Manchester and Leeds Railway

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The Manchester and Leeds Railway was a railway company in the United Kingdom that opened a railway line from Normanton to Manchester via Hebden Bridge and Rochdale in 1839 and linked Manchester and Leeds by sharing a route on the North Midland Railway . Company headquarters were in Manchester and Leeds. In 1847 she went on in the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway .

history

A parliamentary resolution authorized the establishment of the company and the construction of the railway line on July 4, 1836. A second resolution authorized the extension of the line beyond the end point at Manchester Oldham Road Station to connect to Liverpool at what was then Hunt's Bank station, now Manchester Victoria and Manchester Railway . At the same time, the construction of branches to Oldham and Halifax was permitted. The construction supervision was carried out by George Stephenson , the chief engineer was Thomas Longridge Gooch, a brother of Daniel Gooch , engineer with the Great Western Railway .

In 1839 the line was opened with a gauge of 4 ft 9 in (1,448 mm) from Manchester to Littleborough , the section between Normanton and Hebden Bridge followed in 1840 and the connection of the two sections by the Summit Tunnel in 1841.

In 1847 the company was incorporated into the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway as its main component. By then it had incorporated several other societies:

  • Manchester and Bolton Railway
  • Ashton, Stalybridge & Liverpool Junction Railway (1844)
  • Liverpool & Bury Railway (1845)
  • Huddersfield & Sheffield Junction Railway (1845)
  • West Riding Union Railway
  • Wakefield, Pontefract & Goole

A large part of the original route is now served by the Calder Valley Line with trains on the Leeds - Manchester Victoria route, the section between Normanton and Brighouse by the Hallam Line and the Wakefield Line .

Railway line and operation

The average gradient between Manchester and the Summit Tunnel was 1: 260 (0.38%). The terrain along the route required the construction of eight tunnels , 116 bridges and several long cuttings and embankments. Two major bridges could be avoided by relocating the Calder River . A tunnel construction near Charlestown near Baildon had to be abandoned due to unstable rock and required a route with tight curves.

For the traffic from Normanton to Leeds , the route of the North Midland Railway was used as the British Parliament did not approve a parallel route.

The locomotives had six axles and were based on Stephenson's templates. Passenger cars were exclusively two-axle, with glazed windows in the first and with wooden shutters in the second class, in the third class only with standing room. Average speed was 25 mph (40 km / h) and about 42 mph (68 km / h) when going downhill.

On January 28, 1845, the boiler of the Irk locomotive exploded in Miles Platting .

The company used Edmondsonian tickets early on .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Parkinson-Bailye, John: Manchester: An Architectural History , Manchester University Press 2000. ISBN 0-7190-5606-3
  2. ^ William Templeton - The Locomotive Engine Popularly Explained - Page 96
  3. ↑ Scrivenor Harry: The Railways of the United Kingdom. Smith, Elder, and Co. 1849
  4. ^ Hewison, Christian H. (1983), Locomotive Boiler Explosions, Newton Abbot: David & Charles, ISBN 0-7153-8305-1

Further literature

  • Wells, Jeffrey: The Eleven Towns Railway: The Story of the Manchester and Leeds Main Line. Railway and Canal Historical Society, 2000. ISBN 0-901461-21-0