Outram Branch

In its early years, Outram served as the railhead during the construction of the Taieri Gorge section of the Otago Central Railway (now preserved as the Taieri Gorge Railway). Trains ran six days a week as promised, and due to restrictions on the weight of locomotives allowed to cross the Taieri River bridge, the line was operated by small tank locomotives such as the F class, with the W^F class being the heaviest class permitted.^[1]

In 1930, two services ran return daily, but this was seen to be excessive and trains were cut to run once daily. These services were mixed trains and they operated until 13 January 1950, when the passenger component was cancelled and the line became freight only. The line was proving uneconomic and the cessation of passenger services could not save its poor financial state. By the early 1950s, traffic was almost non-existent: 107 tonnes of agricultural lime and fertiliser were railed in a week, with a meagre seven tonnes of freight railed out. Outram was very adequately served by road transportation and the railway was overdue for maintenance - it was clear it would not be beneficial to keep it open any longer. Accordingly, the line was closed to all traffic on 5 December 1953.^[2]

It is typical for both nature and human activity to reduce or wholly destroy traces of closed railway lines, and little remains of the Outram Branch. In Outram itself, the goods shed has been incorporated as part of a road transportation company's depot, and outside of the town, across the Taieri River, School Road uses the old route of the railway for nearly three kilometres. Concrete abutments at the location of a long-gone bridge over a small creek are still present, as are some traces of the line's formation at points along its former route, and the site of the Dukes Road station still possesses its concrete platform.^[4]