Diesel Hauled Goods trains on the Mansfield Line in Victoria, Australia

The Mansfield branch left Victoria's main North East line at Tallarook. It was 121 kilometres (75 miles) in length and also included a junction at Cathkin for the Alexandra line. It opened in 6 stages between November 1883 and October 1891. In its later years, reduced track maintenance saw the passenger service to and from Melbourne withdrawn after 91 RM left Mansfield for Melbourne on the 28th of May 1977. Goods trains continued to run infrequently until the complete closure of the line, including that to Alexandra on the 8th of November 1978. Although there was the possibility of part of the branch becoming a tourist railway, this was dashed when the track was removed with undue haste, preventing any chance of this occurring. The films included in this video cover the last two decades of the branch's life when steam had been replaced on goods train by diesel electric motive power This material is part of the DVD release `CLOSED BUT NOT FORGOTTEN' which covers a number of closed lines in North Eastern Victoria. For further details, please visit our website www.channel5productions.com