Mother's Bridge

 An update on Mother's Bridge - Inland Rail modifications

Inland Rail changes in Junee, have forced a lot of traffic to the level crossing.  Last week, I was stopped first in line, by the boom gates for around 5 minutes, waiting for the long container train to pass through.  The one bonus, is that I get to do some picture taking.

3 years ago, I covered the pair of footbridges that cross the railway line in Wagga, mentioning that they would be replaced with Inland Rail

https://buildingwagga.blogspot.com/2022/06/footbridges.html

Well, changes have started.  This blog post will be an update on the earlier post, including some new information.  For completeness, I will include some pictures that appeared in my 2022 blog post.

Built in 1936.

Image stolen from the Lost Wagga Wagga facebook page

Mothers bridge was opened in 1936, by the Mayor of Wagga.  The below newspaper article gives the reason why the bridge was called "Mothers Bridge".  The pictures used in the newpaper article date from later; what interested me is that they used one of mine. (The newspaper article  appeared on Lost Wagga Wagga facebook group, without acknowledging the source of either picture)

I took my picture in 2007, with my Olympus C350 digital camera.  The footbridge was a firm favourite with photographers over the decades

Sixmaps aerial image shows Mothers bridge.  

Plans of the bridge will be very useful when it comes to making my model.  Thanks Bob S for supplying me with these from the NSW railway archives

Some detail pictures

The original girder connection to the northern ramp.  There is a subtle hint that the original bridge is a cantilever design - which is important, as we will see later

Inland Rail artist impressions

The following images were taken from the Inland Rail video of the artist impression of the new bridge.  It is pretty impressive video, particularly in the rendition of the Wagga Wagga station and surrounds, including the palm tree. 

The street entrance to the Wagga Railway museum isn't right, but I am impressed they got the correct number of corner blocks.  This level of detail takes time, and I wonder what the video actually cost?

The temporary changes

In the last week, there has been a "discussion" in the press on who owns "Mothers Bridge".  Inland Rail have suggested that the bridge was always owned by Wagga council, and that Wagga council will be responsible for the cost of replacement.  Of course, Wagga council has other ideas.  

The first part of the rebuild was to remove the northern ramp, and replace with temporary scaffolding

Side road to parking, and other buildings is manually controlled traffic lights.  Northern Access to Mothers bridge is beside the station, and up the scaffolding ramp.

The existing bridge girder cantilevers on the platform support, and the scaffolding then connects

The original northern ramp has been fully removed, leaving just flat ground. 

The scaffolding ramp is less steep than the ramp now removed.

Finishing up.

Some bonus shots from recent operations on Kangaroo Valley 

During the October operation session, I was able to run the new Auscsion DEB set from Moruya to Sydney and return.  Lovely looking and running model.  Here it is on Kangaroo Valley - platform 2

November had me doing the Limestone Local run (again).  1307 and CCA crosses the 159' Whitten truss bridge on its way to Kangaroo Valley.  The bridge was a very limited edition Anton UnEEK kit.  (I have 2 spans for my Murrumbidgee river bridge)

At Kangaroo Valley, the tank engine runs around the carriage, for the return trip

Until next time, build a model or two