Markets 
Walking through a small door into one of Sydney’s largest historic locomotive workshops is akin to stepping into an Aladdin’s cave for train enthusiasts and the curious.
A four-decade veteran of NSW’s railways, Stephen Attrill knows well the vast building – officially named the Large Erecting Shop – at the Eveleigh railway yards in the inner city where an old oil smell lingers.
After finishing his apprenticeship in the late 1980s he toiled away in the workshop for more than a decade for a not-for-profit company that restored and ran Locomotive 3801, one of NSW’s prized steam engines.
Attrill, from Gosford, recalls staying overnight in carriages parked in the workshop after long shifts.
“We used to stay here in the sleeping cars,” he said, adding that the overnight stays were partly because he would otherwise have had a long trip home. “We would have a barbecue for dinner and work late.”
The steam engine buff, who now works for Sydney Trains, got his start in the workshop because the not-for-profit company 3801 Limited was looking after the famed Flying Scotsman locomotive while it was in Sydney for Australia’s bicentenary in 1988 and needed extra hands.
Hidden behind Victorian-era brick walls, the Large Erecting Shop is a step back in time. Six railway tracks run the length of the 189-metre building, which was opened in 1899. Sand pits between the tracks allow workers to stand under locomotives.
Tony Finch, a 42-year railway veteran, spent part of his apprenticeship as a fitter and turner in the workshop in the early 1980s, and recalls it being an eye-opener for a 15-year-old from the country.
“You were given a pair of overalls and a pair of gloves and you got to work. There was no PPE [personal protective equipment] like we have today – it was a different era,” he said.
“It was dirty, heavy work – there were no ifs or buts about it. And being an apprentice, you always got the dirty jobs.”
Finch, who is now Sydney Trains’ senior facilities manager, describes the workshop as a one-off. “I’ve never seen anything like it. I’ve been around other rail sites but nothing like the interior of this site,” he said.
He remembers being taken aback by exposed electrical wires in the workshop’s ceiling that killed birds the instant they landed on them. “The next minute you’d see one on the ground,” he said. “It’s all turned off now for safety.”
The workshop stands like a jewel in the crown of NSW’s railways. A row of cast-iron columns supports the roof and overhead cranes that lifted boilers, wheels and entire locomotives in the heritage-listed building where hundreds of people worked.
After steam locomotives were retired in the 1960s the workshop was used to maintain diesel trains for the state’s railway, until the 1980s when it began to be used to maintain and store heritage trains.
Distinctive silver carriages from the Southern Aurora, which ran between Sydney and Melbourne, and Pullman-type sleeper carriages are among the historic trains housed in the workshop, which is in the care of Transport Heritage NSW.
Transport Heritage NSW safety, environment and quality manager John Thorogood said the workshop was used as the base for steam trains when they ran from Central Station to the Blue Mountains and elsewhere.
“It’s a key location for us. It’s like a hotel for trains,” he said.
The old diesel trains stored in the workshop are in various condition, some sporting broken windows and graffiti. The workshop helps to stop them deteriorating by sheltering them from the weather, while acting as an overflow for trains that cannot be housed at the NSW Rail Museum at Thirlmere.
Tens of metres away from the old trains in other parts of the sprawling rail yards at Eveleigh, some of the newest additions to the state’s passenger fleet, such as Mariyung intercity trains, undergo work.
For the foreseeable future the Large Erecting Shop will remain a home for historic trains in the inner city. Transport for NSW finalised plans in 2023 to rezone the site to open the way for the workshop to be renovated for a mix of retail and commercial uses, but those have not been progressed.
Start the day with a summary of the day’s most important and interesting stories, analysis and insights. Sign up for our Morning Edition newsletter.
Read the full article here
