These are obviously special railway termites that enjoy timber impregnated with water!!! Never seen a wagon dis-intergrate quite like this thru rot!! This was Foxfield today.

🔗Foxfield-Coal-Mine-User-Album-Image-32202[linkphoto]Foxfield-Coal-Mine-User-Album-Image-32202[/linkphoto][/link]

---

I've seen some wagons and carriages in similar if not worse condition today at Tanfield Railway nr. Stanley Co. Durham.
The sidings on site are like a graveyard for old locos and rolling stock, very sad really to think they where once all lovingly kept and busy moving coal and goods around the
locality
Part of the track is in use as a heritage line, today they had a steam hauled train going back and forth from Sunniside to Causey Arch.

Who owns them ICLOK?

Looks like a restoration job for somebody with a soft spot for a lost cause 😉

---

God knows, but there were shed loads of these old wooden wagon all over the ncb... inc 8 at Swanwick junction on my local railway that were there in the same spot when I was 4 nearly 40 years ago!!!

---

The termites seem to like eating metal as well - the frame at the left seems to be a bit on the loose side!

I suppose that we're now in an age where we've finally realised that preserving things is not just a case of saving them and restoring them once - be it a mine, a railway wagon or a car.

The real worry is going to be whether or not there's going to be another generation that will take the weight of looking after all these things - otherwise, much of our industrial history is going to fade away, with museums closing and machines being quietly scrapped.

---

Already happening I'm afraid... I know of lots of locos (and wagons etc) that were preserved and lovingly restored....(by a generation that was bothered and that probably remembered the things in service or came from that industry), that are now just rusting away in sidings or rotting away.

I think only the big railways/museums will come thru

---

Indeed :(

Although we're veering way off-topic, I'm somewhat surprised that the railway to Amlwch across Anglesey hasn't been 'preserved' in some form - and that it seems a lot more likely that the track will be lifted and it will become a cycle track.

It seems that an unused 18 mile long branch line in an area where tourism is by far and away the dominant part of the economy should be a guaranteed success for a sustainable heritage railway, yet it seems that tarmac and a bicycle twice a week is more viable.

Yet (as we touched on a couple of weeks back) the Welsh Highland is in the process of being completed, which is a restoration of something that closed many decades ago.

Most curious...

---

I agree but again in conversation with others of the same opinion, the concern is that if it was to be tried how long to be up and running and will it once again dilute the somewhat already large market of preserved lines in Nth Wales once it is?

A few of us had the idea of doing this near Ripley with the Little Eaton - Denby branch which given a few crossing gates etc is good to go, but given we have the MRT, the Ecclesbourne, Peak Rail, and Crich with 10 miles... I don't think another is sustainable.

We now have a group intending to put the old Ashover light railway together (with steam), yeah I'll join... can it work? I don't know....

---

I agree but again in conversation with others of the same opinion, the concern is that if it was to be tried how long to be up and running and will it once again dilute the somewhat already large market of preserved lines in Nth Wales once it is?

Hence the rather ugly battle between the 1964 Company (For) and the Ffestiniog (Against) about restoring the Welsh Highland. The Ffestiniog was concerned about the impact on its revenues and thus viability. In the end they led the majority of the restoration – if the revenues come to them its hardly going to put them out of business and there are economies of scale (all Loco work at Boston Lodge etc.).

The fight was quite nasty and there is still a lot of ill feeling around about it in some quarters.

I worry about the 1964 Company (now the Welsh Highland Heritage Railway) but they have set themselves up, whilst still a separate organisation, as the 'Museum Department' for both the Ffestiniog and WH (the Ffestiniog turned their rather small museum into a bar) with exhibits on loan from the Ffestiniog, original and original style carriages and a station that tries to recreate a 1920s WHR station as exactly as they can (down to the type of washers used to put together the 'Tin Shed' station building).

BTW the Bowes Railway have two Inclines working if you want to see one:

http://www.bowesrailway.co.uk/ 

From the Foxfield website that wagon is a 1907 Railway Clearing House 'Private Owners' wagon from Wolstanton Colliery, the worst one of three. '... now almost unique in the UK ...'. '... require extensive timber replacement but the metal components are generally in usable condition'. '...it is hoped that at least one or two of them can be restored eventually, to carry authentic "Foxfield Colly" or other local private owner wagon liveries.' I would guess that this one would be used to donate parts to get the other two up to scratch.

Rick