Entrance to a tunnel on the Christchurch railway
Entrance to a tunnel on the Christchurch railway
[ca. 1868]
Contractors drilled the railway tunnel through the Port Hills from Heathcote to Lyttelton and completed it in 1867. The first train passed through the tunnel on 18 Nov. 1867. It is 1.6 miles (2.5km) long, cost £240,000, and was the first time a complete section of an extinct volcano had been cut. The scheme was promoted by the Canterbury Superintendent, William Sefton Moorhouse (1825?-1881) as a government scheme to get around the problem of farmers transporting their goods to Lyttelton either over the Bridle Path or the very difficult Sumner Road. Goods could be taken over the Sumner Bar but this too was dangerous. See The Christchurch star, 1 Nov. 1960, p. 28
File Reference CCL-KCPD-18-0029
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