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The most spectacular of these, the Staircase Viaduct, carries the rails 73 m above the stream bed. The viaducts were built under Treasury contracts by both New Zealand and British bridging firms. This section included 16 tunnels and four major viaducts, not including the Kowai already constructed. Napier Bell in 1883 and described to the Royal Commission by District Engineer William Newsham Blair as “very rough, the mountain slope rises from the riverbed while the river runs in a fearful gorge all the way”. The Waimakariri and Broken River gorges, the major obstacles to the railway, were immediately ahead. This 13 km route was surveyed by C. It was not until 1898 that the Public Works Department took over and resumed construction. Legal argument and court actions between the parties ensued. The Crown seized the company’s assets and completed works, on the grounds that the contract had expired with the works incomplete. The foundations for Pattersons Creek viaduct were in place but the steel superstructure still had to be manufactured and erected. On the Springfield section only the Kowai bridges and 4.5 miles of track to Otarama was usable as a railway. Inevitably NZMR ran out of money and all construction ceased in 1895. The work was to include steel viaducts over the Kowai River and Pattersons Creeks. This contract for the 9 km from Springfield to Pattersons Creek was let to J. It was not until 1890 that work commenced at the Canterbury end. The company commenced construction from Brunner, the Nelson line heading up the Grey Valley towards Reefton, while the Christchurch line diverged from it at Stillwater.

However, it had little chance of success because of insufficient capital and the London management’s remoteness from the realities of New Zealand railway construction. Their 10-year Government contract was for building 376 km of railway between Christchurch and Nelson via Brunnerton. In July 1885 the deputation accepted an offer from a committee, which became the New Zealand Midland Railway Company (NZMR). A deputation of Arthur Dudley Dobson, Alan Scott and CY Fell visited London to promote the company and rally interested financiers. However, the economic depression at this time meant the Government was not in a position to make further investment in railways. Instead they passed the East and West Coast and Nelson Railway Act, enabling the railway to be built and operated by private enterprise.

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