Meltham branch line

Meltham branch line
Legend Penistone Lineto Huddersfield Lockwood Penistone Lineto Sheffield Woodfield Butternab Tunnel Netherton Tunnel Netherton Healey House Healey House Tunnel Meltham

The Meltham branch line is a disused railway line that ran for 3 ¹⁄₂ miles (5.6 km) from Lockwood to Meltham, in West Yorkshire, England. The line was single track for its entire length. The last regular passenger service was on 21 May 1949. It closed completely on 3 April 1965.

History

Mean Lane Bridge, Meltham branch line

The line was authorised by the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway Act of 7 June 1861.^[1] Construction began in April 1864 and the line opened to freight on 10 August 1868 with the first train carrying coal and lime. Passenger services began on 5 July 1869. The line was used to transport tractors from the David Brown tractor factory at Meltham.

The route

The route began just south of Lockwood station near Lockwood viaduct at a junction with the Penistone Line and continued as follows:

• Woodfield (Opened and closed June 1874 due to being on an unsafe gradient)^[2]
• here is Butternab Tunnel (256 yards)
• here is Netherton Tunnel (333 yards)
• Netherton
• Healey House
• here is Healey House Tunnel (30 yards)
• Meltham

Present day

A new housing estate and a Morrisons supermarket have been built on the site of the Meltham station but much of the line remains. In 2004 a plan was proposed to convert much of the track bed to a cycle track to be known as the Meltham Greenway.^[3] The first section of this opened in May 2008^[4] between Station Road in Meltham and Huddersfield road (B6108).^[5]

In 2012, the Friends of Beaumont Park were awarded £49,900 from the Heritage Lottery Fund to carry out restoration of the section of track bed which ran along the lower end of the park and to turn it into a heritage trail. The project was completed towards the end of 2014.^[6]

References

1. • Bairstow, Martin (1993). The Huddersfield & Sheffield Junction Railway. Martin Bairstow. ISBN 1-871944-08-2.
2. National Archives - "Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway: Woodfield Station. Top File No: R. 4200". In summary, the Board of Trade gave initial permission to open the station prior to inspection, however Colonel Hutchinson's subsequent report was highly critical of the dangerous gradient and the risk of runaway rolling stock running through to Huddersfield. For reasons not recorded in the available documents, L&YR chose not to carry out the necessary and costly levelling of the line and Woodfield Station was never reopened.
3. "Expert spotlight on plans for new cycleway". The Huddersfield Daily Examiner. 20 September 2004. Retrieved 1 January 2007.
4. "Meltham Town Council - MELTHAM GREENWAY UPDATE". March 2009. Retrieved 2 May 2009.
5. "Kirklees Planning Applications - Meltham Railway Path adjacent To The Cobbles, and Land Between The Cobbles / Huddersfield Road, Meltham, Holmfirth.". 30 April 2009. Retrieved 2 May 2009.
6. Friends of Beaumont Park: Railway Line, Buttress Wall and Heritage Trail

External links

• Photographs of the Meltham branch line