Just North of Moorthorpe Railway Station towards Pontefract. When travelling towards Pontefract on the York train if you look towards South Elmsall you can see a large earthwork curving towards South Elmsall. I was just wondering if anybody knows why the line was lifted?
Oh right so it never linked Pontefract and the S and K with the LNER southbound to Doncaster via South Elmsall.
If this is it, it looks like it was a spur to the Hull & Barnsley - maybe never have been fully connected as this is the 1890's map and it is marked as a disused railway in the 1907 version.
Spent many a happy hour in that area where the York line goes over the Leeds line. Aged between 9 - 12. Supposedly trainspotting. Also loved going through the disused Tunnel between Hemsworth and Shafton. Under the Cow Mounts.
Cheers it's the M.N.E.R Joint branchline I'm referring to. So back in day you could get direct from Baghill to London.
Brierley Tunnel? Half of it is still accessible, albeit a bit of a ball ache to get to! The other half was pumped full of concrete when they built Hemsworth Bypss.
Last time I was down there me and my mate got off our mountain bikes and climbed down the embankment. There was a steel door and the padlock had been sheered off. We didn't dare go in though. He'd told me a ghost story that the tunnel was closed because of a fire that couldn't be put out. I think he scared himself with his own hocus pocus. I later found out that it closed to make way for the bypass.
There's a video on Youtube where a bloke goes inside it from the Brierley end, where it was always fun climbing up or down the cutting. Not sure what they did at the Hemsworth end.
I used to go down to Pontefract Baghill to see the loco hauled 47's and Inter City coaches rattling through in the early nineties. It's a shame what has happened to the line between Moorthorpe and York. Until 1992 it was a mainline. There even used to be a Saturday special from Leicester to Scarborough that stopped there.
If my memory is not wholly shot to pieces, passing through Moorthorpe - I think it was on a Saturday - there was a train we called the "Poole Bournemouth" which had its destinations hung on on a plate on the side. Often it was a locomotive of interest to us cos it wasn't local. And the people on it were happy and dressed for holidays.
After Baghill (all but closed). There used to be the "Porterbrook" stormed through at around 16:10 towards York on a Saturday afternoon.
The roundabout pretty much sits on top of the tunnel and Hemsworth bypass follows the old alignment of the track for quite a distance. They filled the tunnel with concrete on that side and then infilled the railway cutting for the road. You wouldn’t know it existed now. It’s common practice to leave tunnels open at one end as they are great for bats.
Remember watching that go through Bolton on Dearne..... I think the full title was "Poole Bournmouth Birmingham York".
