Plea to return old rail shed to Greytown

DERELICT: The old goods shed stands on land at Woodside, which is up for tender.

As the countdown to the sale by tender of a historic Woodside railway goods shed approaches, a plea has been made to have the building returned to Greytown where it started its working life.

Greytown Community Heritage Trust considers the fate of the old Greytown branch line railway station to be an urgent heritage issue and is calling on the townspeople to band together to make sure it finds a suitable final resting place.

The old station, which serviced the Greytown branch line that ran to and from Greytown and Woodside from 1880 until it was closed down in the mid-1950s, was shifted to Woodside to become a goods shed but is now declared surplus to railways requirements.

The building and the 2.2 hectares of land it sits on has a rateable value of $140,000 and is due to be sold by tender on February 11, unless sold prior.

The heritage trust's secretary, Frank Minehan, said he wanted the public to be aware of the " critical heritage issue" the disposal of the old station had posed.

He said the building seemed to be in reasonably sound condition and could be moved and "appropriately resited".

It has no heritage protection registered with Heritage NZ/Pouhere Taonga or the South Wairarapa District Council Combined Wairarapa District Plan.

"Time and fate is of the essence.

"We can probably only hope at this late stage that a sympathetic landowner successfully tenders and is then agreeable to the old station being moved back into Greytown," Mr Minehan said.

He said removal would most likely depend on a building removal company or a trucking firm doing the job for free and that there was a precedent.

"In the 1980s, the Greytown community and a local company successfully moved and resited the old Masonic Hall from West St to Stella Bull Park on Main St. It became the town's library."

He said the trust supported a proposal for the old station to be shifted to the proposed William Nation Arbor Day nursery/woodlot on South Wairarapa District Council-owned land off Cotter St.

"The idea is the building to be closed in and secured as an implement shed or something similar.

"Alternatively, the trust would expect significant and immediate interest from Cobblestones Museum. They already house Greytown's first church and hospital," he said.

The trust hoped the hugely successful Greytown Trails Trust would take "more than a passive interest in this issue".

"Those wonderful people initiated and made a bicycle trail from Cotter St, Greytown to Woodside Station.

"It follows the route of the old Greytown railway branch line and is very popular," Mr Minehan said.