Golden Pipeline

A bridge in Northam’s West End is now unused but in the past it played a significant role in the design of the water supply scheme. Later, it was used by migrants, displaced by WW11,  to access the town from where they were housed at was then Northam Army Camp and now is the Northam Detention Centre. 

How best to cross the Avon River?

In determining the route of the pipeline from Mundaring to Kalgoorlie, water supply engineers faced many problems. Crossing the Avon River was one. The pipeline was split into two smaller pipes laid  in parallel under the bed of the river.

Each of the smaller pipes was fitted with a stop valve on either side of the river. The theory was that if one pipe failed while the river was flowing, it could be isolated and the water supply maintained through the other pipe until the river subsided and repairs could be made. Was it the luck of the Irish that during the winter of 1917 both of the small pipes failed at the same time?

Instead a timber trestle bridge was built to carry the pipeline over the river. This bridge, the Poole Street Bridge, still stands although it no longer carries the pipeline. After the pipes were relaid in the 1930s, the bridge was used as a pedestrian crossing.

Two pipes now cross the Avon on trestles complete with walkways, allowing maintenance access at all times.