WT465

ID/Name: WT465
Type:  Goods Wagon
Description: Four wheel Water Tank
Built: 1957
Status: Available for traffic

HERITAGE

As much of Victoria suffered regular droughts, the Victorian Railways had a need to be able to supply their 1000s of employees with fresh water. This was particularly so to those in small settlements in with no town supply, only tanks.

This saw dedicated water tanks built from the late 1890s, some for locomotive use and some for domestic use. Those for domestic were clearly marked as such with DW.

WT465 is one of the last batch built in the late 1950s with a cylindrical tank on the reused frame from a scrapped wagon. It differs from the original WTs that were built with a tank integrated into the frame.

As the branchlines closed in the 1970s, reticulated water expanded to more areas and track maintenance evolved from many small local gangs to large ones that came in and the left, the need to cart water diminished drastically.