High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! The South Maitland Railway was once an extensive network of privately owned colliery and passenger railway lines which served the South Maitland coalfields in the Hunter Valley of New South Wales, Australia and were the second last system in Australia to use steam haulage, having used steam locomotives until 1983. Only a single track of the main line remains in use to Bellbird Junction servicing the sole remaining colliery branch line to Pelton. The colliery at Pelton has closed but the surface facilities remain in use servicing the nearby Austar Colliery (formerly Southland Colliery & originally Ellalong Colliery).