NEW ZEALAND: ‘An aging 19th century rail plant has been transformed into a modern 21st century one’, KiwiRail Chief Executive Peter Reidy said when the modernised Hillside Workshops site in Dunedin was officially inaugurated on May 16.
Hillside is KiwiRail’s main heavy maintenance facility for the South Island.
The once-thriving Dunedin works had been run down to only a handful of staff and piecemeal work by 2012, when the operating looked at selling the Hillside Engineering business. In 2019 the government announced the site would be redeveloped and reactivated. Following the confirmation of funding, work began in 2021.
A 5 500 m² multi-purpose workshop has been built to provided 21 work stations where locomotives and rolling stock can be worked on simultaneously. It has cranes and Mechan jacks able to lift 120 tonnes, a 130 tonne capacity 11-road traverser, a remodelled yard with fully electric shunting. One of the original 1870s buildings has been strengthened against earthquakes and is being used for storage. There are facilities for the Dunedin track teams, and office space shared by mechanical and infrastructure teams, with around 100 people now working at the site.
Depot safety control specialist First Class Safety & Control and Freightquip deployed a bespoke depot protection systems combining a mechanical interlocking with a wireless interface to the traverser, workshop roads and sidings.
The rebuild was funded with NZ$20m from the government’s Provincial Growth Fund in 2019, NZ$85m from the 2021 budget to modernise the facilities and fund wagon assembly, and NZ$23m from a wider government investment in replacing KiwiRail locomotives and wagons.
Work to assemble up to 1 500 wagons at the site in collaboration with Indonesian manufacturer PT Inka began in March 2024, and 401 had been completed by the end of April 2025.
‘Not only is the new Hillside providing a modern environment for our mechanical teams, wagon assembly has created jobs, introduced new skills and is providing a wider experience base for our apprentices’, said Reidy. ‘Our Dunedin track teams are also based at Hillside for the first time, helping to grow the culture of the place.’
