Weston, Clevedon and Portishead Light Railway

Construction and opening A broad-gauge railway from Portishead to Clevedon was proposed in 1865 to connect with the Bristol and Portishead Railway which was then under construction. If it had been built it would have allowed direct services from Clevedon to Bristol which would have avoided the need to change at . A new proposal in 1884 envisaged the three towns being linked by a 'Weston-super-Mare, Clevedon and Portishead Tramway'. This standard-gauge line would run along the street from the Boulevard to Ashcombe Road in Weston-super-Mare and then off-road (apart from numerous level crossings) from there to Portishead. An act of Parliament, the '''''' (48 & 49 Vict. c. clxxxii) authorising its construction was passed on 6 August 1885. Building of the Weston-super-Mare to Clevedon section of the tramway began in 1887, but progress was slow due to many legal and financial problems. The act had stipulated that construction should be completed within five years, but further acts had to be passed on 25 July 1890, with the ' (53 & 54 Vict. c. cxxxii) and again on 27 July 1892 with the ' (55 & 56 Vict. c. clviii) to extend the time allowed. The section from Ashcombe Road to Clevedon was formally inspected by the Board of Trade on 26 August 1897 but not allowed to open. Due to the long time taken to build the line, some of the wooden sleepers had rotted and needed to be replaced. The local council also complained about the state of the track along the streets in Weston-super-Mare, so this section was taken up. A second inspection was made on 9 November and the line finally opened on 1 December 1897. Completion to Portishead The powers to construct the railway had run out in 1896 so another act of Parliament was required. After some opposition from the Clevedon Urban District Council regarding the necessary level crossings, the Weston Clevedon and Portishead Light Railways Act 1899 (62 & 63 Vict. c. ccxxi) was passed on 9 August 1899. In addition to allowing construction to be completed to Portishead by August 1904, it enabled the tramway to convert to a light railway with the name changed to the Weston, Clevedon and Portishead Light Railway Company. Financial difficulties continued. By 1904 the company was about £76,000 in debt so a new limited company, the Weston, Clevedon and Portishead Docks Railway, was formed with a capital of £120,000. The new company still found it difficult to raise enough money until September 1905, when £14,500 of 5% debentures were taken up by the Excess Insurance Company. In 1906, it borrowed £16,000 from other sources but was unable to repay the interest so the Excess Insurance Company provided funds up to £15,000 in March 1907 on the condition that the existing directors were replaced by new directors chosen by the insurance company. With money available again work could be completed on the new line to Portishead. It was inspected on 31 July 1907, and opened for traffic on 7 August. Receivership and closure In 1909, Cuthbert Heath, the managing director of the Excess Insurance Company, petitioned for the railway to enter receivership. Spencer Gore-Browne, one of the directors nominated by the insurance company, was appointed as the receiver and Colonel Stephens, the so-called' 'Light Railway king' was appointed as manager in 1911. He managed the railway along with a number of similar lines from an office in Tonbridge, Kent. Stephens tried to gain additional business for the line. A small branch was opened at Wick St. Lawrence to serve a wharf which the railway built on the River Yeo; the railway operated some boats carrying coal from Wales for a few years in the 1920s. Two additional passenger halts were opened in 1917-1918 and the larger stations given improved facilities. From 1921, a number of internal combustion railcars and rail-mounted tractors were used which significantly reduced costs. Steam locomotives were retained, especially for the trains from Clevedon to Portishead which conveyed heavy traffic from quarries in the area. Some wagons were stored in various sidings at the Weston-super-Mare end of the line but were moved back across the river in case of bombing. The WC&PR rolling stock was all taken to Swindon Works in August 1940 but was scrapped except for two Terriers which were overhauled and retained by the GWR. Lifting the line started on 3 October 1942 from the Weston-super-Mare end using one of the Terriers. By the end of October, the track had been lifted as far as Ebdon Lane. Between February and June 1943, the track was lifted between Portishead and the River Yeo but the remainder had to be removed by road. 16,000 tons of material was recovered. The company which owned the land no longer existed, so it could not be sold off. The town councils at Weston-super-Mare and Clevedon wanted it for roads and houses so paid the £3,750 value of the land to the Bank of England. ==Description==

The railway ran through sparsely-populated and level countryside. It was long with the steepest gradient being 1 in 68 for about on the northern side of Clevedon. The only notable engineering work was the bridge across the River Yeo near Wick St. Lawrence, which was long with cast iron piers supporting steel lattice girders. The railway was a single track. A passing loop was provided at Wick St Lawrence in 1898 on the Clevedon side of the station, but this fell out of use after 1914. Trains could pass at Clevedon from 1909 when the loop was provided with signals, however the station only had a single platform. When trains needed to pass, the one going to Weston-super-Mare had to reverse out of the station and then pull forward into the loop to allow the second train to enter the platform. Stations There were 19 stations or halts, most of which only had a small shelter and no platform but were merely calling places adjacent to level crossings. There were also several sidings handling freight traffic: A short branch was opened in 1915 at Wick St. Lawrence to serve a jetty which the railway company built on the River Yeo. There was a loop on the branch from which a single line ran out onto the jetty which had a concrete platform supported by wooden piles. Conygar Quarry was served by a long siding from Walton Park station. There were more quarries in the Gordano Valley. Black Rock was the largest and had a double loop line in 1919 but more sidings were added in 1931. Nightingale Quarry had its own siding near Black Rock. In 1937, the Conygar Quarry transported 3,968 tons by rail and the other two moved 34,755 tons. Connecting lines There was no connection with other railways when the line opened in 1897. A connection was made at Clevedon in 1898 when a tightly curved line (of radius) was laid behind the engine shed to connect with the GWR's goods yard. locomotives ran with one pair of wheels uncoupled, making them s, so they could negotiate the tight curve of this line. The 1892 Act of Parliament to allow completion of the line also authorised connections to be built to the GWR at both Portishead and Weston-Super-Mare. The Portishead connection was brought into use on 2 November 1908 ==Rolling stock==

Most of the locomotives and rolling stock were bought second-hand from various sources, making a varied collection. Steam locomotives Internal combustion Carriages and wagons The line had six 'cars' when it opened in 1897. These were bogie carriages, long over their buffers with American-style open end platforms and both first and second class seating. They had been built by the Lancaster Carriage and Wagon Works for the Argentine Republic Railway but the sale to that company was never completed. They were taken out of service in the early 1920s, but three saw further use from 1937 until the line closed. An additional coach was later bought from the Great Central Railway, a small four-wheel vehicle used as a 'smoking car' during the summer. It had been renumbered into the freight stock series by 1913 and its underframe was stored in the siding at Wick St Lawrence. Seven former Metropolitan Railway four-wheeled coaches were put into service in 1907, six of them close-coupled in pairs. The pairs were long. Coach number 7 has been restored to its Metropolitan Railway condition. A four-wheeled Great Eastern Railway passenger brake van arrived in 1911 but was withdrawn in 1922. Three London and South Western Railway four-wheeled coaches arrived in 1924 and were close-coupled as a set although sometimes ran without the centre coach. The final coach was a former Taff Vale Railway four-wheeled coach which could be used on its own on quiet days. == The line today ==

Due to the lack of major infrastructure, there are few obvious remains of the line. Still surviving is a small bridge over a rhyne in Portishead, the remains of a bridge over the River Yeo, and the wharf. Much of the route of the track bed survives, a small part of which can be walked on Weston Moor reserve in the Gordano Valley. There are plans to convert some of the track bed to a cycle path as part of the National Cycle Network. The WC&P Railway Group was formed in November 2006, to attempt to preserve what was left of the railway. == References ==