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I’m blogging from the Wellington Railway Station where Wellington’s rail development reaches a milestone this weekend.
At the entrance to Wellington Station, new railway signalling systems are being commissioned as one of the final steps in the installation of a third main line.
With the new tracks and overhead wires physically in place already, the next stage was to complete the necessary railway signalling.
That new third main line will be bi-directional, which means it will carry trains into Wellington Station in the morning and out in the evening - and that requires complex new signalling for the whole area.
KiwiRail staff and contractors will be out this weekend working on two major projects to improve the Wellington region’s rail system. While the work is underway, buses will replace some trains.
Once complete, the third main line will reduce congestion at a known bottleneck in the rail network, where four main lines merge into the two which feed the station platforms.
Further north, sections of a new subway are this weekend being installed under the North Island Main Trunk line at Paraparaumu Station. Staff and contractors are working 24 hours over the weekend to ensure the line is open again for passenger services on Monday morning.
Once complete later this year, the subway will connect the existing platform with a second platform being built on the other side of the tracks.
KiwiRail is extending duplicated tracks and electrification so regular commuter services can reach Waikanae early next year.
I was hoping to ride the trains today - but buses have replaced trains all weekend and the ones to Paraparaumu will take forever.
But it’s great to see the progress- and of course the new Matangi trains are only a few weeks arriving by ship in the capital.
3 Comments
Peak flow for the trains! Aucklands equivalent is the Harbour Bridge I suppose. Good stuff for Wellington travellers, and good timing with the Matangi units about to arrive.
it looks like they put new ashpalt on the platforms. on the of the station.
Sorry guys - it’s not a milestone until the job is done, and done right. Let’s hope everything works properly in time for Monday morning..
also seems very odd that they’re doing major work at opposite ends of the wellington metro…. doesn’t seem too smart from a scheduling point of view.