Today's historic photo of the day: Exactly forty years ago today, I returned to Tuggeranong siding, but this time, instead of photographing the Canberra Monaro Express DEB set as I had the previous Saturday, this day I saw diesel #locomotive 42102 in Candy livery, flat end leading, hauling five non aircon passenger cars on the northbound Cooma Mail running on the far side of the Melrose Valley NSW/ACT, February 16 1985.
The Cooma Mail at this time ran four nights per week (Sun, Tues, Thurs, Fri) from Sydney, overnight down to Cooma, then the following morning it returned in daylight from Cooma to Sydney, and passed through the Melrose Valley and Tuggeranong station in the late morning.
The Cooma Mail ran for the last time just over one year later. This line saw its last regular passenger trains in 1988, its last goods trains in 1989 and ceased operating as a tourist railway in 2006.
A few seconds later, the train is here headed west on the south side of Melrose Valley as seen from my vantage point above Tuggeranong station. The train is in NSW as are the hills behind, but the land between us and the train is all in the ACT.
After navigating the curves at the eastern end of the Melrose Valley, the train rounds the curve into Tuggeranong station. The station had closed to passengers a decade beforehand, so she just rolled through without stopping.
42102, flat end leading, rolls across the Old Tuggeranong Road level crossing at the west (up) end of the closed station. Old Tuggeranong Road was really just a dirt track, and as I recall, it was protected by a gate that was normally closed to road traffic.
The train rolls past me and into the cutting just below me. You can see the classic EMD style streamlined cab at the no 1 end of the locomotive. Whilst these locos had a streamlined cab at just one end, they had a fully functioning driving cab at the no 2 end.
And finally, she rolls around the corner and heads up towards Queanbeyan. Note the largely vacant valley in the background which is approximately the location of today’s Canberra suburbs of Chisholm and Gilmore.
