Leamside Line

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Leamside Line

Legend Durham Coast Line towards Newcastle Durham Coast Line towards Sunderland Wardley Colliery Freightliner terminal Usworth Washington Freightliner terminal Victoria Viaduct across the River Wear Durham-Sunderland line towards Sunderland Penshaw Fencehouses Leamside Durham-Sunderland line towards Durham Sherburn Shincliffe East Coast Main Line towards Durham East Coast Main Line towards Darlington

The Leamside Line (originally known as Durham Junction Railway) is a railway line in the North East of England, branching off from the main East Coast Main Line (ECML) at Tursdale Junction in County Durham, and continuing north through Sunderland, Washington and Wardley, finally joining the Newcastle to Sunderland line at Pelaw Junction.

It is currently mostly out of use, having been 'mothballed' by British Rail in 1991 after the closure of the Freightliner freight terminal at Follingsby, near Washington, which was the recipient of most of the line's traffic in its last years. A very short section of the line from Pelaw Junction remained in operation for a number of years, serving the open-cast coal mine at Wardley, but this too has now closed.

[edit] History

Victoria Viaduct over the River Wear near Washington. This massive railway viaduct, a spectacular engineering feat on the Leamside Line, was completed in 1839, and carried the East Coast Main Line between London and Edinburgh until 1872.

The line opened in 1839, and was formed from the original lines of the Newcastle and Darlington Junction Railway and the Durham Junction Railway. It constituted part of the original East Coast Main Line route from Edinburgh to London, eventually being incorporated into the North Eastern Railway. The line's main source of revenue, as with most of the early railways, was mineral traffic, principally coal from the Durham coalfield. The line was linked to many private colliery branch lines and wagonways.

It remained part of the main line until 1872 when the route was bypassed by the NER's Bishop Auckland to Gateshead line and Croxdale link, which became part of the ECML and remains so to this day.

Thereafter it continued to carry local passenger services and freight traffic, as well as serving as a useful diversionary route from the ECML, until the passenger service was finally withdrawn in May 1964 during the infamous Beeching cuts. However, coal and other freight continued to be carried, until the gradual closure of the Durham coalfield in the 1970s and 1980s resulted in a severe drop in the line's traffic and in 1991 the line was mothballed.

From south of Leamside to just north of Penshaw, the line also formed part of the Durham to Sunderland Railway, which was another victim of the Beeching Axe.

[edit] Victoria Viaduct

The main engineering feature of the line is the Victoria Viaduct^[1] over the River Wear near Washington. It is said to be based on the Roman bridge in Alcántara, Spain.^{[citation needed]}

The rails passed 135 feet (41 m) over the valley, carried on four great arches. The middle two arches span 160 feet (49 m) and 144 feet (44 m), and the arches beside them span 100 feet (30 m). In addition, there are three 20 feet (6 m) approach arches on both ends. Of the extant masonry railway viaducts in Britain, the Victoria has the second longest single span,^[2] exceeded only by the Ballochmyle Viaduct.

[edit] Passenger stations

• Usworth
• Washington
• Penshaw
• Fencehouses
• Leamside
• Sherburn
• Shincliffe

[edit] The line today

After mothballing, the double track was reduced to a single line in some places, and the track was severed at some level crossings along the line. All its engineering features remain intact.

Part of the Durham to Sunderland line that left the Leamside Line just south of the Victoria Viaduct has been brought back into use (2002) for the Sunderland Extension of the Tyne and Wear Metro, terminating at South Hylton, around a mile from the former junction with the Leamside Line.

Around one mile of track to the south of Penshaw was 'stolen' in 2003^[3] and will have to be replaced if the line is finally reopened. This theft, which took place over a six day period using a gang of workers who were unaware that the work was illegal, has substantially raised the costs of reopening the route.

Substantial parts of the line and infrastructure are also missing from around the former Usworth station which is also severely overgrown.

[edit] Future plans

On 4 December 2006, Tyne and Wear Passenger Transport Authority announced that it had commissioned a study into the future use of the line, with a view to possible re-opening as a suburban railway linking into the local transport network^[4]. The line would also be used as an over-spill for freight on the ECML, while also carrying services between Newcastle and Teesside The next day, it was announced that Network Rail had also signed up to the study, although current plans for removal of the track (see below) would still proceed.^[5]

The line had been briefly considered in 2000 for reopening by Railtrack as a diversionary freight route to take the burden from the congested ECML. A number of studies have advocated re-opening the line, for example The vision for passenger rail services in the Tees Valley. Re-opening the line would provide economic benefits to areas depressed since the demise of the coal mining industry. However, these plans were put on hold.

Durham County Council's Local Transport Plan (LTP)^[6] indicates that the Council supports passenger traffic return to the Leamside Line, and would promote the service. See Railwatch for more details.

If the Leamside line is opened to passenger traffic, it would lead to the reopening of several railway stations along the route. The Select Committee on Transport, Local Government and the Regions has expressed concern at the delays in determining the future of this line.^[7]

[edit] Track removal

On 14 September 2006, Network Rail announced plans to lift the track along the full length of the line. It is maintained that the track, after 15 years out of use, would need replacing anyway if the line was ever to re-open, and that this move will have no implications for any future use of the railway. The company also pledged that all bridges would be left in place, with no sales of land attached to the line.^[8] A former British Rail engineer, who oversaw a major upgrade of the line just two years before its closure, has countered Network Rail's claims, saying that the track is still in excellent condition and would need only minimal refurbishment to bring it back into use.^[9]

Some sections of the line from the south of Sunderland and Pelaw, however, appear to be in quite a poor state. The steel rails appear sound, but the majority of sleepers are wooden and are rotten or disintegrating. Some short sections have concrete sleepers and the line here appears sound. Embanked areas are subsiding in a few places with the aggregate ballast seeming to have been washed away. There is no signalling or fencing at all remaining and in some areas over growth of shrubs and trees is taking over. It certainly appears that some significant work would need to be done to make use of the existing track, certainly replacing the rotten wooden sleepers.

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Newcastle & Darlington Junction Railway
• Durham Junction Railway
• Railways and Waggonways in County Durham
• Railwatch
• Tyne and Wear Metro
• A memorandum by The City of Sunderland submitted to parliament
• Tees Valley Vision