Wa165 INFO

Gisborne City Vintage Railway:
We are an incorporated society and registered charity not a Trust. Our official title is 'Gisborne City Vintage Railway Inc'. Membership fees are $20 per annum for an individual and $30 for a family (as at 4th August 2011).

We are always looking for donations and sponsors no matter how small in order to keep our Wa165 running. See the "How you can Help" Page for more details.

Thank you
There are many people and organisations around Gisborne and New Zealand we would like to take the time to sincerely thank for their contributions over the years we have been restoring our Wa165 . These contributions however big or small have been genuinely appreciated and have assisted us to where we are today. As you all can appreciate we could not list everyone here on our website but the committee would like to mention a few:

  • Williams Trusts
  • Clark Trust
  • Department of Tourism 1988 (NZ Government Grant)
  • ECT
  • ECCT
  • Lion Foundation
  • Sovereign
  • James Bowman
  • E-C Website Solutions

We welcome contact from new sponsors:
If you would like to participate and assist with the ongoing restoration and running of our local steam train Wa165 we would love to speak to you about any assistance you may be able to give to us. Feel free to ring 06 867 0385 or email on info@GCVR.org.nz

Members – may they rest in peace.
Our thoughts are with those members who have passed on since starting the restoration of Wa165. Their contributions have been an integral part of getting Wa165 into steam.

  • Toby White
  • Hoss Fafeita
  • Bob Samson
  • Robin Henderson
  • Ron Scott
  • Mike Vita
  • Phil Fischbach
  • Keith Boivin
  • Chris Page
  • Hink Healey
  • Bill Sefton
  • Ken Athy
  • George Shannon
  • Graham Cust

Plans for the future

  • Erect the wooden water tower (ex Motuhora)
  • Continued Lobbying of keeping the Napier/Gisborne line open. This is the main issue that faces us at the moment and is supposed to be decided upon around the middle of next year (2012). The current situation is that Geoff Joyce (President) is negotiating with KiwiRail to see if we can contract them to keep the line between Gisborne and Beach Loop up to standard for GCVR to continue using it. At the moment GCVR is waiting for costing information from KiwiRail. It could be the end of September before we obtain this. Depending on the outcome of the costing exercise we can look at fund raising options to meet the cost.
  • Diesel Locomotive: We are wanting to purchase a diesel locomotive for short trips and recovery purposes.
  • GPS Tracking: We are looking at installing a GPS unit on the carriages to publish real time location on the internet whilst on our excursions.