Minister of Rail Winston Peters said in a budget announcement yesterday there would be a return of $7m in unspent funds from the Hillside workshop programme, reflecting improved wagon assembly efficiency.
The funding was part of a wider redevelopment of the old Hillside workshops to rebuild the precinct and build up to 1500 wagons. The final assembly would see 1350 wagons assembled, reflecting demand modelling and following 1304 wagons procured prior to the assembly programme, Mr Peters said.
KiwiRail chief metro and capital programme officer David Gordon said in addition to the company’s core services, KiwiRail built wagons in its purpose-built assembly workshop in South Dunedin, employing a dedicated team of 45 mechanical staff and 60 network services staff at the Hillside workshops.
‘‘As part of the Government’s significant investment in KiwiRail, we are in the process of replacing our ageing CFT [container flat top] wagon fleet. KiwiRail has found efficiencies in how it assembles wagons, which has reduced costs. This has seen a portion — $7 million — of the government funding returned in this budget,’’ he said
He said 1350 wagons were being assembled at Hillside, with 850 completed so far and put into service around the country. The remaining 500 are expected to be completed by mid-2027.
‘‘KiwiRail is looking at options for the wagon assembly staff once the assembly programme is complete,’’ he said.
Rail and Maritime Transport Union general secretary Todd Valster said there still appeared to be plenty of work for staff at the Hillside workshops.
‘‘They’ve got plenty to do because of how it’s set up with basically two separate railways now. We’re not connected to the North Island any more, so they will pick up work that would normally be sent through to the workshops in Lower Hutt, and so there is plenty to do in the short term,’’ he said.
He said work was being done on carriages for charter trains.
‘‘Hillside has been a success: they’ve got apprentices, and obviously it’s good for the economy in Dunedin and beyond, but I think that they’ll have plenty of work to do, purely because you can’t get assets to the North Island for repairs. So there might be a little bit of down side.’’
The lack of rail ferries crossing Cook Strait was causing problems.
‘‘It is not just wagons and locomotives, but also rail, sleepers — all those types of things that need to go to the South Island, but they’ll have to come in via the port.’’
He said there was just the hassle of not having a rail ferry, which was very inefficient.
‘‘They actually have to put those wagons on to truck trailers and ship them to the North Island on road trailers, which is pretty inefficient.
He said there had been no heads-up about any downsizing at Hillside.
The old workshops used to have a foundry which did lots of other jobs outside railways but it had been taken out and no foundry had been constructed in the rebuild, he said.
