Temporary repairs to Station Roof
Glenreagh Mountain Railway is seeking urgent assistance from the community to save an important part of the Coffs Coast Railway Heritage. We need $13,000 to undertake urgent repairs to the roof of the heritage listed Lowanna Railway Station, with the total replacement cost of the damaged asbestos tiles in the range of $33,000. The roof has weather damage and we need to repair it to stop the rain undoing all the hard restoration work Glenreagh Mountain Railway has undertaken over the years.
This Station is one of the Coffs Coast’s important railway heritage items in this region and a recently commissioned report stated:
“The Lowanna Railway Station Yard, Lowanna, New South Wales, has local historic, social and aesthetic significance as a small intermediate railway station in its rural setting. The Lowanna Railway Station Yard has local historic significance as part of the Glenreagh to Dorrigo Branch Line, constructed between 1916 and 1924. While never considered a profitable line by NSW Railways, the Line played a critical role in the development of the regional economy, transporting a range of goods, most notably timber, within and out of the area. During the period 1924 to 1957, when the line offered passenger services, it connected the occupants of the small communities of the Dorrigo Plateau to each other and the outside world. The significance of Lowanna Station, as the only staffed intermediate station along the line, is manifest in the presence of a precast concrete Station Building (Type Pc.3), Signal Box and Men’s Toilet Block, constructed c.1924. These buildings have historic and technical significance as part of a larger group of precast concrete station buildings designed by engineers and erected by NSW Railways during the interwar period. The Lowanna Railway Station Building was one of at least eighteen Type Pc.3 station buildings constructed, and is one of at least eight still standing. It is the only concrete station building in the Coffs Harbour Local Government Area. Other structures of significance part of the Yard include a Gang Hut and Yard Crane.”
Donations can be sent direct to Glenreagh Mountain Railway, PO Box 104, Glenreagh NSW 2450 or dropped in at the Local Member for Coffs Harbour Office, Andrew Fraser MP, 1/9 Park Avenue COFFS HARBOUR NSW 2450
