The abandoned Denniston Coal Mine Upper Incline | West Coast | New Zealand

Categories: West Coast Region

Tags: denniston, denniston coal mine, new zealand, west coast

Added: 2 years ago

Looking around the abandoned Denniston Coal Mine Upper Incline on the West Coast of New Zealand's South Island.

In 1879 the Denniston Incline was built to move coal from Denniston down about 518 metres to Conn's Creek. 14 wagons of coal per hour at 12 tons each sped along at 80kph down the 1 in 1.69. Incline. The Denniston mining community of over 1500 people had only one way to get from Denniston down to Conn's Creek and back - in the coal wagons. A lot of food and household goods and people never made the dangerous journey up to Denniston. When the new 5km Bridle track was opened in 1858 it was forbidden ride the coal wagons. In 1967 the Incline was closed down because of the drop in coal sales and the expensive repair work needed to keep the Denniston incline operating. After moving 12 million tons down the Denniston incline it was decided to close it down and use trucks to move the coal down the new Denniston road.

Today Denniston is a small, almost deserted coal town, 27 km north-east of Westport. It was named after R. B. Denniston, manager of the first major mine to open in the 1870s and later a director of the Westport Coal Company. On a bare plateau at an altitude of 600 metres, Denniston was the bleakest of the coal mining towns, often shrouded in fog. The nearby town of Burnetts Face was squashed into a narrow valley, close to the original coal discovery. Jenny Pattrick's novel The Denniston rose (2003) gives a depressingly vivid picture of the lives of miners and their families.

Coal was transported from the plateau down to a branch railway line by the Denniston incline, a spectacular cable railway. Mining ceased in the 1990s, and only a few inhabitants remain. Part of the town is a historic reserve, with a museum and walking tracks around mining relics.