Thoresby Colliery was a coal mine in north
Nottinghamshire
Nottinghamshire (; abbreviated Notts.) is a landlocked county in the East Midlands region of England, bordering South Yorkshire to the north-west, Lincolnshire to the east, Leicestershire to the south, and Derbyshire to the west. The traditi ...
on the outskirts of
Edwinstowe
Edwinstowe is a large village and civil parish in the Newark and Sherwood district of Nottinghamshire, England, on the edge of Sherwood Forest. It is associated with the legends of Robin Hood and Maid Marian and known for the proximity of the f ...
village. The mine, which opened in 1925, was the last working colliery in Nottinghamshire when it closed in 2015. The site has been cleared and it being redeveloped as a housing estate.
History
Thoresby colliery opened in 1925.
The first two shafts in 1925 were sunk to . The shafts were deepened by in the 1950s. After privatisation of the
National Coal Board
The National Coal Board (NCB) was the statutory corporation created to run the nationalised coal mining industry in the United Kingdom. Set up under the Coal Industry Nationalisation Act 1946, it took over the United Kingdom's collieries on "v ...
in the 1990s the mine was taken over by
RJB Mining RJB may refer to:
* Radio Bernese Jura
* Rajbiraj Airport, Nepal, IATA airport code
* Ring junger Bünde
* rj basket schools edit by ew
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(later
UK Coal
UK Coal Production Ltd, formerly UK Coal plc, was the largest coal mining business in the United Kingdom. The company was based in Harworth, in Nottinghamshire. The company was a constituent of the FTSE 250 Index. The successor company that con ...
as UK Coal Thoresby Ltd).
Coal seams worked by, or available to, the pit included the Top Hard seam, the Parkgate seam (after closure of
Ollerton Colliery in 1994); the Deep Soft seam; and the High Hazels seam (working ceased 1983).
In April 2014 it was announced that the pit would close by July 2015. The colliery's 600 employees had been reduced to 360 by the time of the closure in July 2015. At the time of closure, Thoresby was one of the two last remaining deep-mined coal sources owned by UK Coal, together with
Kellingley which closed soon after.
In 2015, the Thoresby Colliery Benevolent Fund, established in 1951, was wound up with £56,000 surplus which was distributed to five different local charities.
Redevelopment
The site is being reclaimed and redeveloped with a ten-year plan into housing and associated infrastructure, named Thoresby Vale, Edwinstowe. Initial plans were to include a country park and with five
acre
The acre is a unit of land area used in the imperial
Imperial is that which relates to an empire, emperor, or imperialism.
Imperial or The Imperial may also refer to:
Places
United States
* Imperial, California
* Imperial, Missouri
* Imp ...
s set aside for a
primary school
A primary school (in Ireland, the United Kingdom, Australia, Trinidad and Tobago, Jamaica, and South Africa), junior school (in Australia), elementary school or grade school (in North America and the Philippines) is a school for primary e ...
. Local MP
Mark Spencer mentioned that provision was also needed for a doctors' surgery, and hoped that
section 106 monies could be used to upgrade the nearby traffic island and establish a passenger rail service extension to the
Robin Hood Line
The Robin Hood Line is a railway line running from Nottingham to Worksop, Nottinghamshire, in the United Kingdom. The stations between Shirebrook and Whitwell (inclusive) are in Derbyshire.
Passenger services are operated by East Midlands Rai ...
.
[''Multi-million pound plan for pit site. Chad'', 27 July 2016, pp.6-7. Accessed 5 July 2021]Major £24m improvements for Nottinghamshire road used by millions each year
'' Nottinghamshire Live'', 26 June 2021. Retrieved 5 July 2021
References
External links
UK Coal
{{Authority control
1925 establishments in England
2015 disestablishments in England
Coal mines in Nottinghamshire
Underground mines in England
Edwinstowe