History: Old Road, Bathurst area, NSW, Australia

[TugBoat]

Discussion thread for this information is:

http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?t=691791

Background

There are two local features in my area that are of obvious historical interest. The first is an old road and the second is a goldmine.

This information relates to the road and was partly a learning experience to see if AP would be usable on the goldmine. The goldmine is probably of more interest; however, it is also a more challenging AP assignment. If I can work out how to get some AP shots of the goldmine I will report on that.

The AP part

One of the problems with the local historical areas is that they tend to be in forested areas and this makes the flying difficult (ie. risky) and also the objects that are of interest are often obscured by the trees. So the AP is probably of more use when combined with a ground survey.

For these photos I had to fly from a cleared area on a nearby hill that was approximately 500m from the old road and also about 30m higher. Without a downlink it was a tricky task to get some usable images. These are the first acceptable images that I have managed to get. I have been trying on and off for a while.

I was trying to get enough images to build a reasonable mosaic; however, I found it difficult to get over the road. With the aircraft up high, and 500m out horizontally, it is difficult to fly a nice straight path. The one almost perfect sequence that I did get had the road just out of frame...

The camera is mounted so that the aircraft movement is along the long axis of the frame - results would be better with the camera mounted at 90 degrees (ie. a 'wider' image path).

I have put together one mosaic with a few shots to give some idea of how this section of the road is laid out. I have indicated two points of interest with arrows. (More about these later.)

The interesting thing at this stage is that the green arrow points to something that is clearly visible and the red arrow points to features that are hidden under the tree cover.

The other tool that I think may turn out to be very useful is the construction of stereo pairs of features. I have had reasonable success with this in the past - but always with oblique shots. This is my first attempt at turning consecutive frames shot vertically into cross-eye stereo pairs. The result is better that average, but still not perfect.

Conclusions at this stage:

- Camera resolution and sharpness is critical - my low-tech Dolphin Jazz is probably not up to this task!
- Mount the camera with the width of the frame at right angles to the direction of flight.

My appologies for the poor colour correction in these images.

[TugBoat]

Information

This old road is the original road into this area when land was originally granted. It is known locally as 'the convict road' - although there is no real evidence that the road was constructed with convict labour. Indeed all the visible works are most likely to post date convict construction. The road was the initial access to the area and was also used by the nearby gold mine for access.

I have attached to maps from the earliest Parish Maps of the area - these are from 1884 - and clearly show the road location. The area itself was initially surveyed around 1818 and is some of the most fertile land in the area. By 1884 you can see that it is well subdivided.

The goldmine leases are also shown on the maps of the time and the general area is labled as 'Oberon Goldfields".

The current road formation runs close in places to the old original road. In some places the current road has been built on top of the original road.

The main visible features of the road are the culverts and works around the various water courses that crossed the road.

The green arrow on the AP shots points to one of these works that has washed away and thus is clearly visible on the photo. Here some of the timber construction has fallen over and is clearly visible on the images.

The red arrow points to another that is in excellent condition and there is nothing to show from the air, partly because there is no washed away area and partly due to the tree cover. However the water course is visible.

[TugBoat]

Here are some ground shots of the area identified by the green arrow in the AP shots.

You can see the fallen timber works and also the exposed pipe work.

The clay pipe work in the construction is clearly marked with the Lithgow pottery works symbol. This works was opened in 1879 and closed about 1898 - so this should date the pipes. However, the Lithgow brick works is known to have continued pipe construction (for "the local market") until the 1946 - so that complicates the issue of exactly when the pipes were installed.

[TugBoat]

At the location shown by the red arrow is a much better preserved example of this construction. These works are in excellent condition as shown by the attached photos.

These water courses are not permanent and only flow when there is heavy rain. So most of the time they are dry - but when they flow there is a lot of water...

[TugBoat]

What is also difficult to see on the AP shots is that the area around and down stream from the washed away road works has been used as a garbage disposal area and contains all sorts of junk from building waste, old bottles, even the odd kitchen appliance.

Some of the junk is itself quite old and may be of interest in its own right. However, the builder's waste is just rubbish...

[TugBoat]

Here is a bit of further background.

This is an AP shot of the O'Connell Plains taken from above the hill about 500m west of the road. The road you can see leading from the bottom centre of the frame and heading 'up' the frame is the current road as it heads onto the plains.

This can be matched up with the Parish Map shown earlier. The original route from Sydney to Bathurst came from the right of frame, through O'Connell (about centre of frame) and then went to Bathurst (top left of frame).

The wide area map lines up almost exactly with this photo. You can see why the land that was initially granted was all on the fertile plains around the river. The mines are mostly in the hills that start just at the bottom of the photo and continue behind the image.

As far as I am aware the original road lies under the current road formation for all of the distance to O'Connell.

About 1km of road is left in the area that I have described. For some reason the modern road deviated from the old road location in this area.

[TugBoat]

Here is an additional piece of information that turned up.

This is a postcard of the Lithgow Pottery works. The works was opened due to the discovery of coal and clay reserves in the same area.

Hence also the brick works and various other coal related industries that developed in Lithgow.