May 2026. Rothes to Craigellachie, Morayshire/Banffshire. The Rothes Way is a community-led project which aims to provide a multi-use path linking Rothes and Craigellachie, which will for the most part follow the line of the former Great North of Scotland Railway and provide an off-road alternative to the A95/A941. It also provides a link to […]
ArchiveNews
News 2025
December 2025. Hawes, Yorkshire. The nascent Upper Wensleydale Railway (UWR) has produced an impressive map showing the route and structures on the six-mile Hawes branch, which they hope one day to reopen. Including the two extant viaducts and Mossdale Head Tunnel, the UWR has identified 39 officially numbered bridges, at least 19 unnumbered culverts, almost […]
News 2024
November 2024. Every railway rambler’s dream: stations for sale. Station residences at both ends of the spectrum are currently, or were recently, on the market, with something else in between. Member Steve Wall sent in details of St Helens railway station on the former Isle of Wight Railway which has just come onto the market […]
News 2023
December 2023. Maerdy, Glamorgan. The surviving section of this line as far south as Pontygwaith was walked by the Club on 6th April 2013 and a report appears in Railway Ramblings 142 (Summer 2014), p. 35. At that time the surface was variable and some sections were still ballasted. However upgrading is now in progress […]
News 2022
December 2022. Huddersfield, West Yorkshire. The humble, yet vital, siding hit the Huddersfield headlines when engineers working on the Transpennine Route Upgrade unearthed a set at Hillhouse, near Alder Street. The sidings are thought to date from 1850, while the wider site also encompassed train sheds and two turntables. It was used to store trains […]
2020 News (March Onwards)
Dec 2020 – Little Mill Jn – Usk, Monmouthshire Monmouthshire County Council’s planning committee has approved plans to convert about 4 miles of the trackbed of the ex-GWR line between Little Mill Junction and Usk. The path will start near a point on the A472 to the west of Coleg Gwent and the Monmouthshire Council […]
News 2021
Dec 2021 – Co. Donegal, Republic of Ireland. The main railway walking available in County Donegal is on the former Londonderry & Lough Swilly Railway, which operated 99 miles of narrow gauge line from Londonderry to Tooban Junction, where separate branches led off to Carndonagh and Burtonport. A Google search for ‘Dismantled railway Letterkenny to […]
News 2020
Above: West Derby station on the Liverpool Loop Line of the former Cheshire Lines Committee. The former railway is now a popular cycle trail, with the route running along the southbound platform seen here on the right. The trail – still called the Liverpool Loop Line and now part of NCN62 – runs from Halewood […]
News 2019
Above: A typical Great Central Railway girder bridge carries the old GCR main line over the Midland Railway just south of Beighton Junction in South Yorkshire (east of Sheffield). This bridge has been sealed off, which is not surprising given that it has no deck, and an operational freight line passes below; the photograph was […]
News 2018
Above: This sylvan scene depicts the crossing of two railways near Port Penrhyn, Bangor: one remains in use while the other is now a multi-use trail. The viaduct carries the LNWR’s still operational Chester-Holyhead line, while the trackbed below – once part of the Penrhyn Railway – now serves walkers, cyclists, etc. The Penrhyn Railway […]
News 2017
Above: One of the many abandoned engine houses on the east side of Bodmin Moor, Cornwall, with the trackbed of the Liskeard & Caradon Railway clearly visible in the foreground. This part of the moor a treasure trove for railway ramblers and industrial archaeologists: the engine houses run into double figures, and a high proportion […]
News 2016
Above: This huge girder bridge – the ‘Black Path bridge’ – carries the Viaduct Cycleway, part of NCN53, over the West Coast Main Line just west of Rugby station. It leads on to a new cycle trail opened in July 2013 with connections to Newbold on Avon (via the Oxford Canal) and the Swift Valley […]
News 2015
Above: On the face of it, these preserved Bedford OBs have nothing to do with old railways … but they do. They are KJH 731, which was new to Kirby’s of Bushey Heath, Hertfordshire, in 1949, and GDL 667, which was new to Paul’s Tours of Ryde, Isle of Wight, in 1950. These vehicles are […]
News 2014
Above: The old goods shed at Cloughton on the former NER line from Scarborough to Whitby has now been restored for use as a guest house. Our photographer was there just after 9:00 a.m. at the start of a delightful autumn day. Scarborough to Whitby, or the Cinder Trail as it is known locally, is […]
News 2013
Above: A steam-hauled passenger working in Sichuan Province, China. We realise that this photograph is not representative of a railway walk, but thought that members might enjoy seeing anywhere in the spring as we in the UK slosh through a winter that Neptune would be proud to call his own. The photographer supplied these comments […]
News 2012
Above: The crossing keeper’s cottage at Leasey Bridge Level Crossing on the former GNR line from Hatfield to Dunstable via Welwyn Garden City, Wheathampstead, Harpenden and Luton. The level crossing is situated between Wheathampstead and Harpenden, and marks the point where a new section of rail trail regains the trackbed, which has been used for […]
News 2011
Above: On 16th October 2010, members of the club’s Southern Area walked along part of the former Test Valley line between Stockbridge and Mottisfont, taking lunch at the John of Gaunt Inn (formerly The Railway Inn) at the intermediate village of Horsebridge. While there, members were lucky enough to see this fine Marshall traction engine […]
News 2010
Above: The neat little station at Fort Brockhurst on the former LSWR branch from Fareham to Gosport was up for sale in June 2009, which explains why the ground floor windows had all been boarded up. Until the final freight-only years under BR, the branch was double track throughout; this is the up platform, with […]
News 2009
Above: A small viaduct on the LNWR’s former Heads of the Valley line crosses a gully in the Clydach Gorge, seen here in October 2008. The terrain that the railway builders were up against here could hardly have been more demanding. Between Llanfoist, just west of Abergavenny, and Brynmawr, this old line now forms part […]
News 2008
Above: This beautiful photograph by Graham Rains makes it obvious why railway enthusiasts, holidaymakers and casual passengers alike fell in love with the scenery beyond the carriage window when they travelled on the former Somerset & Dorset Railway. This view is taken from near Gains Cross, south of Shillingstone, and shows a permissive section of […]
News 2007
Above: That’s the way to do it! Just over two years ago, this site at Peasmarsh, Surrey, was a tangled mass of vegetation with empty brick abutments standing either side of the River Wey where once a railway bridge had carried the former branch line from Christ’s Hospital on towards Guildford. Just look at the […]
News 2006
Above: Just to prove that members do occasionally get out on to an operational railway, this is a picture of members from the Yorkshire Area enjoying a brake van trip on the Bowes Railway – the only railway in the country which features an operational rope-hauled incline. Unfortunately, the future of the Bowes Railway is […]
News 2005
Above: The rusting clock at Carron station on Speyside, frozen in time, calls to mind Rupert Brooke’s famous poem, ‘Grantchester’, which asks if the church clock still stands at ten to three. For how many years has this Victorian timepiece shown twenty past four? Normally, photographs in our ‘News’ pages illustrate a story, but this […]
News 2004
Above: While Sustrans has done a great deal to re-use old railway lines, this type of trackbed conversion is less than ideal. If a single track railway were relaid here (not an impossibility nowadays), the cycle trail would have to be dug up and relaid in a straight line. Why pretend that this wasn’t a […]
News 2003
Above: The club sometimes uses preserved buses to provide transport for members, especially as an easy way of linking short sections of railway path that are not worth a visit in their own right. This is ex London Transport RF single decker MXX 481, seen at Chawton, near Alton, Hampshire. When the photograph was taken, […]
News 2002
Above: Holsworthy in Devon was served by a station on the single track line from Halwill Junction to Bude. The station was unusual in having a viaduct either side of it. Derriton Viaduct, pictured here, is on the west side of the station, and has recently been restored for use by walkers and cyclists. For […]
News 2001
Above: View across Meldon Viaduct, Devon, in July 2000. This viaduct, near Okehampton, has recently been restored for public access and carries a new cycle trail which will link Okehampton and Tavistock within the next few years. For further details, see entry for February 2001. (Richard Martin) December 2001. How about some more pictures for […]
News 2000
Above: A party of ramblers from the club’s Yorkshire group cross the valley of the River Belah, once spanned by a massive viaduct on the Stainmore route between Barnard Castle and Kirby Stephen. Two stone abutments are all that remains of this structure. (Look for the vertical edges on the skyline to the left and […]