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British Narrow-gauge Railways
There were more than a thousand British narrow-gauge railways ranging from large, historically significant common carriers to small, short-lived industrial railways. Many notable events in British railway history happened on narrow-gauge railways including the first use of steam locomotives, the first public railway and the first preserved railway. History Early railways: before 1865 The earliest railways were crude wooden trackways used in coal mines to guide wooden tubs. Because of the restricted loading gauge of the tunnels and the need for loaded tubs to be light enough to be pushed by one man, these railways were almost all narrow-gauge. These underground lines often had short above-ground sections as well. After the start of the Industrial Revolution it became possible to create railways with iron tracks and wheels, which reduced the friction involved in moving wagons, and made longer horse-hauled trains possible. These could move more material over longer dista ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Richard Trevithick
Richard Trevithick (13 April 1771 – 22 April 1833) was a British inventor and mining engineer. The son of a mining captain, and born in the mining heartland of Cornwall, Trevithick was immersed in mining and engineering from an early age. He was an early pioneer of steam-powered road and rail transport, and his most significant contributions were the development of the first high-pressure steam engine and the first working railway steam locomotive. The world's first locomotive-hauled railway journey took place on 21 February 1804, when Trevithick's unnamed steam locomotive hauled a train along the tramway of the Penydarren Ironworks, in Merthyr Tydfil, Wales. Turning his interests abroad Trevithick also worked as a mining consultant in Peru and later explored parts of Costa Rica. Throughout his professional career he went through many ups and downs and at one point faced financial ruin, also suffering from the strong rivalry of many mining and steam engineers of the day. D ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Slate
Slate is a fine-grained, foliated, homogeneous, metamorphic rock derived from an original shale-type sedimentary rock composed of clay or volcanic ash through low-grade, regional metamorphism. It is the finest-grained foliated metamorphic rock. Foliation may not correspond to the original sedimentary layering, but instead is in planes perpendicular to the direction of metamorphic compression. The foliation in slate, called " slaty cleavage", is caused by strong compression in which fine-grained clay forms flakes to regrow in planes perpendicular to the compression. When expertly "cut" by striking parallel to the foliation with a specialized tool in the quarry, many slates display a property called fissility, forming smooth, flat sheets of stone which have long been used for roofing, floor tiles, and other purposes. Slate is frequently grey in color, especially when seen ''en masse'' covering roofs. However, slate occurs in a variety of colors even from a single locality; for ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Comparison Of British Track Gauges
Comparison or comparing is the act of evaluating two or more things by determining the relevant, comparable characteristics of each thing, and then determining which characteristics of each are similar to the other, which are different, and to what degree. Where characteristics are different, the differences may then be evaluated to determine which thing is best suited for a particular purpose. The description of similarities and differences found between the two things is also called a comparison. Comparison can take many distinct forms, varying by field: To compare things, they must have characteristics that are similar enough in relevant ways to merit comparison. If two things are too different to compare in a useful way, an attempt to compare them is colloquially referred to in English as "comparing apples and oranges." Comparison is widely used in society, in science and the arts. General usage Comparison is a natural activity, which even animals engage in when decidin ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Welshpool To Llanfair Caereinion Railway Line (12989519473)
Welshpool ( ) is a market town and community in Powys, Wales, historically in the county of Montgomeryshire. The town is from the Wales–England border and low-lying on the River Severn. The community, which also includes Cloddiau and Pool Quay, has a population of 6,664 (as of the 2011 United Kingdom census), with the town having 5,948. There are many examples of Georgian architecture within the town. Powis Castle is located to the north. Toponym ''Y Trallwng'' is the Welsh language name of the town. It means "the marshy or sinking land". In English it was initially known as Pool but its name was changed to Welshpool in 1835 to distinguish it from the English town of Poole in Dorset. History St Cynfelin is reputed to be the founder of two churches in the town, St Mary's and St Cynfelin's, during the Age of the Saints in the 5th and 6th centuries. The parish of Welshpool roughly coincides with the medieval commote of Ystrad Marchell in the cantref of Ystlyg in the K ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Charles At Penrhyn Castle (geograph 2157370)
Charles is a masculine given name predominantly found in English and French speaking countries. It is from the French form ''Charles'' of the Proto-Germanic name (in runic alphabet) or ''*karilaz'' (in Latin alphabet), whose meaning was "free man". The Old English descendant of this word was '' Ċearl'' or ''Ċeorl'', as the name of King Cearl of Mercia, that disappeared after the Norman conquest of England. The name was notably borne by Charlemagne (Charles the Great), and was at the time Latinized as ''Karolus'' (as in ''Vita Karoli Magni''), later also as '' Carolus''. Etymology The name's etymology is a Common Germanic noun ''*karilaz'' meaning "free man", which survives in English as churl (wikt:Appendix:Proto-Indo-European/ǵerh₂-">ĝer-, where the ĝ is a palatal consonant, meaning "to rub; to be old; grain." An old man has been worn away and is now grey with age. In some Slavic languages, the name ''Drago (given name), Drago'' (and variants: ''Dragomir'', ' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Standard Gauge
A standard-gauge railway is a railway with a track gauge of . The standard gauge is also called Stephenson gauge (after George Stephenson), international gauge, UIC gauge, uniform gauge, normal gauge in Europe, and SGR in East Africa. It is the most widely used track gauge around the world, with about 55% of the lines in the world using it. All high-speed rail lines use standard gauge except High-speed rail in Russia, those in Russia, High-speed rail in Finland, Finland, High-speed rail in Uzbekistan, Uzbekistan, and some line sections in High-speed rail in Spain, Spain. The distance between the inside edges of the heads of the rails is defined to be 1,435 mm except in the United States, Canada, and on some heritage British lines, where it is defined in Imperial and US customary measurement systems, U.S. customary/Imperial units, British Imperial units as exactly "four feet eight and one half inches", which is equivalent to 1,435.1mm. History As railways developed and expa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Regulating The Gauge Of Railways Act 1846
The Railway Regulation (Gauge) Act 1846 ( 9 & 10 Vict. c. 57) or the Regulating the Gauge of Railways Act 1846 or the Gauge of Railways Act 1846 is an act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, that was designed to standardise railway tracks. It achieved royal assent on 18 August 1846, during the reign of Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. It mandated that the track gauge – which was the distance between the two running rails' inner faces – of 4 feet 8 inches to be the standard for Great Britain and 5 feet 3 inches to be the standard for Ireland.The metric equivalents of the dimensions specified are 1435 and 1600 millimetres respectively. The act The act stipulated that: Furthermore, it also provided that, following the act's passing, it would be illegal to alter a railway gauge that was in use for the conveyance, i.e. transport, of passengers. Assessment The act continued legislative approval of the broa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Porthmadog
Porthmadog (), originally Portmadoc until 1972 and known locally as "Port", is a coastal town and community (Wales), community in the Eifionydd area of Gwynedd, Wales, and the historic counties of Wales, historic county of Caernarfonshire. It lies east of Criccieth, south-west of Blaenau Ffestiniog, north of Dolgellau and south of Caernarfon. The community population was 4,185 in the 2011 census and was put at 4,134 in 2019. It grew in the 19th century as a port for local slate, but as the trade declined, it continued as a shopping and tourism centre, being close to Snowdonia, Snowdonia National Park and the Ffestiniog Railway. The 1987 National Eisteddfod was held there. It includes nearby Borth-y-Gest, Morfa Bychan and Tremadog. History Porthmadog came about after William Madocks built a sea wall, the Cob, in 1808–1811 to reclaim much of Traeth Mawr from the sea for farming use. Diversion of the River Glaslyn, Afon Glaslyn caused it to scour out a new natural harbour deep ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Blaenau Ffestiniog
Blaenau Ffestiniog () is a town in Gwynedd, Wales. Once a slate mining centre in historic Merionethshire, it now relies much on tourists, drawn for instance to the Ffestiniog Railway and Llechwedd Slate Caverns. It reached a population of 12,000 at the peak development of the slate industry, but fell with the decline in demand for slate. The population of the community, including the nearby village Llan Ffestiniog, was 4,875 at the 2011 census: the fourth most populous in Gwynedd after Bangor, Caernarfon and Llandeiniolen. The population not including Llan is now only about 4,000. Etymology and pronunciation The meaning of Blaenau Ffestiniog is "uplands of Ffestiniog". The Welsh word ' is the plural of ' "upland, remote region". Ffestiniog here is probably "territory of Ffestin" (Ffestin being a personal name) or could possibly mean "defensive place". The English pronunciation of Blaenau Ffestiniog suggested by the ''BBC Pronouncing Dictionary of British Names'' is , but th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Slate Industry
The slate industry is the industry related to the extraction and processing of slate. Slate is either quarried from a ''slate quarry'' or reached by tunneling in a ''slate mine''. Common uses for slate include as a roofing material, a flooring material, gravestones and memorial tablets, and electrical insulation. Slate mines are found around the world. 90% of Europe's natural slate used for roofing originates from the Slate Industry in Spain.European Association of Mining Industries website retrieved on 26/01/2010 The major slate mining region in the United Kingdom is the Lake district, with Honister slate mine being the last working slate mine, the only producers of the world famous Westmorland greenslate. In the remainder of Continental Europe and the |
Ffestiniog Railway
The Ffestiniog Railway () is a heritage railway based on Narrow-gauge railway, narrow-gauge, located in Gwynedd, Wales. It is a major tourist attraction located mainly within the Snowdonia#Snowdonia National Park, Snowdonia National Park. The railway is roughly long and runs from the harbour at Porthmadog to the Slate industry in Wales, slate mining town of Blaenau Ffestiniog, travelling through forested and mountainous terrain. The line is single track throughout with four intermediate passing places. The first mile of the line out of Porthmadog runs atop an embankment called ''the Cob'', which is the Levee, dyke of the polder known as Traeth Mawr. The Festiniog Railway Company, which owns the railway, is the oldest surviving railway company in the world. It also owns the Welsh Highland Railway, which was re-opened fully in 2011. The two railways share the same track gauge and meet at Porthmadog station, with occasional trains working the entire route from Blaenau Ffestinio ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
