The line was called a "Light Railway", but it was authorised before the
Light Railways Act 1896, so it received none of the benefits of that legislation. It was soundly built as a "heavy" line, but with a
route availability of "two", which severely restricted the axle weight of locomotives and rolling stock which could be used. Being almost dead level and single track throughout, with a terminus at the country end, the line lent itself to
one engine in steam working. The route had just one signal of its own – a
fixed distant on the approach to the junction with the main line – and needed no signalboxes. Traffic passing to and from the NER was controlled by that railway using signals of their own on Cawood line territory. For this the NER used what was "Brayton Gates" signalbox, which was subsequently renamed "Wistow Junction" and in 2018 remained operational as "Selby West" signalbox. The line had seven
gated level crossings and eight sets of sidings, five near level crossings, one each at Cawood and Wistow stations and exchange sidings at Brayton Gates. The loading banks next to sidings at Cawood and Wistow were long and had sections of different heights for loading and unloading different consignments. Four of the level crossings had gatekeeper's cottages with bay windows to observe the track in both directions, the two country stations' buildings were similar to each other, but differed from the NER's rural station style. By 2005 three crossing keepers' cottages survived, with the one at Broad Lane, Cawood being externally the least altered. The line had no overbridges and two underbridges, one crossed the Black Fen Drain, the other was the line's only engineering work of any note – a
plate girder bridge over the Selby Dam, which, despite its name, is a small river. The line was relaid and the stations repainted in 1953, but local hopes of an upturn in fortunes came to nothing. The line's initial passenger timetable provided five trains a day, Monday to Saturday, plying between "Selby" (i.e. Selby (Brayton Gates)) Wistow and Cawood. The journey time was 17 minutes. By July 1899 the timings had been adjusted and one train had been removed on Tuesdays to Saturdays. On Monday – Selby's Market Day – an extra train was provided out and back mid-morning and an extra from Brayton Gates at teatime, which returned empty. By 1910 the unbalanced teatime Market Train had been withdrawn and timings had been adjusted, but the pattern of four a day plus a Market Day extra remained, with the added benefit that the first train from Cawood in the morning ran through to York. The journey time remained 17 minutes despite the extra to reach Selby's main station instead of Brayton Gates. By 1914 there were two Market Day extras and four daily trains, but by 1923, whilst the Market Day extras remained, only two daily trains survived, morning and mid-evening. Passenger traffic was encouraged on occasions such as cheap tickets to visit the Wistow Show and Sports day. The CW&SLR had two coaches and one locomotive, an
0-6-0ST built by
Manning Wardle, named
Cawood. All three items were hired from the
Yorkshire Railway Wagon Company (YRWC) for seven years from April 1897. The loco was housed in a single-track
engine shed at Brayton Gates. Apart from being referred to as "First and Third Class composite coaches" photographs and details of the coaches have evaded historians. The company hired "wagons, sheets and ropes as may be required" from the NER. When the NER took over they inherited the hire of
Cawood and the coaches. The company arranged to return them to the YRWC in summer 1901. The coaches' fate is not known, but the loco had a varied and useful life until at least 1927. The next twenty nine years of passenger working appears quixotic, but it was ultimately dictated by the line's very low route availability, mainly caused by the Selby Dam bridge. The NER had no problem with providing very low axle-weight goods locomotives, but very light locos fitted with
continuous brakes and reasonably capacious water tanks were rare. The first solution was to use NER class H2 (LNER class J79)
0-6-0T No. 407. This loco, one of a class of three, was a six-coupled development of the successful
NER Class H 0-4-0T, two of which have survived into preservation. At some point No. 407 was fitted with extended tanks for use on the Cawood branch, as the line's only watering facility was a hand pump at Cawood. Three other tank engines were fitted with
Westinghouse continuous brakes and moved to Selby
engine shed – sister "H2" No. 1787 from 1905 to 1909 and
NER Class E 0-6-0Ts Nos. 296 and 1197 from around 1908; these last are known to have worked the Market Day extra trains for several years. In 1903 the NER introduced
Petrol-electric Autocars on some lightly-used routes. After considerable development work two of them – Nos. 3170 and 3171 – moved to Selby in summer 1908 to work passenger trains on the Cawood branch, among other services. In 1909/10 four seats were taken out of both cars to enable the luggage compartments to be enlarged. The cars were driven by "Motormen" and housed from 1912 in a specially-built
lean-to shed attached to the locomotive
coaling stage at Selby
engine shed. Remarkably, this structure survived until the shed as a whole was demolished in 1964. Use of Autocar No. 3171 appears to have faded from the early 1920s, with long periods in store. In 1923 No. 3170 was re-engined, renumbered as 3170Y and sent to work in the Harrogate area, but this lasted only for the 1923 summer season, after which there is no published evidence of it being used until it was withdrawn in 1931. Remarkably, No. 3170 was discovered in the early 21st century, having been used as a holiday home near
Kirbymoorside for 70 years. It was bought in 2003 with a view to restoration and ran under its own power on the
Embsay and Bolton Abbey Steam Railway in 2018. When the autocars ceased working the line reverted to steam haulage, with trains composed of a single "Bogie Brake third" coach worked by a
NER Class E 0-6-0T or, occasionally,
BTP 0-4-4T No. 189. On 9 July 1923 a quite different form of
internal combustion-powered provision was deployed on some services in the form of the unique "Leyland" petrol railbus, a converted 26-seater NER road bus of conventional appearance for the period. This ran a wide-ranging diagram including the Cawood branch which came to a sudden end on 11 November 1926 when the railbus was destroyed by fire while refuelling at Selby. The immediate hiatus was filled by a combination of BTP tank locos and a "steam autocar". Research continues as to what form this took. On 1 May 1928 Selby received its first
Sentinel steam railcars. No. 220 "Water Witch" may have been the first to work to Cawood, but it was destroyed in a collision near Doncaster on 9 June 1929. Better remembered were two similar cars, No. 225 "True Blue" and No. 273 "Trafalgar" which worked the branch until the last passenger service on Saturday 30 December 1929. The arrival of the Sentinels followed by closure to passenger traffic reduced then removed the need for small locomotives with continuous brakes to act as backup, so they were moved away from Selby between 1929 and 1932. Occasional special passenger trains, such as excursions to
pantomimes in
Leeds, used the line until 1946. By 1945 declining traffic, except in the "Campaign", i.e. harvesting time for key crops of potatoes and beet, meant a handful of
0-6-0Ts were regularly in charge, notably
J71s 68285 and 68286 and veteran "Ironclad"
J77 68406, being replaced by a
J72 towards the closure of Selby
shed on 13 September 1959. From then to closure in May 1960 the line's "flyweight" trains were in the hands of
Class 03 diesel shunters, particularly No. D2063. Before the
Second World War trains of 40 wagons of root crops were commonplace in the Campaign, with trains of 20 wagons still to be seen in the early 1950s, but by 1955 trains ran "as required", which was rarely daily. Despite the land's rich and rising productivity the decline in traffic came about almost entirely due to road competition on price, convenience and quality. A lorry could be ordered at short notice, be loaded on the farm or even on the field then deliver immediately. By rail the produce had to be double-handled at farm then siding, incurring extra cost, time, loss and damage. ==After closure==