Footbridge

Provenance

Camera: NIKON D810
Lens: 14.0-24.0 mm f/2.8
Settings: 14mm · f/22.0 · 1/100 · ISO 100
Paper: Ilford Galerie Smooth Cotton Rag 310 gsm

A timber footbridge spanning the Bombala Railway Station yard, photographed in 2016. Open tableland visible beyond the far end. No structures on the opposite side. Timber railings and deck weathered but intact. The station building sits 30 metres behind.

Edition

Open edition

Open edition
Printed to order, no fixed quantity. Each print is hand-signed by the photographer.

Limited edition
A fixed number of prints exist. Once sold, the edition closes permanently. Each print is individually numbered and signed.

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Colour

Signed, numbered, with COA. Made to order in 5 to 10 business days (unframed). Shipped in protective packaging with edition certificate, paper-stock reference and a printed care guide.

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In situ

Footbridge at Bombala Station, black-framed print displayed in situ on a wall.

Footbridge at Bombala Station, raw timber-framed print displayed in situ on a wall.

Footbridge at Bombala Station, glass print displayed in situ on a wall.

01 PROVENANCE

Print datasheet

Title: Footbridge
Series: Bombala Station
Catalogue: BST-005
Process: Giclée
Captured: 26 December 2016
Camera: NIKON D810
Lens: 14.0-24.0 mm f/2.8
Aperture: f/22.0
Shutter: 1/100 s
ISO: 100
Focal length: 14 mm
Paper: Ilford Galerie Smooth Cotton Rag 310 gsm
Paper size: 290 × 200 mm
Location: Bombala, New South Wales, Australia
Authenticity: C2PA verified provenance →
Recognised by: Highly Commended in Multimedia at the 2016 National Trust of Australia (NSW) Heritage Awards

02 LOCATION

Bombala, New South Wales, Australia

Map · Mapbox · OpenStreetMap

03 THE STORY

About this print

The timber footbridge at Bombala Railway Station is one of those things that makes more sense the longer you look at it, and less sense the moment you try to explain it. Built in 1921, the same year the station opened for passenger services on 21 November, it extends 30 metres from the station building across the working yard. On the far side: open ground. No platform, no building, no obvious destination. Heritage NSW, in its State Heritage Register entry for the station, calls it a superb example of a non-standard solution to site access, and notes it is the only footbridge of its type built at a rural terminus in NSW. Its purpose was to allow residents to cross the yard without walking through the working infrastructure of a functioning terminus. Bombala Railway Station was the end of the line, the final terminus of a branch that took 37 years to push south from Joppa Junction to the Monaro tablelands. The station opened as passenger services began on 21 November 1921, completing a network extension that had been approved in 1915 and suspended during the First World War before construction resumed. The yard stretched approximately 900 metres and held the full complement of a working terminus: turntable, goods shed, gantry crane, stock siding, weighbridge, and signal box. The station building itself is a Type 11 pre-cast concrete structure, part of a standardised NSWGR design used across regional NSW between 1919 and 1932. Heritage NSW describes it as one of the best pre-cast concrete structures to survive in the state. The station closed on 26 March 1986. The branch line itself was officially closed in May 1989 after the Numeralla River bridge at Chakola was declared unsafe. The footbridge underwent a $100,000 repair in late 2012, funded by John Holland Railways. The site is now managed by the Friends of Bombala Railway as a heritage museum and community precinct. This photograph, made in 2016, records the footbridge from yard level. The timber deck and railings extend into the frame, the open tableland beyond offering no answer to the question the bridge keeps asking.

04 FROM THE FIELD NOTES

The timber footbridge at Bombala Railway Station stands 30 metres from the main building, reaching across the yard toward open ground with no structure on the far side to justify it. Heritage NSW describes it as a superb example of a non-standard solution to site access, and the only footbridge of its type built at a rural terminus in NSW. It was constructed in 1921, the same year the station opened, and allowed residents to cross the working yard safely. It remains one of the most distinctive elements of a site that Heritage NSW describes as one of the most intact country terminus stations in the state.

Brett Patman

The series

Bombala Station

2016 · 23 photographs

Bombala railway station is the terminus of the Goulburn-Bombala branch line, sitting at the southern end of the Monaro in NSW, near the Victorian border. The Nimmitabel to Bombala section opened on 21 November 1921, and every building in the yard dates from that year: the pre-cast concrete station building, signal box, goods shed, footbridge, turntable, gantry crane, cattle yard, and barracks. The last passenger service ran in August 1974. The last goods train rolled out on 26 March 1986. Listed on the NSW State Heritage Register (item 5011934, 2 April 1999), the station is described as one of the most intact country terminus sites from the 1920s railway expansion, with the station building rated as one of the best surviving pre-cast concrete structures in NSW. The Friends of Bombala Railway maintain the precinct as a heritage museum.

View all in this series →

05 SIZE GUIDE

Print sizes

The anatomy view shows what this finish is as a physical object: paper margin, mat band, frame depth, acrylic profile. The comparison strip shows how each size sits relative to the others at true scale. Click a size or a finish to update both.