Hump yards in Australia and New Zealand

MKrumholz Jan 20, 2002

  1. MKrumholz

    MKrumholz New Member

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    Hello everyone,

    I am a German rail enthusiast specially interested in hump yards of the whole world. I have created an international YAHOO group about this subject:
    http://www.groups.yahoo.com/group/humpyardgroup
    where I want to post a database about all hump yards of the world. I have only very few knowledge about Australian and New Zealand's hump yards, those I know are:
    1) AUSTRALIA: Sydney-Enfield, Melbourne North Yard, Melbourne-Tottenham (?), Northam and Perth-Forrestfield;
    2) New Zealand: Westfield (Auckland) and Te Rapa (Hamilton).

    Thus I ask everyone who knows more about hump yards in A. and NZ. please to help me and tell me:

    1) Who knows whether all hump yards in A. and NZ. are closed such as it happened in Great Britain and Japan?

    2) Who knows any details about one of these yards (GAUGE!!!, retarders, number of tracks in the marshalling sidings formerly and today)?

    3) Who knows other hump yards in A. and NZ. (if possible with further details)?

    4) Who knows whether Adelaide with its surroundings and Christchurch have hump yards? (For Brisbane I have got the information that there never was a hump yard from the Queensland-rail-related YAHOO-group).

    5) Who knows whether Tottenham and the freight yard of Wellington have humps? If yes, how many marshalling sidings are there? Retarders?

    6) I have an old aerial image from Newcastle which shows a very large freight yard near the steelworks. Who knows the name of that yard, is or was there a hump, does the yard still exist? Does anyone know other large industrial yards (hump or flat)?

    7) Are there any large flat shunting yards which are comparabely with hump yards by size? If yes, how many tracks are there?

    Thank you very much in advance for your labour.

    Regards,

    Michael Krumholz.
     
    MKrumholz, Jan 20, 2002
    #1
  2. Gats

    Gats TrainBoard Member

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    Michael,

    As far as I know there isn't any hump yards in Australia, and Enfield is definitely NOT a hump yard - it is a gravity yard built on a gentle grade. Rather than having to push the cars over a US-style hump, they utilise gravity to keep the cars rolling slowly to the end position. A shunter (carman?) either rides the car or wlks beside it applying the hand brake, which is located on the side sill rather than the typical end mount used in the US, for example.

    Gary.
     
    Gats, Feb 4, 2002
    #2

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