Australian screenshots

Yes, Phil, the route and custom assets will be freeware releases on the DLS. Many of the custom assets have already been released. Route building in the section from Wingen to Ardglen requires the completion of Murrurundi township - only the area bordering the railway is completed so far - and Ardglen quarry. The section Ardglen to Braefield is complete to the outskirts of Willow Tree. None of Willow Tree township is done. My thinking is to release Wingen-Ardglen in advance of the complete route. Sessions for Wingen-Ardglen can illustrate banking operations over one side of the Liverpool Range. No session development has taken place as yet.

Cool !

I look forward to seeing more progress shots.
 
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A couple of shots of a four car tait at Flinders Street, and then running an Essendon service through Kensington, at night.

Regards
Zec
 
Hi
Yes look forward to that route Armidale to Tamworth.Peter are you also rebuilding the Tumut & Batlow branches route you mentioned in a previous post.
Thanks
Robert2004-1
 
Phil - the E is a newly resurrected project that's only had about a week's worth of work on it to get it to that stage. I believe the creator fully intends on releasing them, along with the Taits and Swingdoors they're also working on. Sure will populate my route nicely when I get it more complete! Speaking of:

Broadmeadows, Donnybrook, Beveridge, Wallan, Heathcote Junction, Kilmore East, Tallarook.

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Liverpool Range, 1955

4B. Murrurundi, part of town bordering the railway

St Joseph's Catholic church and rectory

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Looking East along Haydon St

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On the T-junction of Adelaide St with Haydon St there were 2 hotels. The Railway Hotel is on the left in the image below, and Tattersall's Hotel is in the centre. In 1955 (the model year), Tattersall's had recently closed, and the ground floor was boarded up. Later it was to re-open as a boarding house. In 2015 when I visited, it was derelict.

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T-junction termination of Albert St with Haydon St

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Intersection of Victoria and Haydon Streets

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Haydon St bridge over Halls Creek

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St Paul's Anglican church

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Small vineyard off Pages St. Railway barracks and depot water tanks in upper right corner.

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Murrurundi aged care is today a modern complex, the buildings occupying the entire land block. For the 1950s I have fantasized a little. The able elderly may walk a circuit in the backyard arboreum.

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Liverpool Range, 1955

4C. Departing Murrurundi

A Down fast goods has paused at Murrurundi so that a bank engine can buffer-up to the rear of the train to assist in the climb of the 1-in-40 grade to Ardglen.

The D53 banking engine gets the train moving

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The slack gate keeper (me) has failed to shut the gates of the Albert St level crossing

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Liverpool Range, 1955

4D. Murrurundi locomotive depot

1. Looking in Down direction (West) from Up (East) end of depot. 3 structures from far left to centre of image are the crew barracks, covered water tanks with water purifier and depot records store.

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2. Looking in Up direction (East) from Down (West) end of depot. Following the road to the right off the Mount St bridge in the foreground you will see a large water tank. This gravity fed the 2 tanks at the Up end of the depot that supplied all the depot water columns. In turn, this tank received water from the railway reservoir to the West at Temple Court.

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3. At the far Down end of the depot was a 5-bay coal stage. I have not seen a description of the use of this design. Note that tracks run down both sides of the coal stage. My guess is that coal was unloaded from S-trucks on the side nearer the viewer. Each unloading bay had a step down from the stage level. A shoveller could stand on the low step, open the S-truck’s swing door, and shovel the coal across from the truck to the stage without having to lift each shovelfull higher than the scoop height. On the other hand, loading coal to a tender from the coal stage would be more easily done if the tender was positioned on the other side of the coal stage. The shoveller could gain height by standing on the coal heaped against the other side of the stage and shovel from this height into the adjacent tender.

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4. The banker engine has just returned from a job, and has bypassed the engine shed by using the Arrivals road, and now stands over the Arrivals ash pit. The pit has a sunken Ash Road to facilitate shoveling ash from the pit to the waiting S-truck. The loco has returned tender first from Ardglen, and so will not require turning on the turntable before its next banking job.

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5. The 4-road shed of 1899 was no longer required by the 1920s as Werris Creek depot assumed responsibility for train-engine supply previously held by Murrurundi. Murrurundi depot became purely a source of assist engines for the Liverpool Range. In the following screenshots of the shed interior you can see Road 4 has had its rails removed and the inspection pit has been boarded over. Over time the shed’s roof cladding over Roads 3 & 4 has been removed, and the better sheets presumably used to repair the roof over Roads 1 & 2. To prevent rain ingress the shed opened in 1899 had chimneys above the smoke-ventilating roof apertures, but the chimney wood rotted resulting in their removal by the 1950s to leave the roof apertures unprotected. The locos at rest in the shed are not ready for their next job - they are facing the wrong way!

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Liverpool Range, 1955

4E. Murrurundi law and order

applegathc, your observation of a landscape similarity between Tehachapi Pass, California and the Pages River valley, NSW jogged my mind to consider a parallel in the European settlement of North America and Australia. In the 19th century colonial era the frontier of settlement moved westward from the eastern seaboard as the indigenous population was dispossessed. The rule of colonial law was weak at the frontier.
From https://www.freesettlerorfelon.com/murrurundi.htm :
In December 1840 the infamous Jewboy Gang arrived in (Murrurundi) village. After the gang had been hunted from their haunts in the lower (Hunter) valley they headed north where they robbed a store at Muswellbrook. Then with loaded packhorses they proceeded to Scone where they bailed up townsfolk at John Wilkie's St. Aubins Inn. After 23 year old storekeeper John Graham was shot and killed, the gang headed for the Liverpool Ranges. They arrived in Murrurundi, where they bailed up 30 people at James Henry Atkinson's Travellers' Rest Inn. Perhaps among their captives were postmaster John Button and pound keeper
Anthony Charles Barlas. When they headed for the Liverpool Ranges they were unaware that Edward Denny Day and his pursuit party including Dr. John Gill were just a few hours behind them. The bushrangers were captured after a dramatic shoot out at Doughboy Hollow and were later executed.
Doughboy Hollow is today called Ardglen. It lies at the peak of the railway’s climb over the Liverpool Range.
Bushranger activities like the one above caused petitions by the Murrurundi community for a permanent presence of law enforcement. In 1861 there was, at last, affirmative action. A court house and gaol was opened in Murulla St, Murrurundi. The court house with attached police station survives today. The adjacent gaol has been re-purposed. Here are the buildings as they were in 1955:

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The courthouse and police station

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The colonial gaol, re-purposed in the post-colonial era. The cell blocks were 2 small wings attached to the lock-up keeper's residence. In today's terms, given the small size of the cells, I think it functioned more as a remand centre for people awaiting trial, rather than a gaol for convicted criminals.

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