Proposal to reopen between Bridgnorth and Ironbridge

[Hesperus]

I really can't see this happening but it would be useful.

 

https://www.shropshirestar.com/news/local-hubs/telford/ironbridge/2021/03/17/trust-bids-for-funding-to-plan-opening-disused-rail-line/

 

In my head a service from Telford to Bridgnorth on the weekends and perhaps running all the way through to Kidderminster during the week would be a massive boost to public transport around here.  It's a shame that the claimed £46M cost is probably a tenth of the actual amount required.

[AY Mod]

I'd love to see it but Bridgnorth Tunnel and the golf club would be the killers. Report done, how do I claim the £43k?

[Gilbert]

1 minute ago, AY Mod said:

I'd love to see it but Bridgnorth Tunnel and the golf club would be the killers. Report done, how do I claim the £43k?

Submit an invoice then drive to Barnard Castle....sorry...

[melmerby]

4 minutes ago, AY Mod said:

I'd love to see it but Bridgnorth Tunnel and the golf club would be the killers.

Has anybody looked inside the tunnel in the last 40-50years?

 

I agree, it's a pipe dream.

[melmerby]

The golf course was there and the railway ran through it in olden times.

[Hesperus]

10 minutes ago, melmerby said:

Has anybody looked inside the tunnel in the last 40-50years?

 

Quite a lot of the local kids including my girlfriend before they made it more secure.

[phil-b259]

13 minutes ago, melmerby said:

Has anybody looked inside the tunnel in the last 40-50years?

 

I agree, it's a pipe dream.

 

The tunnel is owned by somebody (I think Highways England as the repository for all disused railway structures once the British Railways Board was finally wound up under the Cameron Government.

 

The owners have a legal obligation to make sure it is structurally sound and the properties above it remain safe from subsidence so, in answer to your question quite a lot of people will have looked inside it over the past 5 decades

[AY Mod]

24 minutes ago, melmerby said:

The golf course was there and the railway ran through it in olden times.

 

Probably 'out of bounds' now.

[Kris]

28 minutes ago, melmerby said:

The golf course was there and the railway ran through it in olden times.

Gives a whole new aspect to landing in the bunker.

[Wickham Green too]

40 minutes ago, phil-b259 said:

The owners have a legal obligation to make sure it is structurally sound and the properties above it remain safe from subsidence .........

Yeah - I don't think we can blame railway for the leaning castle !

[CDGfife]

Notwithstanding the issues at the Bridgnorth end already discussed, the civils at the Ironbridge end would be a nightmare.  The whole gorge is more or less sliding into the river and thundering (alright even crawling) trains would not help that by any means.

[009 micro modeller]

It all sounds interesting but there seem to be quite a few different organisations involved. Is Ironbridge Railway Trust formally linked to either Telford Steam Railway or the Severn Valley or are they a third party hoping to work with both? I get the impression that trains from the SVR to Horsehay would need to reverse at Buildwas/the power station site anyway so the plan may not be to run through, but how is the TSR power station extension plan coming along? And how much does this new scheme depend on that being in place first (so that there is a connection at both ends and not just the SVR end)?

 

It would be amazing if they did actually manage to establish a link between the SVR and TSR though. It just seems to depend a lot on things other people are doing, if that makes sense.

 

Edit: this is interesting and perhaps somewhat more practical: https://steamingtoironbridge.co.uk/phase-4-tramway/

Edited March 18, 2021 by 009 micro modeller

[TravisM]

I thought there was a housing estate that was built on the trackbed as well?  As noted, I think one of the reasons for closure in BR days was the condition of the gorge.

[Covkid]

2 hours ago, 009 micro modeller said:

It all sounds interesting but there seem to be quite a few different organisations involved. Is Ironbridge Railway Trust formally linked to either Telford Steam Railway or the Severn Valley or are they a third party hoping to work with both? I get the impression that trains from the SVR to Horsehay would need to reverse at Buildwas/the power station site anyway so the plan may not be to run through, but how is the TSR power station extension plan coming along? And how much does this new scheme depend on that being in place first (so that there is a connection at both ends and not just the SVR end)?

 

It would be amazing if they did actually manage to establish a link between the SVR and TSR though. It just seems to depend a lot on things other people are doing, if that makes sense.

 

Edit: this is interesting and perhaps somewhat more practical: https://steamingtoironbridge.co.uk/phase-4-tramway/

 

Was there not quite a difference in height between the lines at Buildwas ?

Not sure whether enough cash could sort that out.  

[Ben B]

11 hours ago, AY Mod said:

I'd love to see it but Bridgnorth Tunnel and the golf club would be the killers. Report done, how do I claim the £43k?

 

Change your name to Jonty Bontington (the third) and pretend you went to Eton with some of the Cabinet?  Then you'll not only get the money for the consultancy, but if you immediately set up a construction company registered in Monaco, you'll also get 40 billion pound-per-mile to build the line

[phil-b259]

7 hours ago, jools1959 said:

I thought there was a housing estate that was built on the trackbed as well?  As noted, I think one of the reasons for closure in BR days was the condition of the gorge.

It didn’t help - however the SVR was actually earmarked for closure (to passengers at least) BEFORE the Beeching report was commissioned due to the losses it was making.

[Siberian Snooper]

There was a proposal to reopen the line north of Bridgenorth a few years ago, at the time the SVR had no interest in it and I doubt that, that position has changed.

 

 

[black and decker boy]

I think they got the decimal place in the wrong place. 16km of new railway in a world heritage and environmentally sensitive location for under £50m???. Building a single carriageway road that long in a normal location would need £160m to £220m. No mention of trains or staff costs to cover either.

 

Even reopening the Blyth & Tyne to passenger traffic is something like £170m and the track & signaling already exists (albeit its 18miles rather than 10).

[melmerby]

6 hours ago, Covkid said:

 

Was there not quite a difference in height between the lines at Buildwas ?

Not sure whether enough cash could sort that out.  

The SVR and Ketley lines joined at Buildwas Junction, a short distance SE of Buildwas Junction Station

[Derekl]

35 minutes ago, black and decker boy said:

I think they got the decimal place in the wrong place. 16km of new railway in a world heritage and environmentally sensitive location for under £50m???. Building a single carriageway road that long in a normal location would need £160m to £220m. No mention of trains or staff costs to cover either.

 

It is actually £43,000 to start investigating the possibility of opening the line. I think it is one of 85 such schemes, some with possibility, others a lot less so.

[Ben B]

Given there apparently isn't even a concrete plan to upgrade the Albert Edward Bridge and return trains to a freight line that still exists with all track and signals in place, leading to a planned massive new housing estate on the old Ironbridge power station site, I frankly can't see this happening.  And that's a relatively short line, until recently maintained to reasonable standards to carry heavy power station traffic.  And this would be the easy bit; as others above have said, returning tracks and stations to a geologically-unstable world heritage site full of private property would be next to impossible, and that's before even getting into the politics of connecting through-trains with a pair of established heritage lines. 

 

This smacks more as the sort of classic (money-wasting) exercise you get in the run-up to local elections, to get people emotionally involved in a promise that will never be kept, and get the middle-aged potential voters nostalgically remembering train journeys when they were younger, so they'll go out and put a cross in the box of that nice young man in the posh suit because he talks about the good old days when your village had a station.  Then afterwards, when 40-million quids worth of tea and biscuits have been consumed at planning meetings with a private consultancy firm, it will be quietly put on the back burner, and everyone will continue using their cars as it's more convenient.

 

Given how few station re-openings on existing lines there are these days (and those that do at ridiculous cost just for a short concrete platform and a bus shelter with an overlarge footbridge), let alone full line re-openings, as I say, I can't see it happening.  Particularly as even post-Covid, I suspect most people's travel habits will have sadly changed for good.  Spending a ton of money the country (apparently) doesn't have, so that West Midlands Trains can be subsidised to cart fresh air around the Ironbridge Gorge doesn't strike me as being a priority when apparently even libraries and leisure centres can only be economically run by volunteers.

 

Trying to be less negative to end this rant, I still think the more 'do-able' extension for the SVR would be the old Stourport branch, which they could do at least to the suburban edge of Stourport itself.  I gather they own a big chunk of this trackbed?  A shuttle service by autotrain or railcar as an extra attraction for gala days or 'short run' for group bookings/school visits by DMU perhaps?  Shame they can't get right into Stourport itself, but that's short-sighted redevelopment by the local council again, especially with the station lasting as late as it did.  Though I gather some years ago there was a plan to reconnect Stourport the other way to Hartlebury- I think the fact that hasn't happened either, on a relatively short, clear route, indicates the sort of success any locals can expect from promises of rail re-openings in the local area...

[meil]

The killer is neither Bridgnorth tunnel or the golf course it's the Jackfield's slip which killed the line in the first place. The instability of the Severn Valley north of Bridgnorth is simply too great to even contemplate re-building the line. Even the £43k is a waste of money.

Edited March 19, 2021 by meil

[009 micro modeller]

1 hour ago, Ben B said:

Trying to be less negative to end this rant, I still think the more 'do-able' extension for the SVR would be the old Stourport branch, which they could do at least to the suburban edge of Stourport itself.

 

Does anyone have an opinion on whether the TSR extension to the power station site is achievable? I can’t remember if all track is still down on that or whether some needs to be relaid to join the mothballed freight line to their existing line.

[Phil Himsworth]

There is a gap between the end of their line and the freight line of about a mile or so. I think it's all still technically clear, but there would be at least one level crossing to reinstate (one bit of road still has rails in from when it was a level crossing originally) and there's the A4169 to cross; apparently they have bought a bridge from Network Rail to do this, but given the levels involved and the fact that there are already some fairly hefty gradients round there anyway I'm not really sure how this would work. It must be possible given they bought the bridge though!

 

The freight line was last used in 2019 (I think) for a couple of steam specials down to Coalbrookdale. They stopped before the river, though; the bridge had a 5mph limit when it was in use, now it is apparently not fit for use at all, but it is listed and enormous so whether repair is feasible I don't know. It keeps getting mentioned that the line will be reinstated for use as part of the demolition of the power station and construction of the new development, but nothing has happened and most of the power station has gone already...

 

Parking in the gorge is pretty rubbish, Ironbridge would be a lot nicer without as much traffic, seeing steam trains over Coalbrookdale viaduct would be very impressive and having Ironbridge and Coalbrookdale as destinations for visitors to the steam railway would seem to make this a plan more worthy and likely of success than many others, especially Ironbridge to Bridgnorth. I don't know what their plan involves for the rest of the line up to the main line; I can see Ironbridge a worthy destination for them, an anonymous industrial estate at the other end of the line less so.

 

I hope they succeed.

 

[black and decker boy]

3 hours ago, Derekl said:

 

It is actually £43,000 to start investigating the possibility of opening the line. I think it is one of 85 such schemes, some with possibility, others a lot less so.

It is but the promoting group state that the cost of reinstating the line is £58m (of which they are seeking around £44m from DfT) 

 

Ironstone Railway Trust submission

 

Shropshire Star article