The Gorseddau Junction and Portmadoc Railway is a defunct

Welsh Welsh may refer to: Related to Wales * Welsh, referring or related to Wales * Welsh language, a Brittonic Celtic language spoken in Wales * Welsh people People * Welsh (surname) * Sometimes used as a synonym for the ancient Britons (Celtic peop ...

tramway. The ''GJ&PR'' was a

narrow-gauge railway A narrow-gauge railway (narrow-gauge railroad in the US) is a railway with a track gauge narrower than standard-gauge railway, standard . Most narrow-gauge railways are between and . Since narrow-gauge railways are usually built with Minimum r ...

connecting the slate quarries of Cwm Pennant with the

wharves A wharf, quay (, also ), staith, or staithe is a structure on the shore of a harbour or on the bank of a river or canal where ships may dock to load and unload cargo or passengers. Such a structure includes one or more berths (mooring location ...

Porthmadog Porthmadog (; ), originally Portmadoc until 1974 and locally as "Port", is a Welsh coastal town and community in the Eifionydd area of Gwynedd and the historic county of Caernarfonshire. It lies east of Criccieth, south-west of Blaenau Ffest ...

harbour. It was built in 1872, partly as a conversion of the earlier gauge

Gorseddau Tramway The Gorseddau Tramway was a narrow gauge railway built in Wales in 1856 to link the slate quarries around Gorseddau with the wharves at Porthmadog. It was an early forerunner of the Gorseddau Junction and Portmadoc Railway and subsequently t ...

, which in itself had incorporated the even earlier gauge Tremadoc Tramway. It opened to mineral and goods traffic in 1875.

Route and operation

The main line followed the route of the original

from

through Tremadoc, ''Penmorfa'' and ''Ynys-y-Pandy'' to

Gorseddau quarry A gorsedd (, plural ''gorseddau'') is a community or meeting of modern-day bards. The word is of Welsh origin, meaning "throne". It is spelled gorsedh in Cornish and goursez in Breton. When the term is used without qualification, it usually ...

. On conversion, the line from Porthmadog to Braich-y-bib, just north of Ynys-y-Pandy, was regauged to . A new extension was added from Braich-y-bib. This led west along the Cwm Pennant before heading north to Cwm Trwsgl where inclines served the Prince of Wales and Dol-ifan-Gethin slate quarries and the Cwm Dywfor

copper Copper is a chemical element with the symbol Cu (from la, cuprum) and atomic number 29. It is a soft, malleable, and ductile metal with very high thermal and electrical conductivity. A freshly exposed surface of pure copper has a pinkis ...

and

lead Lead is a chemical element with the symbol Pb (from the Latin ) and atomic number 82. It is a heavy metal that is denser than most common materials. Lead is soft and malleable, and also has a relatively low melting point. When freshly cu ...

mine. This branch added an additional 5 miles to the length of the railway, for a total length of 13 miles. At Porthmadog the last few hundred yards of the original Gorseddau route were abandoned and traffic was worked to the wharves over the

Croesor Tramway The Croesor Tramway was a Welsh, narrow gauge railway line built to carry slate from the Croesor slate mines to Porthmadog. It was built in 1864 without an Act of Parliament and was operated using horse power. The tramway was absorbed into the ...

. At around the same time the line from Braich-y-bib to Gorseddau quarry had been abandoned. The Prince of Wales quarry supplied most of the traffic for the railway during its existence. Unlike its predecessor the GJ&PR had a single

steam locomotive A steam locomotive is a locomotive that provides the force to move itself and other vehicles by means of the expansion of steam. It is fuelled by burning combustible material (usually coal, oil or, rarely, wood) to heat water in the locomot ...

, a vertical boilered

De Winton De Winton & Co (1854–1901) were engineers in Caernarfon, Wales. They built, amongst other things, vertical boilered narrow gauge locomotives for use in Welsh slate mines and other industrial settings. At least six De Winton locomotives have ...

named ''Pert'', although it continued to use horses as motive power for most of its existence. The locomotive is believed to have been disused after 1878, and to have been sold in 1896 to Glodd-fa'r-Glai Quarry which was connected to the

Nantlle Railway The Nantlle Railway (or Nantlle Tramway) was a Welsh narrow gauge railway. It was built to carry slate from several slate quarries across the Nantlle Valley to the harbour at Caernarfon for export by sea. The line provided a passenger service ...

Abandonment

By 1887 the railway had largely fallen into disuse as the mines and quarries it served failed, and by 1890 single wagons were being hand propelled to Porthmadog. The land the railway ran on was sold in 1897 by which time it had been dismantled. Between about 1903 and 1907, a short section of Gorseddau trackbed between the

Cambrian Railways The Cambrian Railways owned of track over a large area of mid Wales. The system was an amalgamation of a number of railways that were incorporated in 1864, 1865 and 1904. The Cambrian connected with two larger railways with connections to the ...

station in Porthmadog and the junction with the

was again re-used to connect the Moel y Gest quarry tramway via the Croesor and the Festiniog to the wharves. Although the latter tramway closed in 1907 and was re-laid in 1919 as a standard-gauge siding of the Cambrian, this section survived until the early 1950s.

Ynys-y-Pandy Mill

The railway served the Ynys-y-Pandy Mill ( cy, Melin Ynys-y-Pandy) a three-storey structure which processed slate from the Gorseddau Quarry. The mill was built in 1856-7 by Evan Jones of

Garndolbenmaen Garndolbenmaen, known colloquially as Garn, is a village in the county of Gwynedd, Wales. It lies near the A487, approximately north west of Porthmadog, in the community of Dolbenmaen, which has a population of 1,300. The closest villages are ...

and is believed to have been designed by

James Brunlees Sir James Brunlees FRSE MICE (1816 – 1892) was a Scottish civil engineer. He was President of the Institution of Civil Engineers for 1882-3. He was born in Kelso in the Scottish Borders in 1816. Early life Brunlees was the son of John Brun ...

. A curved ramp brought two branches of the railway into the mill on two different levels, one to the upper floor, the other to the middle floor. The building incorporated a diameter internal overshot water wheel. The mill produced flag-stones, dairy equipment, troughs, and urinals. The building was a venue for

eisteddfod In Welsh culture, an ''eisteddfod'' is an institution and festival with several ranked competitions, including in poetry and music. The term ''eisteddfod'', which is formed from the Welsh morphemes: , meaning 'sit', and , meaning 'be', means, a ...

au until the roof was removed around 1906. The remains of the mill is Grade II* listed. The small waste tips at the site show that little slate was worked at the mill. In the 1980s the mill was bought by the

Snowdonia National Park Authority Snowdonia or Eryri (), is a mountainous region in northwestern Wales and a national park of in area. It was the first to be designated of the three national parks in Wales, in 1951. Name and extent It was a commonly held belief that the nam ...

and the stonework was repaired. 'Ynys y Pandy' is

for 'Isle of Pandy' or 'Pandy Island'.

References

External links

Surviving features and quarries served
{{DEFAULTSORT:Gorseddau Junction And Portmadoc Railway Welsh Highland Railway Early Welsh railway companies Rail transport in Gwynedd Industrial railways in Wales Railway companies established in 1872 Railway companies disestablished in 1892 Railway lines opened in 1872 Narrow gauge railways in Gwynedd 2 ft gauge railways in Wales Porthmadog Dolbenmaen Narrow gauge railways in Snowdonia

Route and operation

Abandonment

Ynys-y-Pandy Mill

Further reading

References

External links