Borambola Station Building - 1

 

Borambola Station

Borambola was located 41km from Wagga - almost halfway between Wagga, and Humula.  It opened in 1917.

Facilities as built included an A4 station building, a toilet block, a J1 station master residence, a G2 goods shed, stock loading ramps, and an elevated water tank with pump from a nearby creek.

 

Uranquinty Station was relocated from Borambola in 1935.  Why such a substantial station building was built at Borambola remains a mystery to me.  I took this picture in 1990, prior to Uranquinty's station demolition

Rear of Uranquinty station

 

I have no idea what the thinking was.   Whilst Borambola once had a primary school, I can find no evidence that there was ever enough population to justify an A4 station building.  It took just 18 months for the Station Master position to be removed.  And it would come as no surprise, that in 1935, the station was relocated to Uranquinty.  A small corrugated iron shed was substituted.

Pictures of Borambola station

Mark Pottie visited Borambola in 1982, and photographed the station building/shed. This image is scanned from the Tumba Rail booklet 'Wagga Wagga to Tumbarumba Railway - "An era of change"' and used with permission. Is the round water tank visible on the LHS, originally from the station?

Looking south, my only visit to Borambola was in the early 1980s.

Closeup of my slide image

Looking North - the silhouette of the station building has no details useful for a model of the station.  

I only visited the station site once in the early 1980s, but failed to take enough photos.  At that stage, I was not planning to model the line.  My memory of the building was it was a simple drafty corrugated iron shed, with nothing to indicate the station once had more importance.

Researching Borambola has been difficult.   Most of the photos I have in my accumulations are of the G2 goods shed, followed by the elevated water tank, and the stockyards.  I have no images of the A4 station or J1 station master residence prior to their removal.  Seems to me the replacement station building (or waiting shed), lacked any appeal to photographers.  Had the station been built small to start with, it might have looked like Umbango – a lot nicer.

Unbango - photographed by Graeme Skeet in the mid 1980s.  This station was constructed by 1917 for the opening of the line.  It similarly sized to Borambola's station shed, and also shares the trait of the nameboard above the door 

Graham Pegg photographed a tour train in front of the elevated water tank in 1965.  The goods shed roof is just visible on the RHS of the image. The station building is hidden by 3020, the second loco of the train.

Graeme Skeet also photographed Borambola, this image taken from the nearby Mate's Gully Road.  Assume the station area was no longer accessable.  At first glance, it shows the good shed, however, the station building (with part of the tin roof missing) is just discernable.  This is the only picture I have showing the station front doorway, more or less front on. The other thing to note is the closeness of the communication/telegraph pole. I don't recall any safeworking wiring within the shed, but it probably existed at some stage

The model

Without measurements, I based my model’s dimensions on a NSW A1 station, although it might have been slightly bigger.   

The A1 station building plan of 1909 - a portion of Data Sheet B2 by Greg Edwards.  These sheets are invaluable for anyone wanting to scratchbuild or detail NSW structures

From memory, the tin shed at Borambola did not have the rear window, and I don't recall any interior wooden cladding or even a seat.  So my interior is  fantasy.  In my defence, I would rather construct something that is moderately attractive, for a working railway line, rather than an abandoned and stripped structure.

Construction was fairly simple.  Cut out the sides, and floor – scribe the walls, and cement into position.  The internal framing done with evergreen styrene strips.  Seating based on the Greg Edwards data sheet – although my rendition of this is rather crude, it should work in the gloom once the roof is on.

After cutting out the sides, and floor, I made a start on assembly before I scribed the interior boards. Whoops.  This made the scribing a bit trickier.

On the underside, I cemented in some joists for the piers that would support the rear of the structure

Interior framing was easy with evergreen styrene strips (0.030 x 0.040). There will be no lighting inside the structure, so there was no need to beef up the walls to prevent stray light showing through.

Rather than 2 sets of seats as per Gregs diagram (which would be virtually invisible when the structure is positioned on the layout, I made use of the lack of a window, and ran the seating along the rear.  The effectiveness of the scribing hides the flatness of the rear of the Evergreen corrugated iron sheets quite effectively

 

Next stage is to finish the doorway, construct the roof, and paint.  And I might have to fit a water tank to the side - similar to Umbango.  It wasn't in place in the early 1980s, but probably was in 1970.

Stay safe during the lockdown – build a model or two.