The Leeds & York Railway and the Tadcaster Viaduct

"The best-laid plans of mice and men often go awry"

Many railroad proposals are never seen through to completion, even if significant infrastructure along the route is built, both here in the United States and abroad.

This was especially true in the early days of railroad companies, which were quite often small operations that did not have much support from governments, and were also competing against such charters that did. 

One such example of an unbuilt railway is the Leeds & York Railway, a proposal from the 1840's to connect its namesake cities in the United Kingdom.

Promoted by the Manchester & Leeds Railway, it was eventually a casualty of a non-compete agreement between the M&L and rival York & North Midland Railway.

Before the proposal was abandoned, workers had completed the Tadcaster Viaduct, which still stands today. While the company that built it came and went without laying track on it, it briefly did serve its purpose as a rail bridge, although only for a side track. (Location)

Tadcaster Viaduct in the distance. Alison Stamp, 2005. Wikipedia Commons

The National Transport Trust describes the viaduct as "An imposing viaduct of eleven arches spans the River Wharfe in Tadcaster, built as part of a projected direct Leeds to York railway promoted by the industrialist George Hudson through the York & North Midland Railway. The construction of the line was authorised in 1846 and was to run from Copmanthorpe to Cross Gates, joining the Church Fenton to Harrogate railway line between Tadcaster and Stutton.

The collapse of railway investment in 1849 lead to the line being abandoned after the viaduct had been constructed. The need for the line evaporated with the opening of the Micklethorpe to Church Fenton line in 1869."

Tadcaster Viaduct in 2007. Andrew Whale, Wikipedia Commons. Whale shared the following, "About a quarter-of-a-mile above the road bridge is a handsome viaduct of eleven arches spanning the Wharfe. This was erected whilst George Hudson was the ruling spirit in the railway world, but with the collapse of the "Railway King" the line, which was intended to connect Tadcaster with York, was abandoned. The viaduct was subsequently purchased by the North-Eastern Railway Co." Later, it was used for a short siding to a mill on the east side of the river." (Tadcaster Extract, 1890)

Today the bridge serves as a walkway over the River Wharfe, and as a reminder about how plans can go awry. The viaduct has also been the subject of several preservation efforts, and its historic and architectural significance has been recognized by its designation as a Grade II listed building.

Thanks as always for reading!

Location: River Wharfe, Tadcaster LS24 9WB, UK

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Underwater Water Slide: Fly Over at Durinrell TikiBad

Image
Have you ever wished to experience being transferred from one pool of liquid to another via a pipe? Had you visited the Dutch water park known as Durinrell , also known as Tikibad before 2010, you would have had the chance. Half water slide, half war crime, this was a unique water slide that was filled to the brim with water, leaving riders completely submerged throughout the journey. Image:  XtremeRidesNL Known as the Fly Over was an underwater water slide, which is exactly how it sounds, and transported riders from one pool to another using the water as propulsion. Built in 1994, riders dove underwater to access the slide, using gravity to transport them upwards via the Communicating Vessels Principle . Riders would be completely underwater for about 15-20 seconds. This is how I imagine those 15-20 seconds felt like while riding the slide. The slide was built to drain water in five seconds or less in case a rider got stuck in the slide or had a medical emergency, but the threat tha
Read more

Choum Tunnel: The Monument to European Stupidity in Africa

Image
Scars of European colonization are located all across Africa, although some are more obscure and strange than others. With that in mind we come to the Choum Tunnel , built in Mauritania when it was controlled by the French. At first glance, it seems like an ordinary railway tunnel, however, one look at the local geography and you'll find yourself asking what its builders were possibly thinking with creating the project. Choum Tunnel in Mauritania. Unknown photographer. The Mauritania Railway was being built in the early 1960s, and was planned to connect Nouadhibou to Zouérat to exploit the iron ore reserves at Zouérat. That route still exists today in largely its original state, with the exception of the tunnel. Image: Ammar Hassan via Atlas Obscura The easiest route required running a short section of track through the then-Spanish controlled Western Sahara , but rather than pay Spain for the land and other concessions, the French engineers instead chose to tunnel under a hill sp
Read more

We asked ChatGPT to write an article on Abandoned Railroads - Here's the Result

Image
We live in an incredibly interesting age of information - made even more interesting by one of the most advanced chatbots that exist. Chatbots have been around for awhile now, but there are very few that have captured the amount of information and artificial intelligence that have been shown by ChatGPT . To demonstrate this, I asked it to write me an article on abandoned railroads with 1200 words in it. After this paragraph, you'll see what ChatGPT wrote. I will provide relevant links in its paragraphs and make any errors that I can see in brackets "[]". What I've noticed is that ChatGPT is great when it comes to general ideas about a particular historical topic, but largely gets facts, dates, and context wrong. Thus, we're still a little ways away from being taken over by computer overlords . Otherwise, thanks as always for reading my material, the rest is by guest blogger ChatGPT! Abandoned railroads are railways that are no longer in use or service. This can ha
Read more