Old railways you never know when you need them again!

[Tricky Dicky]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-leeds-49451634

I have to applaud the group fighting to keep the Queensbury tunnel open with plans to turn it into a cycle track. Too much railway infrastructure is being lost when many of these Beeching cuts could be reversed.

An example is where my daughter lives in Ilkley, the town's streets and residential areas are cluttered with commuter cars coming from outlying areas to pick up the train to Leeds or Bradford. At one time a railway line continued from Ilkley to Skipton the remnants of which are the Embsay preservation line but now a huge gap exists. Places like Addingham had their own stations but are now only accessed by road yet since the Beeching days have expanded and it places like this where the commuters are coming from.

Although the route of the line can easily be traced through the countryside in Ilkley a number of bridges and a viaduct have disappeared part of the route ironically is a car park another part is a school playground plus a few homes. Although a heavy rail solution is probably not viable but a light rail solution like the Metrolink in Manchester using trams on old heavy rail routes as well as street running.

So well done, the Queensbury preservation group for fighting to save the tunnel even if initially for cyclists you never know it may still have a future as rail line!

Richard

[LC&DR]

Perhaps there are two excellent examples of railways long abandoned which have been brought back to life lately.

My first example is the Welsh Highland Railway from Caernarfon to Porthmadog, closed in 1936, but brought back to life in the 1990s finally completing the entire route in 2011.

The second example is the Waverley Route, which was closed in the 1960s under the Beeching axe. The Scottish Government very sensibly decided to reinstate the line, so far as Galashields and Tweedbank, but hopefully all the way back to Hawick and eventually to Carlisle. It featured last night on "The World's most Beautiful Railway" on More4.

[Walkingthedog]

They are hoping to reopen the High Wycombe to Bourne End branch line in the future as part of a link to Crossrail.