The Burnie Airport Corporation has shortened the runway at Wynyard that used to be crossed by a railway line. But no train has run here since March 2003
and one of the excuses for the truncation of the runway was that the warning light system for trains/planes was too expensive to upkeep. We think the real reason was
that they want to make some money out of a housing subdivision on the old runway!
Approaching from the east, this sign is near the Primary School at East Wynyard
The track is getting to be well overgrown
This is the eastern signal guarding the crossing.
The Camp Creek bridge was one of the many
bridges on this section of the line that were needing repair or replacement.
The new fence across the runway. Visible in the distance above the sign is the runway crossing, the bitumen
stopped at the crossing and the runway to the north was gravel.
Another view of the fence and runway. Another one of the Airport Corporation's concerns was the
inability to secure the perimeter of the airport due to the railway crossing. Perhaps if trains had started running again they could have
installed automatic gates, as used on many farms!
This is how the runway looked in 2002, showing the warning
lights. The railway enters the airport from the east at the left side, location of track indicated by the blue arrow. Part of the bitumen "landing pad" is shown
, actually there was only a small section of the runway in gravel.
A closer view of the lights. Green was the normal indication, changing to flashing red
once the lights were activated by the drivers of approaching trains. In the days when there was a manned
control tower at Wynyard, the lights were activated by the air traffic controllers,
but I am not sure how the railway contacted them.
Another view, this time the sign shown in the upper photos taken from the track is just visible on the left side.
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Updated 23 August 2005