Glentunnel
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Glentunnel is a small village in the Selwyn District of the Canterbury region of New Zealand's South Island. It is officially recognised as a "populated area less than a town".[1] The 2001 New Zealand Census of Population and Dwellings gave Glentunnel's population as 129. It is located on State Highway 77 and was served by the Whitecliffs Branch, a branch line railway, from the line's opening on 3 November 1875 through to its closure on 31 March 1962. Few remnants of the railway remain in the town, with the station's platform incorporated into the backyard of a private residence.[2]
Industrial activity such as lignite coal mining and the manufacture of pottery and bricks used to take place in the region around Glentunnel. This was the reason the railway was built, but activity declined sharply in the 20th century and has been effectively non-existent since the 1980s.[3]
[edit] References
- ^ Land Information New Zealand, "Place Name Detail: Glentunnel", New Zealand Geographic Placenames Database, accessed 19 May 2008.
- ^ David Leitch and Brian Scott, Exploring New Zealand's Ghost Railways, revised edition (Wellington: Grantham House, 1998 [1995]), 71-2.
- ^ Selwyn District Council, "Glentunnel and Coalgate", accessed 19 May 2008.
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