The Taonui Branch was a minor

branch line A branch line is a phrase used in railway terminology to denote a secondary railway line which branches off a more important through route, usually a main line. A very short branch line may be called a spur line. Industrial spur An industri ...

railway 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 ...

in New Zealand's

national network The National Network (or National Truck Network) is a network of approved state highways and interstates for commercial truck drivers in the United States. The Surface Transportation Assistance Act of 1982 authorized the establishment of a nati ...

. Located in the

Manawatū District Manawatū District is a territorial authority district in the Manawatū-Whanganui local government region in the North Island of New Zealand, administered by Manawatū District Council. It includes most of the area between the Manawatū River ...

of the

North Island The North Island, also officially named Te Ika-a-Māui, is one of the two main islands of New Zealand, separated from the larger but much less populous South Island by the Cook Strait. The island's area is , making it the world's 14th-largest ...

, it opened in 1879 and operated until 1895.

Construction

In the late 1870s,

sleepers ''Sleepers'' is a 1996 American legal crime drama film written, produced, and directed by Barry Levinson, and based on Lorenzo Carcaterra's 1995 book of the same name. The film stars Kevin Bacon, Jason Patric, Brad Pitt, Robert De Niro, Dustin Ho ...

were needed for the Foxton & Wanganui Railway (later the

Wanganui Branch The Wanganui Branch is a 5.00 km branch line railway in the Manawatū-Whanganui region of New Zealand's North Island. It links Wanganui with the Marton - New Plymouth Line (MNPL) at Aramoho and has been open since 21 January 1878, althoug ...

, the now-closed

Foxton Branch The Foxton Branch was a railway line in New Zealand. It began life as a tramway, reopened as a railway on 27 April 1876, and operated until 18 July 1959. At Himatangi there was a junction with the Sanson Tramway, a line operated by the Manawa ...

, and parts of the

North Island Main Trunk The North Island Main Trunk (NIMT) is the main railway line in the North Island of New Zealand, connecting the capital city Wellington with the country's largest city, Auckland. The line is long, built to the New Zealand rail gauge of and ser ...

railway and

Marton - New Plymouth Line Marton may refer to: Places England * Marton, Blackpool, district of Blackpool, Lancashire * Marton, Bridlington, area of Bridlington in the East Riding of Yorkshire * Marton, Cheshire, village and civil parish in Cheshire * Marton, Cumbria, villa ...

). Accordingly, a line was constructed from Taonui, near

Feilding Feilding ( mi, Aorangi) is a town in the Manawatū District of the North Island of New Zealand. It is located on State Highway 54, 20 kilometres north of Palmerston North. The town is the seat of the Manawatū District Council. Feilding has w ...

, in a northeasterly direction towards Colyton through a stand of

totara ''Podocarpus totara'' (; from the Maori-language ; the spelling "totara" is also common in English) is a species of podocarp tree endemic to New Zealand. It grows throughout the North Island and northeastern South Island in lowland, montane and ...

trees. It was laid with light 30lb rails and opened on 17 November 1879 It was overseen by three separate authorities: initially the Railways Commissioners; then the

Public Works Department This list indicates government departments in various countries dedicated to public works or infrastructure. See also * Public works * Ministry or Board of Public Works, the imperial Chinese ministry overseeing public projects from the Tang ...

(PWD) from 20 April 1881; and finally the

New Zealand Railways Department The New Zealand Railways Department, NZR or NZGR (New Zealand Government Railways) and often known as the "Railways", was a government department charged with owning and maintaining New Zealand's railway infrastructure and operating the railway ...

from the start of July 1882.

Operation

Despite being officially designated a branch line, it was little more than an elongated

siding Siding may refer to: * Siding (construction), the outer covering or cladding of a house * Siding (rail) A siding, in rail terminology, is a low-speed track section distinct from a running line or through route such as a main line, branch l ...

. No stations were located on the line and it never carried passengers. In November 1879 it was recommended that the line be worked by the Railways Department and from January 1880 their engine worked the line to the sawmill. In March 1880 it was proposed to work line with horses to save money. By 1882 PWD hired horses to haul empty wagons up the line, which, when loaded, ran down by gravity, using just their brakes, to the main line. An August 1893 report said revenue for the last three months was only five shillings, as the sawmills had all moved. From January to April 1895 the only traffic was 29 wagons of sawn timber, 4 of firewood, and 1 of goods. The line was not just used to provide the national railways with sleepers; some private timber companies also offered traffic. Henry Adsett had a mill along the line and became a farmer once the trees had been felled. However, this traffic was not significant and closing the line was proposed by 1893. Closure came on 14 August 1895 and the rails were gone by February the next year. Rails of 30, 40 and 52lb were recovered. Closure was authorised by the Taonui Branch Railway Act 1894, which said the line opened in June 1879.

Today

No earthworks at all were required for the line and no traces of the

formation Formation may refer to: Linguistics * Back-formation, the process of creating a new lexeme by removing or affixes * Word formation, the creation of a new word by adding affixes Mathematics and science * Cave formation or speleothem, a secondar ...

survive. The only extant remnant is the station building from the junction in Taonui. It closed in the 1960s and was subsequently relocated to a farmer's paddock near its original location. A few decades later, the farmer donated it to the

Feilding and District Steam Rail Society The Feilding and District Steam Rail Society, also known as Feilding Steam Rail, is a railway preservation society located in Feilding in the Manawatu region of New Zealand. The society has restored or is restoring a number of locomotives and wa ...

. It has now been restored and included as part of the society's depot in Feilding, and the restoration work earned the society a Certificate of Merit from the Rail Heritage Trust of New Zealand, awarded on 2 June 2002.Feilding and District Steam Rail Society
"Taonui Railway Station"
accessed 27 November 2007.

References

Citations

Bibliography

* *

External links

Photo of Henry Adsett's Sawmill on Taonui Rd, near Reid Line East about 1890
{{NZR Lines Railway lines in New Zealand Rail transport in Manawatū-Whanganui Railway lines opened in 1879 Railway lines closed in 1895 Closed railway lines in New Zealand