Category: Closed Railway

  • The Scole Railway

    The Scole Railway is one of Britain’s most obscure lines. It was a system built to serve farmland and market gardens. Passengers were never carried. The Scole Railway is considered one of the pioneer systems built for the specific purpose of serving farms and agriculture. The system connected with the main Great Eastern line at…

  • A Tower Subway memo

    A London Inheritance published a post detailing the Tower Subway and also implied the southern end of the subway happened to be a mystery because it could not be ascertained whether the modern structure behind the Unicorn Theatre in Vine Lane was indeed its southern end. Its not its original southern end however the tunnel…

  • The former railway from Barnstaple to Ilfracombe opened on 20th July 1874 – 150 years ago. It never reached its 100th anniversary, closing on 5th October 1970. By the time the anniversary year came about four years later, the line had been disused for that time and not long after, despite deliberations on whether to…

  • This is the second part of the online guide to the Ilfracombe railway and features the stretch from Braunton to Willingcott. That is near near the summit of the line just south of Mortehoe. Although around half of the route through Barnstaple, Braunton and Ilfracombe now constitutes the Tarka Trail, much of the following section…

  • The Barnstaple and Ilfracombe railway opened in July 1874 thus 2024 is the 150th anniversary of the line’s opening. Despite opposition the line closed in October 1970 after British Railways had totally rationalised the line in an attempt to keep the costs of running it to a minimum. Ultimately the Government of the day was…

  • Avery is of course the western end of the noted 440 mile long Rockies electrification. However the company also ran another electrics division that traversed the Cascades in Washington state, and these tracks led to Seattle and Tacoma. The latter was of course the absolute extremity of any of the Milwaukee’s electrified lines even though…

  • Rails to Ilfracombe #2

    This week is the 50th anniversary of the closure of the Barnstaple to Ilfracombe Railway. This opened on 20 July 1874 and shut for good from 5th October 1970 – the last train was actually two days earlier on the 3rd October – an eight car DMU forming the 19.55pm from Ilfracombe to Exeter carrying…

  • Rails to Ilfracombe #1

    Trains do indeed still cross the River Taw in many places, eleven times this happens in fact. However a twelfth crossing was the biggest of all – and the one trains just do not use anymore. Yes you guessed – its the Ilfracombe line’s stupendous cast iron viaduct at Barnstaple. That was a rarity in…

  • The second part of this special gallery of Milwaukee Road scenes! Most are from Flickr pools – and not even featured on Google’s pages. Many fascinating pictures – and great photographers who captured these scenes! Drummond between Deer Lodge and Missoula. One of the few stops on the Rockies division to retain semaphore signals. Source:…

  • I thought I’d do a gallery of Milwaukee Road scenes! Most are from Flickr pools – and not even featured on Google’s pages. Many fascinating pictures – and some very lucky guys who captured these scenes! The eastern terminus of the 438 miles of electrification at Harlowton. Large marshalling yards and locomotive depots were found…