North Island: Blue Sky
New Zealand: Blue Sky
Welcome back to Blue Sky on the Substack. Following Jetlag Season 5, and the resurgence of “Okaihu Express”, I went ahead and did a series of maps for the major centers of New Zealand.
The North Island currently has the Te Huia (Auckland-Hamilton) and Northern Explorer (Auckland-Wellington) intercity routes, with Wellington’s distance Capital Connection (to Palmerston North) and Waipara Connection (to Masterton) have equipment contracted out from KiwiRail, but operated by Transdev-the capital’s commuter rail system.
As for the South island, there are two more intercity routes that meet in Christchurch: the Costal Pacific continues north to Picton while the TranzAlpine heads to the west coast. There are no intercity services north of the Auckland metro or south of Christchurch. A previously suspended service, the Southerner, will return for four days in May as far as Dunedin-when the original ran all the way to Invercargill (which was the southern most train station in the world).
Kiwi Rail also operates the Interislander ferry between Wellington and Picton.
Today, lets reel it back into to the North Island for today.
Auckland
Currently, Auckland is building a center city tunnel to allow through service at Power Rangers SPD filming location Britomart/Waitematā. Once completed, tracks 1 & 5 will be through tracks and track 2 will be closed.
I added long-held proposals to convert the Northern Busway to rail, as well as an airport connection originally proposed as light rail that got shelved-in this case via an extension of the presently truncated (no longer serves Britomart) Onehunga line via rebuilding the HWY 20 bridge to carry trains serving Mangere and the north lot before arriving at the Airport itself. To the north, I extended the ex-busway from Albany to Hibiscus Coast (renamed Silverdale, presently just jumps on the highway) and Orewa.
Unlike the official proposal, I merged the west and south and made the Eastern line terminate at Grafton simply because I made both of these branches significantly longer, so would make sense to have short-turns of 10-30-60 min zones, while the Eastern line might have less ridership since Manukau is a stub (a very useful stub, but still a stub) and reduced density than on the core of the West-South from Puhinui to HWY 19 (New Lynn is right by the mall and Henderson has warehouses-but mostly just strip malls and single family homes).
I continued service hourly beyond Swanson to Helensville, with a “Northern Connection” intercity train continuing to Whangārei via Kaipara Flats, Wellsford, Maungaturoto, Waiotira (thruway to Dargaville). Maybe eventually tracks could be restored to Otiria, then just keep busses beyond that-sorry Okaihau.
I thought Strand was a stub, but its fine. Line 4 comes from a proposed Southdown line shown on Open Railway, which still leaves a lot without rail inside it between HWY 20 and HWY 1/North Island Main Trunk-but it would keep a crosstown line after the Onehunga runs to the north shore.
Hamilton NZ
Continuing south with the Te Huia we hit Frankton Junction and Hamilton. With an abandoned line at Huntly, I thought about partially restoring service with streetcars, with commuter service continuing 2 stops north to Te Kauwhata unless a yard can be built more cost effectively closer to Pokeno-in which case 20-30min service south of Huntly, hourly + 3 additional peak trips to Pukekohe (and at least 3 round trips Daily via the Te Huia and thrice weekly Northern Explorer).
The branch to Huntly would continue with an extended Te Huia to Hamilton’s bus terminal (renamed Hamilton-Angelsea, guess we can go back to Hamilton being Frankton JCT?), with the blue line serving the University of Waikaito and local stops to Cambridge, with the Te Huia being express from Hamilton to Cambridge-likely below grade under HWY 1B to avoid a business on the branch.
The red line would continue south of Frankton to the next stop on the Northern Explorer, Te Awamutu, whilst to the west along with a new intercity train 3 stops west of the University in Morrinsville. This new intercity train would continue to Taraunga in the Bay of Plenty.
To make all of this work, the junction needs to be rebuilt to allow trains to not have to reverse out of Frankton Junction and to try and double track the whole thing with a new connecting track with platforms on all track segments in order for it to work.
I also added two more sophisticated LRT/BRT lines to the west running from Anglesea to Swarbick Circle as a 10min or better combined service before branching to the zoo and Whatawhata/Raglan.
Bay of Plenty
Our Bay of Plenty IC train then meets the Bay Hopper west line at Waharoa JCT (with our Bay Hopper line continuing to the Raceway-also where a yard would be). Crossing the mountains, there will be bus connections near Aparta to Athenree, Waiiti, or Waihi (actually back in Waikaito region). This network would realistically work with Stadler FLIRT DMU’s. Maybe we can couple 2 together if we need to?
Like Auckland, I decided to close a loop-with minor freight spur interference at Tauranga Central to provide a 1-stop connection from the airport westbound (being New Zealand, the left-side of the tracks). The line from Waharoa would run counterclock-wise though, serving the airport before returning outbound.
The other Taraunga-serving Bay Hopper would serve the city area clockwise, continuing outbound at Mercury Ballpark towards Matatā/Tāneatua.
At Matatā, a shuttle line to Murupara would be built-with only new ROW from Putauaki to Onepu to bypass the dairy at Kawerau.
Unfortunately, the seat of power at Rotorua is isolated from the rest of the network. The branch between Putāruru and Rotorua is abandoned or non-existent. A modern routing would make more sense along HWY 36-which what I made the thruway do (along with a more local service serving the airport, Kawerau, and meeting the Murupara branch).
This network is probably the most fantasy although the Airport crossing could be built cost-effectively.
Palmerston North
Back on the Mainline with the Northern Explorer, which serves Taumarunui (and occasionally, Okahukura), it serves (Tongariro) National Park-entering Manawatū-Whanganui region. North of a junction at Marton, only the locally-operated National Park express (only serving Palmerston North, Airport, Marton, Waioru, and National Park) and Interregional line (might skip lesser-used stations) parallel the Northern Explorer. Continuing west, the Whanganui Line continues over rivers and mountains before terminating downtown to serve the college there.
The mainline continues to New Plymouth in Tamaraki, but I didn’t double down on intercity service here although there’s another giant Volcano National Park there too. Such a service would probably terminate in Palmerston North, serve the Airport, Marton, Whanganui East, Waitotara, Hāwera, Stratford, Ingelwood, and New Plymouth.
The Interrgional East of Palmerston North is a commuter line to Woodville that parallels the Whanganui line to Shannon the Capital Connection, with this branch continuing with the Capital Connection to Wellington Territory in Waikanae.
Wellington
from Waikanae, the Kapiti line takes over local service (I could see Mana rebuilt to handle short-turns). I did decide to extend the Johnsonville line with a tunnel continuing from Raroa to an underground infill station at Glenside to serve Grenada Village.
I also fully integrated the Wairarapa Connection into the Hutt Valley Line with 15-20min service to Upper Hutt, 30-60min to Masterton, with an additional peak round trip terminating at Fetherson except on holidays with 30mins to Upper Hutt, 60mins to Fetherson, and 6rts all the way to Masterton.
I converted the Stub of the Melling Branch into Light Rail from Petone to the Silverstream Railway.
I also extended a freight spur to Wainuiomata for the idea, but I think even a local bus to Petone with some trips running express into Wellington would be significantly cheaper.
I also decided on an extension of the main trunk by extending platforms 1-5 underground to the airport and ferry terminal as the new Te Aro Trunk with stops at Lambarton (for the cable car to Kelburn), Te Aro (probably right under Te Aro Park), Newtwon (Wellington College), Wellington Zoo (Wakefield Hospital), Onepu [Road] (with bus connection to Lyall Bay), and Wellington Airport-with perhaps an even further extension to the Weta Workshops.
Back at Central, platforms 6-9 would continue to serve the Northern Explorer and most service to/beyond Featherston, including a possible Kiwi Rail reinstatement of control of a true intercity route being Wairarapa to Woodville and beyond. I could see some intercity trains also run all the way to the airport, but I don’t mind retracting this as I never planned for the Northern Explorer to do this since its classed as “long distance”.
What would be your opinion, should the Masterson/Woodville and Palmerston North trains use the Te Aro tunnel to run express from the existing station to the airport?