Driver's Eye View (Wales) - Welshpool & Llanfair Railway - Part 1 - Llanfair Caereinion to Welshpool

The Welshpool and Llanfair Light Railway (W&LLR) (Welsh: Rheilffordd y Trallwng a Llanfair Caereinion) is a 2 ft 6 in narrow gauge heritage railway in Powys, Wales. The line is around 8.5 miles long and runs westwards from the town of Welshpool (Welsh: Y Trallwng) via Castle Caereinion to the village of Llanfair Caereinion.

Early proposals -

The first of these to connect Llanfair Caerinion and Welshpool by railway was the Llanfair Railway of 1864; this would have been a narrow gauge line, with a mixed gauge section where it connected to the Cambrian Railways. This proposal failed as did several subsequent proposals. In late December 1896, the mayor of Welshpool William Addie proposed a 2 ft 6 in gauge railway called the Welshpool and Llanfair Light Railway. By March 1897, Addie contracted noted narrow gauge promoter Everard Calthrop to assist in preparing a case for the inquiry. An application for a Light Railway Order was submitted to the Board of Trade in May 1897. At the August 1897 public inquiry Calthrop appeared, along with J.R. Dix manager of the Corris Railway. The enquiry considered both the Llanfair & Meifod Light Railway and the Welshpool and Llanfair Light Railway proposals. The promoters of the W&LLR approached the Cambrian Railways, asking them to pay for and construct the line. After much time-consuming negotiations, the Cambrian agreed and on 8th September 1899, the Light Railway Order was granted to begin construction of the line.
It was opened on 6th April 1903 to aid economic development in the area. Originally operated by the Cambrian Railways, the line was built through difficult country, requiring many contour hugging curves to reach the summit at 600 ft. The original Welshpool terminus was located alongside the main line station requiring trains to share the road through the town, locomotives were fitted with a warning bells for used on this section.
In the 1923 Grouping, the Cambrian Railways, including the Welshpool to Llanfair Caereinion line, was absorbed by the Great Western Railway. On 9th February 1931 passenger services ceased, it remained open as a freight-only line, although it was temporarily re-opened to passengers between 6th and 11th August 1945 for the Eisteddfod. The GWR itself was nationalised in 1948 and became part of British Railways.
Freight traffic lingered on until 1956, by which time British Railways decided to close the line, with services ceasing on 5 November.

Preservation -

A group of volunteers and enthusiasts took the line over and started raising money to restore it. On 6th April 1963, the western half of the line, from Llanfair Caereinion to Castle Caereinion, was reopened as a Heritage railway.
On 13th December 1964, a pier supporting the steel girder bridge over the River Banwy was seriously damaged by flood waters dislodging the bridge. During the spring and early summer of 1965 the 16th Railway Regiment of the Royal Engineers replaced the damaged masonry pier with a fabricated steel one and restored the span to its original position. Train services between Llanfair Caereinion to Castle Caereinion resumed on 14th August 1965.
In 1972, services were extended to Sylfaen. The line through Welshpool, however, could not be reopened, requiring a new terminus station to be built at Raven Square on the western outskirts of the town, it was opened on 18th July 1981.
Because of the 2 ft 6 in gauge, unusual for British narrow gauge railways, locomotives and rolling stock to supplement the originals had to be obtained from sources around the world including the Zillertalbahn in Austria. A major grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund permitted restoration of both original locomotives together with several coaches and original wagons along with new workshop facilities, ready for the line's centenary.
Golfa Bank - is particularly steep with a mile long 1 in 29 gradient, the steepest passenger carrying section on the Cambrian Railways, it is still a challenging climb today. Golfa bank rises from about 350 ft above sea level at the start of the climb to 630 ft above sea level at the summit, equal to climbing 280 ft in 1.5 miles. Due to the severity of the climb, locomotives had to be specialy designed and built to cope with the gradient. There was a halt at the top called Golfa Halt, 1.75 miles from the Welshpool Raven Square, opened on 6th April 1903 it closed again on the 9th February 1931 when passenger services were withdrawn, the line closed to all traffic on 3rd November 1956. In preservation the halt reopened on 18th July 1981 only to be closed again in 2015.

For more information, please click on this link - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welshpo...

To make enquiries or to make a booking, please click on this link - https://wllr.org.uk/