Left: Cartoon first published in “Steam at Llangollen” No 108 and Right: all that remains of Bonwm Halt
Above: The trackbed at Corwen where the LNWR Branch from Denbigh joined the GWR line from Llangollen. Corwen town is to the right of the picture
Above Left: The remains of the underbridge at Corwen and the trackbed towards the original Corwen Station. The rebuilt Llangollen Railway will terminate behind where the photographer is standing. The Old Fire Station is to the left of the picture. Above Right: The Old Fire Station building taken on the same day 8th May 2005.
The GWR Goods Shed at Corwen, one of the few railway buildings still standing, now part of Corwen Industrial Estate.
There is a photograph from the tender of a locomotive standing alongside the Shed
taken from a similar position as the right hand picture in “Scenes from the Past
9: Railways of North Wales -
Pictures of the volunteers clearing 43 years of re-
Photos George Jones & John Rutter
FOR CORWEN EXTENSION
Neil Evans Writes:
The Widnes site is being cleared for new business premises and the siding area cleared for use as a cycle track. The resultant track material has been donated to us free of charge but we have retained a contractor “Trackwork" to dismantle and transport it etc. It is our's to be used on the railway, primarily for the extension, and we cannot sell it.
The total length of track amounts to approx one kilometre of sidings (flat bottomed rail) and 4 points which Steve Stowell has assessed and they can form the basis of our requirements for the proposed station loop at Corwen.
As regards the extension to Corwen, it has been the long term intention of the railway to get there since 1974 during which time we have reached Carrog.
We are presently coming to the end of an exhaustive and complex exercise to obtain the necessary Transport and Works Application (a combination of planning application and Railway Act) for the extension from Carrog to Corwen.
This has been done in partnership with Denbighshire County Council and the Welsh Assembly Government and we are indebted to all their help and assistance with this.
The project will cost approx £2.5m and will be heavily reliant on grant aid from our partners. If all goes well we hope to start on site some time in 2009 and the donated Widnes Track will play a great part in the works.
This works will involve the re-
Views of the track removal operations from the site in Widnes
Photos -
Updated 20th April 2010 by John Rutter
Link to Google Maps for the Satelite image of the location of Bonwm Halt
Above: Caer Drewyn, the Iron Age hill fort on the north side of the River Dee overlooks Corwen. It has been linked with King Arthur as the home of Uther Pendragon
A meeting was convened by Samantha Williams -
Opening up the hill fort will create a focus for passengers on the railway when they get off the train to explore Corwen.
The track-
TO BE SUBMITTED TO THE WELSH ASSEMBLY GOVERNMENT
ARE NOW AVAILABLE BY FOLLOWING THIS LINK
LLANGOLLEN RAILWAY -
The Station, Abbey Road , Llangollen , LL28 8SN – 01978 860979
For Immediate release:
CORWEN EXTENSION AWAITS THE GREEN LIGHT
Following the submission of the Transport and Works Order application in September 2009, to extend the popular Welsh Heritage Railway Line from Carrog to Corwen, Llangollen Railway Trust received five objections and one representation from various public and private bodies. We are pleased to announce that all but two of these have now been withdrawn, The most recent withdrawal is by Sustrans (a organisation dedicated to promoting cycling facilities).
Railway Vice Chairman, Neil Evans said, 'We hope to settle the remaining two objections, Welsh Water and the Countryside Council for Wales in the near future. The level of opposition really is quite low for a fair size project of this sort and none of the objectors have opposed in principle to the Extension'.
The Project's team, Vice Presidents Gordon Heddon and Bill Shakespeare with Vice Chairman Neil Evans, who have done much work on the project said, 'Residents, businesses and others all stand to benefit from the scheme and it is clear that the local community can't wait to see trains running to Corwen again after almost 50 years.
The level of public support demonstrated by the commitment shown by the railway's landlord Denbighshire County Council whose intervention lead to the withdrawal of the Sustrans’ objection. Sustrans wanted a shared used path beside the line which the Trust maintained could not be accommodated within railway land. The Trust has agreed to talks with Sustrans on the provision of improved facilities for cyclists.’
Llangollen Railway Chairman, Jim Ritchie, added, '2010 promises to be an exciting year for the Railway if (when) the Transport and Works Order is granted and we can begin the task of progressing the extension beyond Carrog towards Corwen where a new Station will be built.
The project will involve the Llangollen Railway in a major cost exercise outside of any grant aid which may be secured. The Llangollen Railway Trust will be seeking donations from well wishers and further sales of shares in the plc to help finance this final stage in the dream which began 35 years ago, to rebuild the line ten miles westward from Llangollen.’
The Llangollen Railway is a seven and a half mile standard gauge railway running
westward from Llangollen following the River Dee to Carrog. It currently employs
over 30 full and part-
The Llangollen Railway comprises of Llangollen Railway plc, the trading company, supported by Llangollen Railway Trust Ltd., a registered charity, the latter replaced Llangollen Railway Society which no longer exists.
Left: The Trackbed to the east of Corwen looking through Bridge 28A towards Bonwm Halt and Right: Detail of Bridge 28
Picture -
Showing the satelite image of CORWEN.
The Railway Trackbed is the fine curved white line
contain reports on the Transport and Works Order by Bill Shakespeare. They bring the story up to date, listing the objections received to the T&WO in the 42 days the documents were available for consultation.
Progress Report on the Corwen Transport & Works Order 6th April 2010
After our Application went public in September 2009, we received six objections, four of which have since been withdrawn. The two outstanding objectors are Welsh Water, who are seeking protection for two water pipes crossing the Railway’s formation, and the Countryside Council for Wales who required much more detailed information than had been included in our environmental statement. CCW have major concerns about the impact the construction and operation of the railway may have on the River Dee SAC and SSSI.
Two supplementary environmental documents were prepared and sent to CCW. One was an assessment of the potential effects of the project on the River Dee, and the second referred to otter surveys and their distribution. This led to a lengthy exchange of correspondence with CCW, along with a couple of meetings and a site visit. We are pleased to record that a satisfactory settlement has at last been reached between CCW and Llangollen Railway Trust, and the former will now withdraw their objection. We have been advised that an agreement will shortly be made with Welsh Water.
With the Trust’s Application now being unopposed, it was naturally assumed that the granting of the T&WO would follow. Not so! To our dismay, on 25th March a letter was received from the Department of Transport stating that the Welsh Ministers had decided to require the Trust to submit these two supplementary reports for public consultation. Worse, these two reports had been with the Ministers for five months!
A public notice will now appear in next Tuesday’s ‘Daily Post’ (6th April), stating
that these reports will be available for inspection at Corwen and Llangollen libraries
and Llangollen Station. The general public will then have a further forty-
On behalf of the Trust, our solicitors sent a letter to the WAG’s department dealing with our T&WO Application. It expressed our great dissatisfaction at the way this matter has been handled, and made it clear that the further delays to be incurred may result in the loss of the WAG grant aid funding package. This grant aid is fundamental towards the construction of the railway extension, and it had a deadline of 31st March for payment. It has taken a full six months of hard endeavour to satisfy the six objectors, and through no fault of the project team, that grant deadline has been missed.
A final extension to 31st August for the grant draw down has been gained with some difficulty, but we still face enormous problems.
By law, work on the extension cannot be started until the T&WO has been approved. The Welsh Ministers’ decision has now added six weeks to the process, and there is scant hope that the T&WO will be granted before 31st August. If we are unable to avail ourselves of the WAG grant aid by 31st August, it is lost for all time to the project. In the current economic climate, it may take many years to achieve the goal of the extension to Corwen.
Up to now, this whole bureaucratic process of applying for the Order has cost the Railway over £60,000 in legal costs alone, for which there has been no outside financial assistance. In addition there has been £20,000 towards JMP Consulting’s costs. These legal costs are ongoing, until such time as the Order is granted. Without the financial boost of this grant aid, the Railway would have insufficient funding to start work on the project.
The foregoing makes for depressing reading, the more so to those of us who have been involved in this project for four years and more. It is made worse knowing that the delays and additional costs involved in the granting of the Order are outside of our control and not of our doing.
Bill Shakespeare Vice President, Llangollen Railway Trust
Gordon Heddon Vice President, Llangollen Railway Trust
Neil Evans Vice Chairman, Llangollen Railway Trust