NSWRail & telegraph
Glenbrook
Steam trains stopped here for water after the climb up Lapstone Hill.
1867Lapstone Zig Zag opens
WHAT STARTED IT
The 1813 explorers found a large lagoon of good water here on their second day out. When the railway climbed Lapstone Hill by a zig zag in 1867, trains stopped at a siding to take on water from Glenbrook Lagoon.
WHAT SUSTAINED IT
The watering stop, known as Wascoe’s Siding from about 1870, was renamed Glenbrook when its station opened in 1879. A tunnel bypassed the Zig Zag in 1892, a second deviation in 1913 avoided that tunnel and moved the station, and the abandoned tunnel later stored mustard gas in the Second World War.
TURNING POINTS
1813Blaxland, Lawson and Wentworth find a large lagoon of good water on the ridge.
1867The Lapstone Zig Zag opens, carrying the railway up the escarpment from the Knapsack Viaduct.
1879The siding is renamed Glenbrook when a railway station opens.
1892A tunnel deviation opens on 18 December and the Zig Zag closes.
1913The Glenbrook deviation opens, avoiding the tunnel, and the station moves to a new site.
WHAT IT DOES NOW
A residential town at the foot of the Blue Mountains on the railway and highway. The Zig Zag’s old formation is a walking route, and the Knapsack Viaduct and the 1892 tunnel are heritage-listed.