I’m now 73 and this really takes me back, thanks for this great nostalgic clip.

I have just finished reading all the comments and enjoyed them immensely. I don’t usually do that! Thank you everyone from Sydney Australia 🇦🇺

I remember the "Choo Choo Trains" chuffing past our place in Levin in 66/67. They took ages to get up to speed from the station and you could hear them forever. It was really relaxing hearing them go off into the distance, but not so much as the ground shook as they passed. It was mostly during the night, so put us back to sleep as they left. My father drove them until the diesel electrics came in. David Bowie has the sound on a song from his album "Station to Station'...Many thanks for sharing...

I was a locomotive assistant in Wellington in 1978. I remember the rail workers lodging huts next to Wellington loco depot shown in the video at around 2 minutes. Majority of work was in the shunting yards as a low seniority fireman. Life changes meant I moved to Australia but my time on NZR was enjoyable and worked with some great drivers. There was only one I remember as being obnoxious and unpleasant. Very few of the Locomotive Assistants got on with him. As in most jobs there is always one.

Priceless 10 mins of footage.

Super beautiful trains

Brings back old memories of when i was living in the single mens camp in Thorndon Quay ,working as a locomotive assistant.

Thank you for a very interesting and strangely relaxing video. I was still living in Wellington and at school at that time and can remember the trains, including the steam engines. Nice touch to finish the video with a steam locomotive pulling freight carriages. I remember as a small boy in the 1950s waving out to the steam locomotive drivers from our car and getting a wave back. All the best from Sydney Australia 🇦🇺

Amazing how much Wellington has changed throughout the years. I remember when the trains used to pass our back fence in Trentham and Upper Hutt. Since I was 3 and 4 years old during those 2 years.

We traveled to & from school during the late 60s & early 70s everyday on them old Hutt Valley-Wgtn trains..was like our own little before & after school get together community. For a bit of mischief fun we would carriage hop between stations in an attempt to avoid the ticket guard who knew us all & would double click our tickets the next day..😂 miss them simple days....😏

Excellent old footage I was living in Porirua in early 1963 and travelled daily to work in Wellington by electric unit then drove trucks for McGowan and Magee, in and around Wellington. So I used to see many of the sights depicted in this footage. Thanks for sharing.

The old units were really really diabolical - couldn't be worse. I miss them like I'd miss my arm. Memories. Time period - not long after the last tram, not too long before the new foothills motorway reaches Hawkstone St. TEV Wahine makes her maiden voyage 1st of August 1966. NZ would soon switch to decimal currency. The 6 o'clock swill would end after fifty years. The airport had been open six / seven years. Porirua recently gained city status 1965.

I spent a good portion of my early childhood in Wellington, though that was in the 80s when the EM class EMUs were new. Interesting to see steam, diesel, and electric all operating mainline service and how some of those types were in still in front-line use until quite recently (DM class EMUs, 56ft carriages, etc.)

That bought back a flood of memories of NZ rail in its hey days of the way we moved freight and passengers the arrival of both the AK -WN Express and Limited passenger trains.

I just remembered when travelling on the electric units from Upper Hutt into Wellington passing along the harbourside near Ngauranga Gorge in the 60's, the effluent from the waste pipes of the nearby Ngauranga meatworks turned the sea blood red and seagulls by the hundred diving for chunks of flesh. How times change !

Great video Peter. It was great to see the EW and ED class electric locomotives in action before the DA class locomotives were given running rights between Paekakariki and Wellington.

Great. I reckon you caught the 4.05 Ew hauled to Upper Hutt followed by the 4.30 Express to Auckland in an earlier sequence. EE units as I recall them from 1970 onwards. Great memories.

Great footage ! Just taken for granted at the time.

Love the shots on the Johnsonville like with the old Ew locomotives on the stock trains

It's crazy how much more freight used to be shifted by railways around Wellington all those years ago...

Brings back memories. This was awesome

It is also great to see the Wellington to Auckland and vice versa Express and Limited passenger trains with their infamous and notoriously unreliable silver FS steam heating cars.

Remember well the red seats of the english electric trains and how you could flip them to face each other to create you own mini lounge 😎😎

ah memories of riding on some of those trains as a kid. A simpler time.

I can still remember the sounds of heavy freights being pulled by DA diesels as I lay in bed late evenings as a child, they echoed up the Hutt Valley through Wallaceville and Upper Hutt ramping up power as they gained height heading for the Rimutaka range and the tunnel. I would feel quite secure for some odd reason and fall asleep to the vibrating chugging sound of the US, Canadian and Australian supplied DA diesels regular as clockwork nearly every night if I remember correctly. The Hutt Valley line electric units were often the gateway to Wellington for movies and school excursions to the old Wellington museum and of course the annual A&P show. We would board at the outer extremity of the line at Upper Hutt and I clearly remember the whirring sounds of the idling electric motors while waiting at the stations. Great memories, thankyou!

My father Transfered to Napier locomotive depot in 7/3/1960

Somehow you managed to create an air of dejection around the condemned Ab beside the new Di.

I really enjoyed that . Did not get to Wellington until 72 when the new motorway blocked the views you have here. Looks like great times especially for the enthusist back then .

Super nice🙏

Interesting to see how old and run down the old 30s English units were back then and they continued to use them well into the 2000s. Interesting to see the motor way to nowhere’s piles being built. This was like a different city back then. They should go back to using electric for freight within the Wellington region.

Nice

How times have changed

Awesome thank you.

A great piece of NZR history. Do anyone know when the DA Locomotives were finally given running rights between Paekakariki and Wellington?

Do you have any video of rewanui railway