This is the end.
All our cities are changing and for some things, at some stage, you have to say "This is the end".
I am back on my primary hobby here, which of course is railways. This shot shows an isolated stub of the Pinkenba Branch railway in Brisbane
which ran, indeed, still runs (sort of) from Eagle Junction down to the industrial suburb of Pinkenba on the north side and towards the mouth of the Brisbane River.
Until a few years ago, this was a busy and important railway to the wharves and industries along the river, as well as being a bit of a humble passenger carrier.
The line passed close to some of Brisbane's more affluent suburbs of Ascot and Hamilton as well as the two main racecourses of Eagle Farm (opposite Ascot station) and Doomben. At Whinstanes, another branch headed towards the river and served several fuel and bitumen depots, Clyde (locomotive builders), Hamilton Yard, what was once the Butter Board, cold stores and wharves along the Hamilton Reach. This line has now well and truly gone with high rise apartments and some different light industry taking over. One day it will all be apartments.
The main branch continued past the old airport which it never really served, a slew of factories including the Ford factory, a defence supply depot (still there) and several other industrial premises over the years.
At Pinkenba proper, it served a fuel depot, a meatworks in years gone by, a large railway yard for grain wagons awaiting unloading at the main grain export terminal and the ACF & Shirleys fertiliser plant. There was the original station near the river and in later years, a new station on a separate line that veered over towards the main road. A meagre passenger service served industrial workers and the odd Pinkenba village resident - on weekends almost no trains at all except for the racecourses. From Pinkenba railway yard, a further line of several kilometres headed further down river serving more fuel, bitumen and LPG depots including the erstwhile Amoco Oil refinery, later BP and now no longer refining.
Industrial change, development of the new Port of Brisbane on the south side, increasing use of trucks and abandonment of rail for fuel saw change not only to the industrial landscape, but the withering of the need for a railway line at all. The section in my photo was on the long siding to the oil refinery opposite the Shell Depot but now entirely closed and lifted - this is just an abandoned and isolated left over, not connected to anything. The station and services left us in the early 90's and its site is now a resources recovery depot. The grain terminal became an ethanol plant and plans to rail grain there never came to fruition despite a new unloader being built. What grain is used is brought some 200 kilometres on busy highways and suburban roads by B double like tippers.
The railway became an instrument of its own death. Railways and fuel suppliers all over most of Australia appeared to jointly abandon rail for most fuel supply, even though it was a bulk traffic and safer by rail. The moribund sidings became depositories for surplus rollingstock, fuel tank cars and other wagons no longer required by the modern railway. Once they were scrapped on site, the rails themselves were torn up and scrapped. The Pinkenba line beyond Doomben where the passenger service now stops, once so busy with shiny rails is now little more than a rusty, weed grown siding with a balloon loop at the end around the ethanol plant that turns its back on the railway surrounding it. No regular trains polish its rusty rails.
It's happened at all Queensland coastal cities and major railway yards as in Sydney and New South Wales, Melbourne and Victoria and round the world. A sad indictment of misuse of infrastructure and a focus on road for nearly everything. Trucks have their place, don't get me wrong but with a will, rail could carry more. Ask the Tasmanians and New Zealanders, it can be done, rail can pay for shorter distances and more commodities. By the time we wake up, it will be too late. Rebuilding diverse rail freight will not happen in the same way we have rebuilt light rail for passengers. It's too expensive and the competition is waiting to let their driverless behemoth trucks loose on the open road. It's already started and it won't stop!
May I quote from the first verse of "This is the End" by Adele from Skyfall, the 007 movie.
"This is the end
Hold your breath and count to ten
Feel the Earth move and then
Hear my heart burst again
For this is the end
I've drowned and dreamt this moment
So overdue, I owe them
Swept away, I'm stolen"
Source: LyricFind
Songwriters: Adele Laurie Blue Adkins / Paul Richard Epworth
Skyfall lyrics © Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC, Universal Music Publishing Group
This is the end.
All our cities are changing and for some things, at some stage, you have to say "This is the end".
I am back on my primary hobby here, which of course is railways. This shot shows an isolated stub of the Pinkenba Branch railway in Brisbane
which ran, indeed, still runs (sort of) from Eagle Junction down to the industrial suburb of Pinkenba on the north side and towards the mouth of the Brisbane River.
Until a few years ago, this was a busy and important railway to the wharves and industries along the river, as well as being a bit of a humble passenger carrier.
The line passed close to some of Brisbane's more affluent suburbs of Ascot and Hamilton as well as the two main racecourses of Eagle Farm (opposite Ascot station) and Doomben. At Whinstanes, another branch headed towards the river and served several fuel and bitumen depots, Clyde (locomotive builders), Hamilton Yard, what was once the Butter Board, cold stores and wharves along the Hamilton Reach. This line has now well and truly gone with high rise apartments and some different light industry taking over. One day it will all be apartments.
The main branch continued past the old airport which it never really served, a slew of factories including the Ford factory, a defence supply depot (still there) and several other industrial premises over the years.
At Pinkenba proper, it served a fuel depot, a meatworks in years gone by, a large railway yard for grain wagons awaiting unloading at the main grain export terminal and the ACF & Shirleys fertiliser plant. There was the original station near the river and in later years, a new station on a separate line that veered over towards the main road. A meagre passenger service served industrial workers and the odd Pinkenba village resident - on weekends almost no trains at all except for the racecourses. From Pinkenba railway yard, a further line of several kilometres headed further down river serving more fuel, bitumen and LPG depots including the erstwhile Amoco Oil refinery, later BP and now no longer refining.
Industrial change, development of the new Port of Brisbane on the south side, increasing use of trucks and abandonment of rail for fuel saw change not only to the industrial landscape, but the withering of the need for a railway line at all. The section in my photo was on the long siding to the oil refinery opposite the Shell Depot but now entirely closed and lifted - this is just an abandoned and isolated left over, not connected to anything. The station and services left us in the early 90's and its site is now a resources recovery depot. The grain terminal became an ethanol plant and plans to rail grain there never came to fruition despite a new unloader being built. What grain is used is brought some 200 kilometres on busy highways and suburban roads by B double like tippers.
The railway became an instrument of its own death. Railways and fuel suppliers all over most of Australia appeared to jointly abandon rail for most fuel supply, even though it was a bulk traffic and safer by rail. The moribund sidings became depositories for surplus rollingstock, fuel tank cars and other wagons no longer required by the modern railway. Once they were scrapped on site, the rails themselves were torn up and scrapped. The Pinkenba line beyond Doomben where the passenger service now stops, once so busy with shiny rails is now little more than a rusty, weed grown siding with a balloon loop at the end around the ethanol plant that turns its back on the railway surrounding it. No regular trains polish its rusty rails.
It's happened at all Queensland coastal cities and major railway yards as in Sydney and New South Wales, Melbourne and Victoria and round the world. A sad indictment of misuse of infrastructure and a focus on road for nearly everything. Trucks have their place, don't get me wrong but with a will, rail could carry more. Ask the Tasmanians and New Zealanders, it can be done, rail can pay for shorter distances and more commodities. By the time we wake up, it will be too late. Rebuilding diverse rail freight will not happen in the same way we have rebuilt light rail for passengers. It's too expensive and the competition is waiting to let their driverless behemoth trucks loose on the open road. It's already started and it won't stop!
May I quote from the first verse of "This is the End" by Adele from Skyfall, the 007 movie.
"This is the end
Hold your breath and count to ten
Feel the Earth move and then
Hear my heart burst again
For this is the end
I've drowned and dreamt this moment
So overdue, I owe them
Swept away, I'm stolen"
Source: LyricFind
Songwriters: Adele Laurie Blue Adkins / Paul Richard Epworth
Skyfall lyrics © Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC, Universal Music Publishing Group