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Dare Valley Country Park
Dare Valley Country Park (Welsh: Parc Gwledig Cwm Dâr) is a public park in Wales. It lies near the village of Cwmdare and the town of Aberdare, Cynon Valley, in Rhondda Cynon Taff, South Wales. It comprises of woodlands, pasture and moorland mountainside. It is maintained by the local Council, Rhondda Cynon Taf. Background Cwmdare had four large collieries in operation during its history, all of which had closed by 1977. The Cwmdare, Merthyr Dare and Bwllfa Dare collieries were all sunk in the 1850s, while work began on Nantmelyn Colliery in 1860. Over the next 120 years, the seams in the Maerdy mountain were gradually used up, with Merthyr Dare closing in 1884, Cwmdare in 1936, Nantmelin in 1957 when coal extraction stopped in the valley. Bwllfa Dare shaft was capped in 1977, after serving for 20 years as a ventilation shaft for Mardy Colliery, located in the Rhondda Valley on the opposite side of the mountain. Two separate railway lines operated in the area operated by riv ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Nantmelyn Colliery
Bwllfa Colliery was a coal mine located in the Dare valley near Cwmdare in Rhondda Cynon Taf, South Wales. It operated from 1856 to 1957, remaining open as a ventilation shaft for Mardy Colliery until 1989. Development Bwllfa No.1 In 1853, Sam and Joseph Thomas began sinking a pit shaft within the remote farming community at the top of the Dare Valley. The two shafts were deep, and initially operated by water balance winding, with ventilation from a furnace. Production commenced in 1856, but by 1857 business partner Ebenezer Lewis was the sole owner. Nantmelyn Colliery In 1856, Mordecai Jones began sinking the shaft of the Nantmelyn Colliery (). After opening in 1860, by 1864 the Bwllfa Colliery Company were the owners. In 1867 they sunk a second deep shaft, ventilated by Guibal fan. Brogden and Sons took over the colliery in 1873. Operations In 1876, the two pits were merged under the combined Bwlfa and Merthyr Dare Coal Company. After a series of accidents criticised by the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Aberdare Park
Aberdare Park ( Welsh: Parc Aberdâr) is a well-preserved Victorian public park located in the village of Trecynon, near the town of Aberdare in South Wales. The park is designated Grade II* on the Cadw/ICOMOS Register of Parks and Gardens of Special Historic Interest in Wales. History The park occupies nearly fifty acres (20 ha). It opened on 27 July 1869. It was landscaped and planted by William Barron, who had laid out many parks in England. The park was created at the instigation of Rees Hopkin Rhys. In April 1948, 33-year old Polish national Jerzy Strzadala was murdered in Aberdare Park in a case that is still unsolved. In 1956 the National Eisteddfod was held in the park. A gorsedd circle was erected to commemorate this event; the stone circle is still remaining. Motorcycling There is a circuit of public roads within the park which is used for motorcycle road racing. Races were held until 1964, with 15 starters in each race. Racing resumed on 24 June 1978. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
River Dare
A river is a natural flowing watercourse, usually freshwater, flowing towards an ocean, sea, lake or another river. In some cases, a river flows into the ground and becomes dry at the end of its course without reaching another body of water. Small rivers can be referred to using names such as creek, brook, rivulet, and rill. There are no official definitions for the generic term river as applied to geographic features, although in some countries or communities a stream is defined by its size. Many names for small rivers are specific to geographic location; examples are "run" in some parts of the United States, "burn" in Scotland and northeast England, and "beck" in northern England. Sometimes a river is defined as being larger than a creek, but not always: the language is vague. Rivers are part of the water cycle. Water generally collects in a river from precipitation through a drainage basin from surface runoff and other sources such as groundwater recharge, springs, an ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Coal Mining
Coal mining is the process of extracting coal from the ground. Coal is valued for its energy content and since the 1880s has been widely used to generate electricity. Steel and cement industries use coal as a fuel for extraction of iron from iron ore and for cement production. In the United Kingdom and South Africa, a coal mine and its structures are a colliery, a coal mine is called a 'pit', and the above-ground structures are a 'pit head'. In Australia, "colliery" generally refers to an underground coal mine. Coal mining has had many developments in recent years, from the early days of men tunneling, digging and manually extracting the coal on carts to large open-cut and longwall mines. Mining at this scale requires the use of draglines, trucks, conveyors, hydraulic jacks and shearers. The coal mining industry has a long history of significant negative environmental impacts on local ecosystems, health impacts on local communities and workers, and contributes heavily to th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Taff Vale Railway
The Taff Vale Railway (TVR) was a standard gauge railway in South Wales, built by the Taff Vale Railway Company to serve the iron and coal industries around Merthyr Tydfil and to connect them with docks in Cardiff. It was opened in stages in 1840 and 1841. In the railway's first years, the coal mining industries expanded considerably and branches were soon opened in the Rhondda valleys and the Cynon Valley. The conveyance of coal for export and for transport away from South Wales began to dominate and the docks in Cardiff and the approach railway became extremely congested. Alternatives were sought and competing railway companies were encouraged to enter the trade. In the following decades further branch lines were built and the TVR used " motor cars" (steam railway passenger coaches) from 1903 to encourage local passenger travel. From 1922 the TVR was a constituent of the new Great Western Railway (GWR) at the grouping of the railways, imposing its own character on ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Isambard Kingdom Brunel
Isambard Kingdom Brunel (; 9 April 1806 – 15 September 1859) was a British civil engineer who is considered "one of the most ingenious and prolific figures in engineering history," "one of the 19th-century engineering giants," and "one of the greatest figures of the Industrial Revolution, hochanged the face of the English landscape with his groundbreaking designs and ingenious constructions." Brunel built dockyards, the Great Western Railway (GWR), a series of steamships including the first propeller-driven transatlantic steamship, and numerous important bridges and tunnels. His designs revolutionised public transport and modern engineering. Though Brunel's projects were not always successful, they often contained innovative solutions to long-standing engineering problems. During his career, Brunel achieved many engineering firsts, including assisting in the building of the first tunnel under a navigable river (the River Thames) and the development of the , the first ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Penywaun
Penywaun (also in ) is a community, electoral ward and north-western suburb of Aberdare in the Cynon Valley within the county borough of Rhondda Cynon Taf, Wales. At the 2011 census, the population of the ward was registered as 3,063. Etymology Penywaun derives from two common Welsh toponyms "Pen" meaning top or head and "Gwaun" meaning moorland. Writing in 1887, Rev. Thomas Morgan states that the toponym (which he spells "Penwaun") indicates the end of the moor known as the ''Hirwaun Gwrgant'' or Gwrgan's "Waun". Background Much of the local housing was built by the local Aberdare urban district council after the Second World War in several stages, starting with simple pre-fabricated houses. Shops and businesses trading in the village include a post office, a newsagents, hairdresser, a traditional fish and chip shop, and three grocery-type stores, one opposite ''the Colliers Arms'' pub. Most of the retail is in a retail precinct ('the Shopping Centre'). Schools *Primary Schoo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Llwydcoed
Llwydcoed is a small village and community north of the Cwm Cynon, near the town of Aberdare, Rhondda Cynon Taf, Wales, with a population of 1,302 as of 2011 census. History The village initially developed in the Tregibbon area, where in 1801 workers' housing was built by Thomas ap Shencin ap Gibbon of Fforchaman Farm. Other early housing was built at Miner's Row, Founder's Row and Scales Houses. The names of these streets betray their early origins; the Scale family were among the founders of the works and remained partners until 1846. In the second half of the 19th century a new period of growth was instigated by the development of the coal industry in the area. Matthew Wayne Esq. of the Gadlys Ironworks opened the Dyllas Colliery in 1840 and in 1849 Ysguborwen Colliery was sunk by Samuel Thomas and Thomas Joseph. Among the houses built in this period were those at Moriah Place, Horeb Terrace and Grey's Place. Exhibition Row was built in 1851 and was named Exhibition Row in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Vale Of Neath Railway
The Vale of Neath Railway (VoNR) was a broad gauge railway company, that built a line from Merthyr Tydfil and Aberdare to Neath, in Wales, chiefly to transport the products of the Merthyr iron industries to ports on Swansea Bay. The railway focused on transporting coal from the rapidly developing rich colliery area around Aberdare. When the narrow (standard) gauge Newport, Abergavenny and Hereford Railway (NA&HR) made moves to link to the area, with its Taff Vale Extension line, the Vale of Neath Railway saw that there was potential in connecting up; it laid a third rail to make mixed gauge. The link was made in 1864 and coal was conveyed to London and the north-west of England by that route. By that time the VoNR and the NA&HR had been absorbed into the Great Western Railway (GWR) system. Connections to the docks at Swansea had not been fruitful in the early days, and the Swansea and Neath Railway, soon taken over by the VoNR, made some improvement, but the docks area remai ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rhondda Valley
Rhondda , or the Rhondda Valley ( cy, Cwm Rhondda ), is a former coalmining area in South Wales, historically in the county of Glamorgan. It takes its name from the River Rhondda, and embraces two valleys – the larger Rhondda Fawr valley (''mawr'' large) and the smaller Rhondda Fach valley (''bach'' small) – so that the singular "Rhondda Valley" and the plural are both commonly used. The area forms part of the South Wales Valleys. From 1897 until 1996 there was a local government district of Rhondda. The former district at its abolition comprised sixteen communities. Since 1996 these sixteen communities of the Rhondda have been part of Rhondda Cynon Taf County Borough. The area of the former district is still used as the Rhondda Senedd constituency and Westminster constituency, having an estimated population in 2020 of 69,506. It is most noted for its historical coalmining industry, which peaked between 1840 and 1925. The valleys produced a strong Nonconformist move ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mardy Colliery
Maerdy Colliery was a coal mine located in the South Wales village of Maerdy ( cy, Y Maerdy), in the Rhondda Valley, located in the county borough of Rhondda Cynon Taf, and within the historic county boundaries of Glamorgan, Wales. Opened in 1875, it closed in December 1990. History Maerdy derives its name from a large farmhouse on a bank of the Rhondda Fach, which became the local meeting place for both court matters and worship. Maerdy is the Welsh language, Welsh word for ''mayor's house''. While other areas of the South Wales coalfield had been exploited up to 50 years earlier, due to the scarcity and difficult access conditions of Rhondda Fach, it remained largely undeveloped. But the demand for steam coal drove development and, in 1874, Mordecai Jones of Brecon and Nantmelyn purchased the mineral rights around the farmhouse and its surrounding lands from the estate of the late Crawshay Bailey for £122,000. Additional capital was provided by a partner, J.R. Cobb (businessm ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
