, the extraction of rock was well-developed, and in 1878, for example, the quarry supplied 25,000 tons of stone.

Closure

After World War II, quarrying based on prisoner labour was stopped, as goods production based on a prisoner's learning of a trade increased. Further, with the rise of automobile ownership, the

South Australian Railways South Australian Railways (SAR) was the statutory corporation through which the Government of South Australia built and operated railways in South Australia from 1854 until March 1978, when its non-urban railways were incorporated into Austr ...

realised that passenger service on the line was uneconomic as patron numbers were low. In July 1961, Stockade was closed, the

turntable A phonograph, in its later forms also called a gramophone (as a trademark since 1887, as a generic name in the UK since 1910) or since the 1940s called a record player, or more recently a turntable, is a device for the mechanical and analogu ...

removed, and the line cut back to the nearby

Northfield railway station Northfield railway station serves the Northfield area of Birmingham, England. It is situated on the Cross-City Line, and is managed by West Midlands Trains, who also operate all of the rail services that serve it. History The station was open ...

, which was itself relocated at this time from the eastern to the western side of Briens Road. Today, the area around the former station and quarry has now been redeveloped as the

Stockade Botanical Park Stockade Botanic Park (commonly known also as ''Stockade Park'' and ''Stockade Botanical Park'') is a public reserve off Hoods Road in the City of Port Adelaide Enfield's suburb of Northfield. It was formerly associated with a prison quarry but h ...

References

Disused railway stations in South Australia Railway stations in Australia opened in 1857 Railway stations closed in 1961 1961 disestablishments in Australia {{SouthAustralia-railstation-stub