Old station at Thorpe Thewles - geograph

Castle Eden former station geograph-3366501-by-Ben-Brooksbank

The Castle Eden Railway was a railway line built by the North Eastern Railway between Bowesfield Junction near

Stockton-on-Tees Stockton-on-Tees, often simply referred to as Stockton, is a market town in the Borough of Stockton-on-Tees in County Durham, England. It is on the northern banks of the River Tees, part of the Teesside built-up area. The town had an estimated ...

and

Wingate, County Durham Wingate is a village in County Durham, England. Wingate is a former pit village with a mixture of 19th-century, post-war, and more recent housing developments. It was originally inhabited by around 30 farmers before 1839 when coal was discovered ...

Northeast England North East England is one of nine official regions of England at the first level of ITL (UK), ITL for Office for National Statistics, statistical purposes. The region has three current administrative levels below the region level in the regi ...

. Although its route actually never went near

Castle Eden Castle Eden is a village in County Durham, in England. The population of the parish at the 2011 census was 642. It is situated a short distance to the south of Peterlee, Wingate, Hutton Henry, the A19 and Castle Eden Dene. The village is famou ...

, it was also informally known as the "Cuckoo Line".

Authorisation

Passed under an

Act of Parliament Acts of Parliament, sometimes referred to as primary legislation, are texts of law passed by the Legislature, legislative body of a jurisdiction (often a parliament or council). In most countries with a parliamentary system of government, acts of ...

as the Stockton and Castle Eden Bridge Railway, it was built by contractor Thomas Nelson. The main

civil engineering Civil engineering is a professional engineering discipline that deals with the design, construction, and maintenance of the physical and naturally built environment, including public works such as roads, bridges, canals, dams, airports, sewage ...

structure was the

viaduct A viaduct is a specific type of bridge that consists of a series of arches, piers or columns supporting a long elevated railway or road. Typically a viaduct connects two points of roughly equal elevation, allowing direct overpass across a wide v ...

Thorpe Thewles Thorpe Thewles is a village which had history dating back to the 12th century. The village shares a parish with Grindon, County Durham, Grindon and is in the Borough of Stockton-on-Tees, County Durham, Northern England. It lies near the A177 road ...

to cross Thorpe Beck and its valley, which consisted of 22 arches, used 8 million bricks and cost £37,000.

Opening

The first section of the line was opened on 1 May 1877 between Bowesfield Junction to Carlton South Junction (later ), with a curve to Carlton West, to give access to the coalfields of South

County Durham County Durham ( ), officially simply Durham,UK General Acts 1997 c. 23Lieutenancies Act 1997 Schedule 1(3). From legislation.gov.uk, retrieved 6 April 2022. is a ceremonial county in North East England.North East Assembly �About North East E ...

. The remainder of the line was opened for freight traffic on 1 August 1878, and passenger traffic between and on 1 March 1880. A curve connecting the line with the

Leeds Northern Railway The Leeds Northern Railway (LNR), originally the Leeds and Thirsk Railway, was an English railway company that built and opened a line from Leeds to Stockton via Harrogate and Thirsk. In 1845 the Leeds and Thirsk Railway received permission for ...

between Bowesfield Junction and Hartburn West Junction was added in 1901.

Electrification

The southern section from Bowesfield to never carried passengers, but in 1914 was

overhead line An overhead line or overhead wire is an electrical cable that is used to transmit electrical energy to electric locomotives, trolleybuses or trams. It is known variously as: * Overhead catenary * Overhead contact system (OCS) * Overhead equipmen ...

electrified Electrification is the process of powering by electricity and, in many contexts, the introduction of such power by changing over from an earlier power source. The broad meaning of the term, such as in the history of technology, economic history ...

by the NER to allow coal to be transported from

Witton Park Colliery Witton Park Colliery was a coal mine in Witton Park, Witton-le-Wear near Bishop Auckland, County Durham, Northern England. Development Part of the Durham Coalfield, coal stocks were known throughout the area to be close to the surface, allowin ...

at , along the former

Clarence Railway The Clarence Railway was an early railway company that operated in north-east England between 1833 and 1853. The railway was built to take coal from mines in County Durham to ports on the River Tees and was a competitor to the Stockton and Darli ...

to and then down the CER to

Erimus Marshalling Yard Tees Marshalling Yard is a railway marshalling yard, used to separate railway wagons, located near Middlesbrough in North Yorkshire, Northern England. Background The yard lay on the original Stockton and Darlington Railway (S&DR) extension ...

, for export from

Middlesbrough Dock Middlehaven is the oldest district in Middlesbrough, situated to the north of the current centre, North Yorkshire, England. It is adjacent to the Transporter Bridge and by the River Tees to the north, and the railway (originally) and A66 in th ...

. During the 1920s the coal traffic declined, and some of the Electric Freight 1 locomotives became surplus to requirements. After the NER was grouped in 1923 as part of the

London and North Eastern Railway The London and North Eastern Railway (LNER) was the second largest (after LMS) of the " Big Four" railway companies created by the Railways Act 1921 in Britain. It operated from 1 January 1923 until nationalisation on 1 January 1948. At th ...

, by the 1935 the LNER had replaced the electric locomotives with steam. A curve connecting with the

between Bowesfield Junction and Hartburn West Junction was added in 1901.

Traffic

Originally proposed as a secondary mainline, it mainly carried freight, including:

Weardale Weardale is a dale, or valley, on the east side of the Pennines in County Durham, England. Large parts of Weardale fall within the North Pennines Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB) – the second-largest AONB in England and Wales. T ...

limestone Limestone ( calcium carbonate ) is a type of carbonate sedimentary rock which is the main source of the material lime. It is composed mostly of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different crystal forms of . Limestone forms whe ...

; West County Durham

coal Coal is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock, formed as rock strata called coal seams. Coal is mostly carbon with variable amounts of other elements, chiefly hydrogen, sulfur, oxygen, and nitrogen. Coal is formed when dea ...

; and Cleveland ironstone to support the growing industrialisation on

Teesside Teesside () is a built-up area around the River Tees in the north of England, split between County Durham and North Yorkshire. The name was initially used as a county borough in the North Riding of Yorkshire. Historically a hub for heavy manu ...

. Its secondary transport was the shipment of agricultural supplies in and produce/livestock out from the valleys farms.

Decline and closure

In 1905 the

Durham Coast Line The Durham Coast Line is an approximately railway line running between Newcastle and in North East England. Heavy rail passenger services, predominantly operated Northern Trains, and some freight services operate over the whole length of the li ...

between and was completed, which started the decline of the importance of the Castle Eden Branch as an express passenger mainline. In 1931 it lost its passenger services, and it closed to freight services in 1951. Its final demise even as a bypass route occurred as a result of the

Beeching Axe The Beeching cuts (also Beeching Axe) was a plan to increase the efficiency of the nationalised railway system in Great Britain. The plan was outlined in two reports: ''The Reshaping of British Railways'' (1963) and ''The Development of the ...

review, closing in stages between 1966 and 1968. The track, ballast and other equipment were all removed by contractors soon afterwards.

The site today

In 1977 part of the line was acquired by

Cleveland County Council Cleveland County Council was the county council of the non-metropolitan county of Cleveland in north east England. It came into its powers on 1 April 1974 and was abolished on 31 March 1996. History The county council came into its powers on 1 A ...

with financial help from the

Department of the Environment An environmental ministry is a national or subnational government agency politically responsible for the environment and/or natural resources. Various other names are commonly used to identify such agencies, such as Ministry of the Environment, ...

and the

Countryside Commission The Countryside Commission (formally the Countryside Commission for England and Wales, then the Countryside Commission for England) was a statutory body in England and Wales, and later in England only. Its forerunner, the National Parks Commissio ...

. In 1979 the viaduct was demolished to make the Thorpe Thewles bypass. The residual section reopened to the public as the Castle Eden Walkway in 1981, while the old stationmasters house at Thorpe Thewles was opened as a Visitor Centre in 1983.

References

* {{reflist

External links

History of the line @ Wynward Wood Land Park
Railway lines opened in 1877 Railway lines closed in 1968 North Eastern Railway (UK) Closed railway lines in North East England 1877 establishments in England