First train to head south
For the first time since the earthquake, a train will be able to head south to Lake Grassmere on Monday after extensive repairs to the Main North Line.
The job facing engineers and track gangs to repair the 347-kilometre stretch of rail between Picton and Christchurch has been described as the biggest in generations.
More than 150 kilometres of the line was damaged in the November earthquake, which twisted railway tracks, sent slips over the route and caused structural damage to bridges and tunnels.
No estimate was available for when the key freight link would be up and running, but KiwiRail says it has made significant progress by restoring the first section of the track to Lake Grassmere.
KiwiRail group general manager network services Todd Moyle said more than 100 staff members, consultants and contractors worked through the holiday period doing design work and fixing tracks.
‘‘We have had track gangs moving in both directions, from Picton south and Christchurch north, over the holidays and a key strategic goals was to get the line to Grassmere completed,’’ he said.
Lake Grassmere is about 40km south of Blenheim, and while there were no slips over the railway tracks, Moyle said there were 50 faults and large sections of the line had moved sideways.
‘‘Our people started that work two-and-a-half weeks before Christmas, so to have it finished by the second week of January is a remarkable feat,’’ he said.
KiwiRail would be running a test train to Lake Grassmere on Monday, the first time a train had been further south than Spring Creek, north of Blenheim, since the earthquake.
To repair the railway tracks a digger mounted on wheels, called a high-rail digger, had been run down the line while operators used the digger arm to re-align the bent sections. While it had not been done yet, this would be followed by a tamper, a machine which refined the alignment and compressed the ballast around the sleepers to make sure they were firmly held in place.
Moyle said the KiwiRail design team as well as external consultants had been working hard to complete designs for the bridges and tunnels along the Main North Line that needed to be repaired or replaced.
There were 180 bridges on the line between Picton and Christchurch, however Moyle said only around 10 of these required work, and designs had almost been completed for six of them.
‘‘Designing a new bridge would normally take several months.
‘‘Instead, in a matter of weeks, we will have six bridge designs ready to go so that construction can begin in early February.
‘‘Accelerating the design process for both bridges and tunnels is a critical part of re-building the line as quickly as possible.
There were 21 tunnels between Picton and Christchurch, however Moyle said only a handful had been damaged enough to warrant repairs.
Unlike State Highway 1, which experts have said will needed to be re-routed in places because of safety concerns, Moyle said he thought the Main North Line would largely remain where it was before the earthquake.
‘‘I think predominantly it will remain in its current alignment, there may be one or two sections we may have to assess, but no decisions have been made on that yet,’’ he said.
The cost of the repairs remained unknown, however Transport Minister Simon Bridges has said the overall cost of repairing the transport network, including both road and rail, could be up to $2 billion.
Moyle said KiwiRail was working closely with other members of the North Canterbury Transport Infrastructure Recovery alliance to co-ordinate repairs along SH1 and the Main North Line.
Before the earthquake, the state-owned enterprise was moving more than 1 million tonnes of freight a year between Picton and Christchurch, the equivalent of 80,000 trucks, which was now being moved by sea or by road.
New Zealand Transport Agency earthquake recovery manager Steven Mutton said last week between 150 and 200 workers were expected to start clearing slips on SH1 north of Kaikoura beginning the week of January 9.