Disused Railways That Have The Fewest Remains

Jonathan1990 · 22 Aug 2018

After the beeching a lot of disused railways became walking and cycling paths (aka cinder tracks). Some even reopened as heritage railways but there were other railways that went completely with very few remains. One I can mention to start with is the line that went from Scarborough to Pickering, then onto Kirkbymoorside and Helmsley which my Grandfather use to ride on into Scarborough when he was 10 around 1940 as his family had to temporary relocate to a place along there during world war 2. I wish that would have become a cycle path like the Scarborough to Whitby one. Been a riding school there the Snainton to Brompton bit would have become extremely popular with horse riders. Now most of the route has been turned into open fields with just the old station buildings remaining and a banking with a bridge near Wykeham that I know.

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Dr_Paul · 25 Aug 2018

There are lengths of the Midland and Great Northern across the Fens that have pretty much disappeared when one looks at the aerial photography.

I don't think that there are any traces of Broad Street in London, and the viaduct to it south of Primrose Street.

delt1c · 25 Aug 2018

Dr_Paul said:
There are lengths of the Midland and Great Northern across the Fens that have pretty much disappeared when one looks at the aerial photography.

I don't think that there are any traces of Broad Street in London, and the viaduct to it south of Primrose Street.

Ok not in the UK, but here in Malta there is very little left of the old railway

AndrewE · 25 Aug 2018

Jonathan1990 said:
After the beeching cuts a lot of disused railways became walking and cycling paths...

I would have said that only a few became cycle or foot paths. Lots of dead lines (Beeching cuts, plus those shut before then and since) have vanished almost completely, sometimes leaving just bridge abutments. I am amazed that it ever paid farmers to remove whole embankments just to incorporate their footprint into a field.

PeterC · 25 Aug 2018

The Hemel Hempstead branch of the Midland Railway was completely obliterated between Hemel station at the gasworks sideing apart from one tiny section of viaduct on Boxmoor. Until the web allowed me to look it up I assumed that the remaining fragment was quite a few centuries older.

Ianno87 · 25 Aug 2018

The original Newmarket line route into Cambridge (running just to the south of present-day Mill Road). Virtually no trace exists that it was ever there nowadays.

Mutant Lemming · 25 Aug 2018

There's very little left of the Liverpool Overhead Railway

edwin_m · 25 Aug 2018

Ianno87 said:
The original Newmarket line route into Cambridge (running just to the south of present-day Mill Road). Virtually no trace exists that it was ever there nowadays.

There may be little physical trace but part of it still shows up in property boundaries, as visible on the OS map here.

https://binged.it/2o9ts9i

Cowley · 26 Aug 2018

Halwill Junction - Almost nothing left apart from the name...
Also the Great Central through the centre of Nottingham - Although us enthusiasts know where the railway was, it’s becoming lost knowledge to the general populace (who have no particular interest anyway).
That’s life though, and I don’t really have a problem with it.

swt_passenger · 26 Aug 2018

I saw on the web that the Ipswich Underground was almost completely removed:
http://www.simonknott.co.uk/ipswichunderground.htm

Cowley · 26 Aug 2018

swt_passenger said:
I saw on the web that the Ipswich Underground was almost completely removed...

bramling · 26 Aug 2018

Jonathan1990 said:
After the beeching a lot of disused railways became walking and cycling paths (aka cinder tracks). Some even reopened as heritage railways but there were other railways that went completely with very few remains. One I can mention to start with is the line that went from Scarborough to Pickering, then onto Kirkbymoorside and Helmsley which my Grandfather use to ride on into Scarborough when he was 10 around 1940 as his family had to temporary relocate to a place along there during world war 2. I wish that would have become a cycle path like the Scarborough to Whitby one. Been a riding school there the Snainton to Brompton bit would have become extremely popular with horse riders. Now most of the route has been turned into open fields with just the old station buildings remaining and a banking with a bridge near Wykeham that I know.

Nottingham is one place which has always seemed to go further than most in obliterating parts of its closed railways - much repurposing of land and backfilling of tunnels in the area.

A lot depends on when a line was closed. More recent closures are generally more likely to have had the trackbed purchased by a local council for use as a footpath - so lines which survived longer even simply as a freight-only route are likely to be more unscathed. At one time BR had a policy of selling off land to adjacent landowners, which naturally resulted in alignments being completely ruined. Generally a survey would be carried out of what would be recovered for further railway use, what would be demolished and what would be left for sale (mainly houses). The extent to which this was carried out in practice did vary however.

bnm · 26 Aug 2018

Very little remains of the Weston, Clevedon & Portishead Light Railway.

Calthrop · 26 Aug 2018

delt1c said:
Ok not in the UK, but here in Malta there is very little left of the old railway

B.L. Rigby's "much-in-little" book on the Malta Railway (Oakwood Press) includes a number of photographs taken about fifty years ago, showing quite prominent traces of the line (earthworks, bridges); but that was, after all, considerably closer in time to the railway's 1931 abandonment, than "now is to then" -- in a time of great change, much of same to be expected over half a century.

Calthrop · 26 Aug 2018

One would suppose, that in the nature of things: lines which were planned and laid out as roadside tramways, would leave very little trace. Some years ago, I travelled by car the length of the Wantage Tramway: nothing en route gave the slightest hint that there had once been a rail line there.

AndrewE · 26 Aug 2018

bramling said:
Nottingham is one place which has always seemed to go further than most in obliterating parts of its closed railways - much repurposing of land and backfilling of tunnels in the area.

The big brick viaduct that used to come out of the city centre was only demolished a few years ago- to put the tram viaduct in. The GCR alignment south out out of the city is still visible too, even where it hasn't been made into a footpath.

bnm said:
Very little remains of the Weston, Clevedon & Portishead Light Railway.

The route from Yatton to Clevedon is still very clear on the 1:25000 OS map, but it is difficult to spot the route onwards towards Clevedon.
It's the obvious routes shown up by the parallel field boundaries allover the the 2 1/2" maps that made me question the OP's original assertion that lots of lines had disappeared almost without trace.

PeterY · 26 Aug 2018

I could find no trace of the GWR Uxbridge to Denham line and very little remains of West Drayton to Uxbridge.

Strangely my daughter lived in a flat that occupied the old Cowley station but behind the flats there is still some of the station iron fencing.

AndrewE · 26 Aug 2018

PeterY said:
I could find no trace of the GWR Uxbridge to Denham line...

Start by looking at the 1:25000 map on bing Maps then! There is a public footpath under the embankment near where it is crossed by the A40, cuttings and embankments are still shown on the map north and south of there, helpfully marked "dismantled railway." The route isn't obvious through the town though.

Harbornite · 26 Aug 2018

Much of the trackbed of the bumble hole line (Old hill- Dudley) has been redeveloped so there's not much left at all.

181 · 26 Aug 2018

Calthrop said:
One would suppose, that in the nature of things: lines which were planned and laid out as roadside tramways, would leave very little trace. Some years ago, I travelled by car the length of the Wantage Tramway: nothing en route gave the slightest hint that there had once been a rail line there.

That's what you would expect, but it isn't always the case. My recollection from a visit in 1997 is that what appeared to be course of the Tralee and Dingle for some miles west of the reopened fragment at Blennerville could still be seen, as a strip between the road and the hedge that didn't follow all the undulations of the road. At one point it crossed the road and there were even rails visible where the tarmac covering them had worn away.

Calthrop · 26 Aug 2018

181 said:
That's what you would expect, but it isn't always the case. My recollection from a visit in 1997 is that what appeared to be course of the Tralee and Dingle for some miles west of the reopened fragment at Blennerville could still be seen, as a strip between the road and the hedge that didn't follow all the undulations of the road. At one point it crossed the road and there were even rails visible where the tarmac covering them had worn away.

If I have things rightly, the T & D followed the road between the two places quite closely; but (as you indicate) only for some of the way did it do so in strict roadside-tramway-fashion. Again IIRC, its locomotives never had the wheels-covering "skirt" arrangement (not that that was universal even for all fully-fledged roadside steam tramways). A 1920s Ward Lock guide to south-west Ireland which I have, says "...the light railway from Tralee to Dingle runs parallel with, and, in some parts, on the road itself..." .

Dr_Paul · 26 Aug 2018

Calthrop said:
One would suppose, that in the nature of things: lines which were planned and laid out as roadside tramways, would leave very little trace. Some years ago, I travelled by car the length of the Wantage Tramway: nothing en route gave the slightest hint that there had once been a rail line there.

I imagine that with roadside tramways, the roads have been widened in many cases, taking over the tramway's trackbed. This has also happened to sections of the Corris Railway, where the A487 has been widened.

Jonathan1990 · 26 Aug 2018

One that I'm trying to see is how much you can explore of the Malton to Thirsk disused railway. At the Malton end I've walked on a bit next to this roman fort field. Malton viaduct over the River Derwent has been demolished although a couple of support beams with a bit of the rail track still exist. It then goes under a bridge which the Pickering road runs over before going into someones garden a bit further up.

delt1c · 26 Aug 2018

Calthrop said:
B.L. Rigby's "much-in-little" book on the Malta Railway (Oakwood Press) includes a number of photographs taken about fifty years ago, showing quite prominent traces of the line (earthworks, bridges); but that was, after all, considerably closer in time to the railway's 1931 abandonment, than "now is to then" -- in a time of great change, much of same to be expected over half a century.

Time has not been kind, there are a few traces Valletta, Birkirkara, Attard and Museum Station but between it is very difficult if not imposible to trace

yorkguy · 27 Aug 2018

Jonathan1990 said:
One that I'm trying to see is how much you can explore of the Malton to Thirsk disused railway. At the Malton end I've walked on a bit next to this roman fort field. Malton viaduct over the River Derwent has been demolished although a couple of support beams with a bit of the rail track still exist. It then goes under a bridge which the Pickering road runs over before going into someones garden a bit further up.

Beyond those gardens, the trackbed is under the Showfield Lane industrial estate access road before being sliced through by the A64, Malton bypass. Then it’s ploughed over until your next access point which is at the bottom of Outgang Lane in Malton, just north of the A64. There’s around 200m of the old route there which is a public footpath. The old wooden fencing shows how enough land was purchased for the double track which never materialised. After that the route can be distinguished by a single fence line over private land westwards towards Amotherby which was the first station stop from Malton

Jonathan1990 · 27 Aug 2018

I'm sure you can walk a bit of it at Hovingham.

AndrewE · 27 Aug 2018

Jonathan1990 said:
I'm sure you can walk a bit of it at Hovingham.

It's a right of way nearer Slingsby. The 2 1/2" map on Bing shows a right of way along the formation at the west end near Husthwaite as well (plus a little bit more further east.) It has hardly disappeared at all if you look at the surviving field and other boundaries on that map.

gg1 · 28 Aug 2018

Harbornite said:
Much of the trackbed of the bumble hole line (Old hill- Dudley) has been redeveloped so there's not much left at all.

Sticking with the GWR's Black Country branches, there's nothing left at all of Swan Village-Great Bridge and I don't think there's anything left of Old Hill-Halesowen other than a few corridors of undeveloped land.

vlad · 29 Aug 2018

There can't be much that still exists of the Brighton & Rottingdean.

steamybrian · 29 Aug 2018

vlad said:
There can't be much that still exists of the Brighton & Rottingdean.

Wrong- . At low tide the route can be clearly identified as most of the stone blocks supporting the rails are still in situ.

Disused Railways That Have The Fewest Remains

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