Thornbury Branch Line

Thornbury Branch Line
Thornbury Tytherington Quarry Tytherington Iron Acton Frampton Cotterell freight line Yate Cross Country Route ← Bristol • Birmingham →

The branch departs from the main line at Yate.

The Thornbury Branchline is a railway line from Yate to Thornbury in the West of England. From 1963 until mid 2013, it remained as a freight route, serving the quarry at Tytherington. It has since been designated 'Out of Use (temporary)' by Network Rail.^[1] The 7.5-mile (12 km) branch of the Midland Railway line between Bristol and Gloucester opened on 2 September 1872, and started at Yate and finished at Thornbury, with stops at Iron Acton and Tytherington.

Train services

The Line's services first consisted of two trains in each direction per day, connecting at Yate with mainline trains. Later trains appeared to be running from Thornbury down to Bristol Temple Meads, although the services were infrequent. By 1910, there were four trains in each direction every weekday. In 1944 the passenger train was run by a class 1P 0-4-4 tank with three coaches, which spent the night at Thornbury. The journey took 19 to 22 minutes. During World War 2 12-coach trains took wounded to hospital at Thornbury.^[2]

Route

The first ¹⁄₂ mile (0.80 km) was level. 1.5 miles (2.4 km) fell at 1 in 176 to Iron Acton. The climb to Tytherington was at 1 in 86, followed by 1 in 59 to Tytherington Tunnel and a siding to a quarry. The 224 yards (205 m) long tunnel was lined only at the ends and a fall of rock blocked the line for a week in 1956. Beyond the tunnel, railway ballast was supplied by Grovesend Quarry. From the 167 yards (153 m) Grovesend Tunnel the line fell at 1 in 50 through a limestone cutting to Thornbury.^[2]

Partial closure

The 1 mile 7 chains (1.8 km) branch to iron-stone mines at Frampton Cotterell was authorised by an Act of 1865, but the mines failed, and Midland's Way & Works Committee agreed to lift the line at its 15 April 1878 meeting, though it wasn't done until 1892.^[2]

On 19 June 1944, the line was closed to passenger traffic. In the 1960s, the stations were demolished, apart from Yate, which was closed with other stations on the Bristol to Gloucester line in 1965 and then re-opened in 1989. The section of track from Tytherington Quarry to Thornbury was dismantled after the closure of the goods depot at Thornbury in 1966.

Continuing goods traffic and mothballing

The rest of the line remained open to goods traffic, serving the Tytherington Quarry with very occasional freight services. Following the cessation of these services and without no near term resumption of traffic expected, the line was designated 'Out of Use (temporary)' beyond milepost 0 mi 30 ch in mid 2013.^[1]

Future potential reopening

Studies into reopening the branch line have been made in a consultation report produced by Halcrow Group in 2014,^[3] as well as the November 2015 joint transport study report produced by The West of England Local Enterprise Partnership.^[4] In 2013 the estimated cost of this would be £38 million.^[5]

References