Old Como railway bridge

Old Como railway bridge now used as pedestrian bridge

Oatley was named after a man who never lived in the area. James Oatley (1770–1839) a convict clock maker arrived in the colony on 27 January 1815 to serve a life sentence. The clock at Hyde Park Barracks, built between 1817–19, included a clock made by Oatley. When he was pardoned, he received several land grants. One, granted in 1833, was 120 hectares (300 acres) near the George's River. He called the property Needwood Forest, after woodlands in his native Warwickshire in England. Oatley never built on the land, but lived on a farm called Snugsborough near Beverly Hills. It stood in a 71-hectare (175-acre) grant received in 1831. He died in 1839, and was buried at Snugsborough, where his grave was found in 1921.

Needwood Forest passed to Frederick, his third son, who sold it to Charles Cecil Griffiths in 1881. The property extended from Gungah Bay on the suburb's western edge, to the later Boundary and Hurstville Roads. When the Hurstville to Sutherland railway line passed through Oatley's old property in the 1880s, the station, opened in 1886, took his name, as did Oatley Bay and Oatley Park, a favourite picnic spot for local residents.[1][2]

The Old Como railway bridge was completed in 1885 as a part of the original Illawarra railway line infrastructure. It is a very fine example of a single track steel lattice girder bridge of the 1870s and 1880s. Como is the longest single track steel lattice girder bridge in NSW and the only such bridge within 250 kilometres (160 mi) of Sydney. It was a notorious bottleneck within five years of its completion when the single track on either side of the bridge was increased to a double track. The double tracks converged to a single "gauntlet track" on the bridge, which enabled trains to cross in either direction without chain points and with a relative degree of safety. It was one of only a few installations of this type in NSW.[1]

Between 1935 and 1942, the Metropolitan Water Sewerage and Drainage Board built a new 1,220-millimetre (48 in) diameter pipeline to pump water from the recently completed Woronora Dam to the Board's reservoirs at Penshurst. The pipeline was carried over the Georges River on the Como railway bridge, supported on new steel outriggers cantilevered from the main girders. To maintain an evenly balanced load, the 1,220-millimetre (48 in) pipeline was split into two 600-millimetre (24 in) diameter mains, one supported on each side of the bridge.

The old Como railway bridge was finally superseded in 1972 by a new double track reinforced concrete bridge, built alongside the existing bridge. Responsibility for the old bridge was transferred to the Metropolitan Water Sewerage and Drainage Board, now Sydney Water. Sutherland and Georges River Councils, the local authorities on either side of the river, shared the cost of converting the railway track to an extensively used cycleway and footpath, which opened in 1985, 100 years after the construction of the bridge.

In the late 1990s, Sydney Water undertook upgrading works to the pipeline and maintenance gantries to repair leaks and comply with current OH & S requirements.[1]

• 1926 - transverse elliptical arch braces raised to support electrical catenary
• 1935-42 - Woronora to Penshurst 48 inch water main installed across bridge
• 1985 - Removal of rail infrastructure and conversion to footbridge/cycleway
• 2003 - removal of timber walkway planks adjacent to the pipeline and the steel handrails.[1]

• Pollen, Francis (1996). Oatley, in 'The Book of Sydney Suburbs'.

This Wikipedia article was originally based on Como Rail Bridge, entry number 01624 in the New South Wales State Heritage Register published by the State of New South Wales and Office of Environment and Heritage 2018 under CC-BY 4.0 licence, accessed on 2 June 2018.