On 24 July 1955 the electrification of the Wellington to Upper Hutt train line was completed. Upper Hutt is a city 30 km north-east of Wellington. Upper Hutt City Council administers the city with its surrounding rural areas, parks and reserves. Its area is 540 km, the third-largest area of city council in New Zealand, after Dunedin and Auckland. Upper Hutt railway station is a two-platform urban railway station which lies on the Wairarapa Line. The Hutt Valley line was the first railway out of Wellington, preceding the Wellington and Manawatu Railway Company's west coast route, which was later acquired by the New Zealand Railways Department and incorporated into the North Island Main Trunk. The first proposal for a railway line from Wellington to the Rimutakas was put to the Wellington provincial government by Robert Stokes in 1858, and five years later the government gave support to the idea. In 1866, the government's investigating committee approved the line. The rails reached Upper Hutt in January 1876. Severe flooding at the end of January caused the road between Upper Hutt and Taita to become blocked and damaged, and so to minimise the impact caused by delays to road traffic, the Upper Hutt station was opened on 1 February, despite the concerns of the Public Works Department that the move was premature. The station was not ready for business, as the station and ancillary buildings had not been completed. However, the line and station were handed over to the Provincial Council to run while construction of the line beyond Upper Hutt commenced.

In 1955, as part of the station upgrading programme for the imminent arrival of electric multiple unit working of the Hutt Valley Line, a new station building was erected at Upper Hutt. With the opening of the Rimutaka Tunnel and deviation, a Centralised Traffic Control system was installed at Upper Hutt station to control main line points and signals between Trentham and Featherston inclusive. These images presented here are from the New Zealand Railways Photographic Collection. Prints from the collection are available to view in the Wellington Reading Room, organised by various categories in drawers in the Register Room.

Reference: AAVK W3439 Box 381

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