South Australia
South Australia was once the proud owner of nearly 5300 km of track throughout the state using both narrow and broad gauge lines. The Commonwealth Railways also had a presence in SA since 1911, and when they eventually built lines, they laid standard gauge tracks down, causing three gauges to be present in one state. This lead to an outbreak of break of gauge stations at numerous locations throughout the state causing not only passenger inconvenience, but economic inefficiency. The railways in South Australia were rejuvenated during the 1920’s ‘Webb Era’ but after the war years a steady decline had set in that was never really arrested (not by any means a unique problem to SA). The final death knell to much of the system was after the “Amalgamation” of the SAR country system with the Commonweath Railways, forming the Australian National Railways, in 1978. The early and mid 1980s saw many stations, goods sheds, and yards, demolished and closed. Stations not required by AN in the country reverted to the state, and then many were torn down. In the suburbs buildings were here today, and gone tomorrow. A final cleansing at the end of the 80s saw what little remained of the old SAR around Adelaide vanish. By now the vast majority of the wood and iron constructed buildings were no more, and some of the beautiful old brick and stone edifices were nothing more than cleared land. So, now is the time to remember the old Dry Creek, Salisbury, Smithfield, Eden Hills, Long Gully, Albert Park, Owen, Mount Bryan, Monarto South, Finniss, and many, many others.
In this early stage of the development of the South Australian part of the site, it will not be quite so orderly as the other states featured here. We have been given access to the Dean Jackson Collection which while historically excellent, do not quite match the formatting we have used in the other states (ie: by line section). This will be rectified when Davo scans up his SAR work, and we’ll then move the Dean Jackson Pictures to their proper lines.
