Yinkanie railway line

The Yinkanie railway line was a 50.6 kilometres (31.4 mi) railway line on the South Australian Railways network. Named the Wanbi to Moorook Railway in its enabling Act, it never reached its intended destination on the River Murray.^[1] The railway ran from a junction with the Barmera line at Wanbi northwards to Yinkanie, opening on 7 September 1925 and closing on 1 May 1971.^[2]

The six railway lines of the Murraylands[3][4]
Order built	Line	Year opened	Year closed	Length (mi)	Length (km)
1	Tailem Bend–Pinnaroo	1906	2015[note a]	86.6	139.4
2	Tailem Bend–Barmera	1913 / 1928[note b]	1996[note c]	159.5	256.6
3	Karoonda–Peebinga	1914	1990	66.0	106.2
4	Karoonda–Waikerie	1914	1994[note d]	73.8	118.7
5	Alawoona–Loxton	1914	2015[note e]	22.0	35.5
6	Wanbi–Yinkanie	1925	1971	31.5	50.6
Total				439.4	707.0
Notes Previously a broad-gauge through line into Victoria, the line was closed at the border in 1996 before being converted to standard gauge in 1998. Construction of the Barmera line was paused at Paringa in 1913 pending funding of a bridge over the River Murray. The line was completed to Barmera in 1928. A branch line was built to support construction of the proposed Chowilla Dam in 1966–67. Some 27.3 kilometres (17.0 miles) long, it branched from the Barmera line 8 kilometres (5 miles) south of Paringa and proceeded to Murtho on the south bank of the River Murray. Construction of the dam was deferred in 1967 and subsequently cancelled; later the line was removed without being used. Paringa–Barmera closed in 1984; Alawoona–Paringa closed in 1990; Tailem Bend–Alawoona closed in 1996. Galga–Waikerie closed in 1990. Converted to standard gauge in 1996.

Yinkanie railway line
Chute for loading bulk grain into trains at Wunkar (the only station on the line to have bulk storage and loading facilities) in 2015
Overview
Status	Closed and removed
Termini	Wanbi Yinkanie
Continues from	Barmera line
Service
System	South Australian Railways
History
Opened	4 September 1925 (1925-09-04)
Closed	1 May 1971 (1971-05-01)
Technical
Line length	49.6 km (30.8 mi)
Track gauge	1600 mm (5 ft 3 in)
Route map Red was broad gauge from 1925 to 1971. Blue was broad gauge from 1913 to 1996 then standard gauge from 1996 to 2012. Yinkanie Wappilka Myrla Wunkar Koowa Tuscan Bayah Caliph Gluyas Wanbi Barmera line to Tailem Bend Loxton line to Loxton This diagram: view talk edit

Route

The route of the line was designed to cover the gap between the Waikerie and Loxton lines at the lowest cost.^[1] The names of the new stations were Gluyas, Caliph, Bayah, Tuscan, Koowa, Wunkar, Myrla, Wappilka and Yinkanie.