Settle – Carlisle railway line

Settle – Carlisle
Ribblehead Viaduct in Upper Ribblesdale
Route length:	117 km
Gauge :	1435 mm ( standard gauge )
Maximum slope :	10  ‰
Legend from Glasgow 60 m 35 ch Carlisle to Barrow and to London 59m 26ch / 307m 12ch to Newcastle Scotby (closed 1942) Cumwhinton (closed 1956) Cotehill (closed 1952) 298m 09ch Armathwaite Armathwaite Tunnel (297 m) Baron Wood Tunnel 2 (230 m) Baron Wood Tunnel 1 (189 m) 292m 50ch Lazonby and Kirkoswald Lazonby Tunnel (91 m) Little Salkeld (closed 1970) 288m 23ch Langwathby Waste Bank Tunnel (150 m) Culgaith Tunnel (604 m) Culgaith (closed 1970) New Biggin (closed 1970) Long Marton (closed 1970) Eden Valley Line ( Penrith - Kirkby Stephen East) to the Eden Valley Line 277m 22ch Appleby Ormside Viaduct (183 m) Ormside (closed 1952) Helm tunnel (522 m) Crosby Garrett Viaduct (100 m) Crosby Garrett (closed 1956) Crosby Garrett Tunnel (166 m) Smardale Viaduct (217 m) from Tebay to Darlington 266m 44ch Kirkby Stephen Birkett tunnel (388 m) Ais Gill Summit Shotlock Hill Tunnel (97 m) Moorcock tunnel (90 m) Dandry Mire / Moorcock Viaduct (208 m) from Northallerton 256m 55ch Garsdale Station (originally Hawes Junction ) Risehill Tunnel (1109 m) 253m 32ch Dent Artengill Viaduct (201 m) Dent Head Viaduct (182 m) Blea Moor Tunnel (2404 m) Ribblehead Viaduct (402 m) 247m 20ch Ribblehead 242m 43ch Horton in Ribblesdale Stainforth Tunnel (110 m) 236m 40ch Settle 234m 44ch from Lancaster Settle Junction (1876-1877) to Leeds

The Settle – Carlisle railway is a 117 kilometer long railway line in the north of England . It is part of the National Rail network and was built in the 1870s. Apart from occasional diversions, for example due to the closure of the West Coast Main Line , all passenger trains are operated by Northern Rail .

The route runs through remote regions of the Yorkshire Dales and the Northern Pennines . It is considered to be the most scenic route in England. The dramatic circumstances of its planning and construction have led it to be viewed as one of the pinnacles of entrepreneurship and engineering in the Victorian era .

The line branches off about two kilometers south of Settle from the Leeds – Morecambe railway line and leads to Carlisle near the border with Scotland . On the way she touches Appleby-in-Westmorland and several smaller towns.

prehistory

The origins of the Settle – Carlisle Line can be traced back to the competitive situation between the Midland Railway (MR) and the London and North Western Railway (LNWR). The MR wanted to expand north, but could not agree with the LNWR about shared use of their tracks to Scotland.

The viaduct at Ingleton

The Midland Railway's existing access to Scotland was via the North Western Railway (NWR) route to Ingleton . From there to the connection to the Lancaster and Carlisle Railway in Low Gill and on to Carlisle, the route was controlled by the rival LNWR. Although structurally connected, the two lines were initially operationally separate, as the LNWR and Midland Railway could not agree on joint use of Ingleton station. Instead, the LNWR trains ended at a separate station at the other end of the Ingleton Viaduct, and passengers had to walk about a mile between the two stations on a steep path.

Eventually an agreement was reached on access to the station, and the Midland Railway was able to attach through cars to the LNWR trains at Ingleton . Passengers could now continue their journey north without getting off the train. But the situation was still far from ideal, as the LNWR deliberately obstructed its competitor's through coaches, for example by attaching them to slow freight trains instead of fast passenger trains.

The route over Ingleton is closed today, but the larger structures such as the viaducts over the Low Gill and in Ingleton have been preserved. It was a solidly built route that was ideal for express trains, but its potential was never really realized due to the rivalry between the Midland Railway and the LNWR. In the end, the board of directors of MR decided that the only sensible solution was a separate route to Scotland. The surveying work began in 1865, and in June 1866 Parliament approved the plan. A little later, however, the bankruptcy of the Overend Gurney Bank led to a financial crisis in the United Kingdom. Interest rates rose dramatically and a number of railroad companies had to file for bankruptcy. Prompted by a revolt of shareholders, the Midland Railway board changed their minds on the project, which was estimated to cost £ 2.3 million. In April 1869, before the work began, the Society therefore applied for the parliamentary resolution to be repealed. However, this request was rejected in Parliament and work began in November of the same year.

construction

Ribblehead Viaduct with Whernside in the background

The line was built by more than 6000 workers, many of them Irish. They worked in adverse weather conditions and did heavy earthworks by hand. Large camps were set up to accommodate them. To combat the effects of alcoholic violence in the remote area, public Bible readings have even been sponsored by the Midland Railway. The labor camps were like small towns. They had their own post offices and schools and had names like Inkerman, Sevastopol and Jericho. The remains of one of these camps, Batty Green, which housed more than 2,000 workers, can be seen at Ribblehead.

A plaque in the church of the nearby hamlet of Chapel-le-Dale commemorates the workers who died from illness and accidents during the construction of the railway line. The exact number is unknown, but 80 people died in a smallpox epidemic in Batty Green alone . In 1997, a memorial stone was erected in Outhgill's cemetery in Mallerstang for the 25 men, women and children who died during the construction of this section of the route and who were buried in anonymous graves.

The terrain crossed is one of the most inhospitable and exposed regions of England, and construction has been held up for months in a row by ground frost, snowdrifts and flooding from the construction sites. One of the contractors involved had to give up because they underestimated the terrain and the weather - Dent Head has almost four times as much rainfall annually as London.

Dent train station

The route was designed for express trains throughout. Local traffic was secondary; since the route goes over the ridges, many train stations are several miles from the villages after which they are named. The apex of the route at Ais Gill, north of Garsdale, is the highest point on a main route in England at 356 meters above sea level .

In order to enable fast driving with steam locomotives, the gradients were limited to 10 per thousand. The 26-kilometer section from Settle Junction to Blea Moor is almost entirely laid out with this inclination and was known to the locomotive drivers as the long drag (German: "the long climb").

In addition to extensive earthworks, 14 tunnels and 22 viaducts had to be built. The most important viaduct is the Ribblehead Viaduct with 24 arches, 32 m high and 402 m long. Because of the swampy subsoil, its pillars had to be built on concrete at a depth of 8 m.

To the north of the viaduct, the route leads through the Blea-Moor-Tunnel, which is 2402 m long and has an overburden of up to 152 m, before it crosses the Dent Head viaduct. At Garsdale, there were water troughs between the rails from which the steam locomotives could replenish their supplies without stopping.

business

The line opened for freight in August 1875, and the first passenger trains ran in April 1876. The cost of construction ended up being £ 3.6 million - 50 percent over budget and a large sum at the time.

For a time the Midland Railway dominated the London – Glasgow traffic market, offering more trains per day than its competitors. But in 1923 the MR was merged with the LNWR and numerous smaller railway companies to form the London, Midland and Scottish Railway (LMS). In the united society, the disadvantages of the Settle – Carlisle Line compared to the West Coast Main Line were clearly noticeable. Travel time from London to Glasgow was longer, due not only to the longer route and steeper gradients, but also to more stops to serve larger cities in the Midlands and Yorkshire . In the past, the Midland Railway was able to compensate for this disadvantage by using particularly comfortable rolling stock, but this advantage did not apply to the combined company.

After nationalization in 1948, the decline accelerated. The route was considered redundant and since control of the London – Glasgow route was spread across different operating regions, planning end-to-end connections proved difficult. Subsidence caused by mining affected the possible speeds in the East Midlands and Yorkshire. For example, in 1962 the Thames-Clyde Express took almost 9 hours from London to Glasgow via the Settle – Carlisle Line - the journey time via the West Coast Main Line was just 7 hours and 20 minutes.

The 1963 Beeching Report on the restructuring of British Rail recommended the cessation of all passenger traffic on the route. Some smaller stations had already been closed in the 1950s. Beeching's recommendations for the route were initially not implemented, but in May 1970 all stations except Settle and Appleby were closed and local traffic was reduced to two pairs of trains a day.

In addition to freight transport, there were still some express trains: the Waverley from London St Pancras via Nottingham and the Waverley Line to Edinburgh Waverley ended in 1968, while the more important Thames-Clyde Express ran from London to Glasgow Central via Leicester until 1975. Sleeper trains from London to Glasgow ran until 1976. Eventually, the route of long-distance trains (three trains per day and direction) to Glasgow – Nottingham was shortened before they were completely discontinued in May 1982.

Imminent shutdown

Settle train station

During the 1970s, the Settle – Carlisle Line suffered from a lack of investment, as a result of which the structural condition of many viaducts and tunnels suffered considerably. Most of the freight traffic was moved to the West Coast Main Line, which had been electrified to Glasgow in 1975. The only good news came from the DalesRail trips, which have served some of the closed stations on summer weekends since 1974. These were organized by the Yorkshire Dales National Park Authority to encourage visitors to the national park to travel by train.

In the early 1980s there were only around five pairs of trains left on the route a day, and British Rail decided that the cost of repairing bridges and tunnels was too high given the low traffic. In 1981 a citizens' initiative was founded, the Friends of the Settle-Carlisle Line (FoSCL). This group began fighting the route closure even before it was officially announced.

In December 1983 the decommissioning process was officially initiated. Neighborhoods and railroad enthusiasts began a joint campaign to save the Settle-Carlisle Line. They pointed out that British Rail ignored the route's potential tourism benefits, overlooked the need for a detour route for the West Coast Main Line, and failed to encourage through traffic from the Midlands and Yorkshire to Scotland.

There was heavy criticism of the closure plans. Critics pointed out that this was a main route. It managed to provide convincing evidence that British Rail was messing around with the closure of the line by exaggerating repair costs (£ 6 million for the Ribblehead Viaduct alone) and deliberately diverting traffic around the line.

The success of these reports of British Rail tactics was a sharp increase in traffic. The number of people carried rose from 93,000 in 1983 to 450,000 in 1989. The campaign resulted in the government refusing to close the line in 1989 and British Rail beginning to repair the decaying tunnels and viaducts.

The route today

Ribblehead train station

Kirkby Stephen Railway Station

The Settle – Carlisle Line is busy again today, possibly more than ever before in its history. Due to congestion on the West Coast Main Line, many freight trains are using the route again. Coal is transported from the Hunterston coal terminal, Scotland, to the Yorkshire power stations, and gypsum is transported from the Drax power station to the British Gypsum factory at Kirkby Thore. Extensive construction work was required to prepare the route for such heavy freight traffic. Further investments aimed to shorten the block sections. Local traffic increased, and eight of the smaller stations closed in 1970 were reopened in 1986. There is a visitor center at Ribblehead Station. The route continues to be an important diversion route for construction work on the West Coast Main Line. However, since it is not electrified, electric trains like the Pendolinos have to be pulled by a diesel locomotive (usually a Class 57 ).

However, express trains were not reintroduced. From 1999, there were twice daily through trains Leeds-Glasgow, which were offered by Arriva Trains Northern and made intermediate stops in Settle, Appleby, Carlisle, Lockerbie and Motherwell . However, these had to be discontinued in 2003 by order of the Strategic Rail Authority . Today there is no direct connection to Glasgow via this route. Throughout Lancashire trains are now only offered as DalesRail services on Sundays in summer .

Line closure in 2016/2017

The route was lowered by 2.5 m at Eden Brows between Appleby and Carlisle in February 2016 after rainfall by a landslide with a volume of almost 500,000 tons. 3000 t of concrete and 2000 m of steel bars for stabilization will be used to restore the route. The cost of the project is £ 23 million . Rail traffic was discontinued on the entire route after the landslide and a bus replacement service was set up. Railway operations between Appleby and Skipton were resumed in February 2017. In the first week of the reopening, 12 connections were used in the regular timetable, which were pulled by an LNER Peppercorn Class A1 60163 Tornado steam locomotive. It will be the first scheduled steam locomotive operation in the UK in 50 years. The route between Appleby and Carlisle is scheduled to reopen on March 31, 2017.

literature

• Stan Abbott and Alan Whitehouse: The line that refused to die . Leading Edge, Hawes 1990, ISBN 0-948135-43-3 .
• SK Baker: Rail Atlas of Great Britain & Ireland . Oxford Publishing Co, Horsham 2007 (11th ed.), ISBN 978-0-86093-602-2 .
• PE Baughan: The Midland Railway North of Leeds . 1966.
• T. Dewick: Complete Atlas of Railway Station Names . Ian Allan Publishing, 2002, ISBN 0-7110-2798-6 .
• FW Houghton and WH Foster: The Story of the Settle - Carlisle line . 1948.
• Midland Railway: Midland Railway System Maps Volume 1: Carlisle to Leeds and Branches . Reprint of the original (1913–1920). Peter Kay, Teignmouth (after 1992), ISBN 1-899890-25-4 .
• WR Mitchell and David Joy: Settle to Carlisle . Dalesman Books, Clapham at Lancaster 1989 (expanded reprint), ISBN 0-85206-985-5 .
• J. Towler: The Battle for the Settle & Carlisle . Platform 5 Publishing, Sheffield 1990, ISBN 1-872524-07-9 .
• FS Williams: Williams' Midland Railway . 1875, reprinted 1968.
• British Rail Track Diagrams 4: Midland Region . Quail Map Company, Essex 1990, ISBN 0-900609-74-5 .

Web links

Commons : Settle to Carlisle Line  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Settle-Carlisle Partnership (English)
• Detailed description of the route with many photos (English)
• Information and photos on the stations (English)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ forgottenrelics.co.uk
2. ↑ settle-carlisle.co.uk ( Memento of the original dated February 16, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
3. ↑ www.freewebs.com/mallerstang/pm-settle-carlisle.htm ( Memento of the original dated February 12, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
4. ^ Report in Telegraph & Argus from April 10, 1999 (accessed October 28, 2008)
5. ^ SRA Stakeholder Briefing: Northern Rail Franchise . Archived from the original on August 11, 2007. Retrieved February 8, 2009.
6. ↑ Mike Addison, Massive construction project on Settle-Carlisle Line moves step closer to March completion , in: The Westmorland Gazette, February 3, 2017, accessed February 14, 2017
7. ↑ Helen Pidd, Full steam ahead as Tornado engine powers Settle-Carlisle train service , in: The Guardian, February 14, 2017, accessed February 14, 2017