Mariloo - Exbury Gardens - Exbury, England - DSC04083

The Exmoor Steam Railway is a

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

steam railway and locomotive manufacturer, located at

Bratton Fleming Bratton Fleming is a large village, civil parish and former manor near Barnstaple, in Devon, England. It lies a few miles west of Exmoor. The parish is surrounded, clockwise from the north, by the parishes of Challacombe, Brayford, Stoke River ...

in North

Devon Devon ( , historically known as Devonshire , ) is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in South West England. The most populous settlement in Devon is the city of Plymouth, followed by Devon's county town, the city of Exeter. Devo ...

gauge

The railway was built by the Stirland family and first opened as a tourist attraction in August 1990. At this time the railway ran in a circuit from the main station at ''Exmoor Central'', trains descending on a large embankment before climbing back up through a spiral tunnel. In 1996 a new station was opened at ''Cape of Good Hope'', which changed the line to an "end-to-end" layout. At the end of the 2001 season, the decision was taken to close the railway to the public and concentrate on building new steam locomotives and associated equipment. The railway remains in full working order, and work started in the winter 2008/9 on extending the railway. By mid-2010 an additional of track had been brought into use, with a very steep ascending and descending ruling gradients of 1 in 28.

gauge

During the 1990s, a number of gauge Beyer Garratt articulated locomotives from South Africa arrived on site and were displayed. One locomotive was sold to the

Welsh Highland Railway The Welsh Highland Railway (WHR) or Rheilffordd Eryri is a long, restored narrow gauge heritage railway in the Welsh county of Gwynedd, operating from Caernarfon to Porthmadog, and passing through a number of popular tourist destinations ...

in 2006, whilst another has been under long-term restoration. Over the winter 2008/9 work started on constructing around of gauge railway to run the Garratts on.

Locomotives

Engineering works

Since the railway opened, there has been a large workshop on site, which was used to build all the locomotives and equipment used on the railway. In 2001, the decision was taken to close the railway as a tourist attraction and concentrate on the manufacture of miniature and narrow gauge railway equipment. Exmoor Steam Railway builds several new steam locomotives a year, as well as rolling stock and also advise on the setup and expansion of miniature and narrow gauge railways. Exmoor is a member of Britain's Great Little Railways and has supplied locomotives to many other members who operate public miniature and narrow gauge railways.

Locomotives constructed

References

Don.Fifer The Heywood Society Journal No.56 Spring 2005

External links

Exmoor Steam RailwayRudyard Lake Steam Railway the largest Exmoor locomotive user
Locomotive manufacturers of the United Kingdom 12¼ in gauge railways in England Rail transport in Devon Exmoor {{England-rail-transport-stub