For some months now a friend of mine who lives at Bradnop has been giving me reports on the disused railway line that passes (at a distance) in front of his property. This last week there have been various engine types traveling up and down the track. Diesel & Steam
All is revealed here: http://www.mcrailways.co.uk/ 

This is good news for quarry I should have thought, time will tell of course. No doubt ICLOK will be able to tell us. Rumours
amongst the locals there could be 2 way traffic to the quarry, which would secure it's future a bit more than of recent times.

Peter.

Lets just say that the Churnet Valley Railway always eyed up the line as a possible re-open with a view to extending its passenger services and freight. As I understand a new company was formed called the MCR (Moorland and City Railways) which was to buy, restore and operate the line as a seperate entity but in conjunction with the CVR, inspection by the Office of Rail Regulation was due in early November and given they had a gala in Nov I must assume they were successful.
The history of this venture goes back to a study in 1998 re remaining stone reserves at Caldon, the quarry owners submitted a joint planning application to develop a new aggregates storage area and rail loading facility that would bring the line back in to use. Planning consent was given in October 1999 but the project was not taken forward by the applicants and the line remained disused.
Over the last 18 months the MCR purchased the Leekbrook to Cauldon Loweroute and re-connected it to the CVR at Leekbrook junction. The route offers some of the steepest gradients in the country. :thumbup: :lol:
It is hoped regular stone trains will start running in 2012 when the line from Leekbrook to Stoke is re-opened to give the necessary mainline connection. This is fabulous news and will boost CVR operations too, another whisper is the CVR may even look at heading to Alton Towers.
Hope that helps. ;D

EDIT Re the future security of the route I think its pretty much secured knowing those involved! 😉

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That is excellent news, and if the recent photos posted on Flickr are anything to go by the Gala was a roaring success. But...as a one-time PW volunteer on a couple of preserved railways I do worry about the track, it doesn't look up to running the heavy locos they have been using. If I lived a bit nearer and wasn't constantly obsessing about slate quarries I might have to chip in. Hopefully they will sort that out if they start running serious trains!

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Thanks ICLOK. The opening hasn't been without it's dramas from what I hear. Certain residents living near to the line are not that happy on the re-opening.

One such resident felt so strongly that they lay down across the line, apparently 😮 😮 😮 😮 Fortunately the incident occurred at a point where the train had come to a stand still at a crossing and was on it's way up and not down. The driver, apparently, was heard to comment "It's a good job that this didn't happen on the way down". 😢 😢 :lol: :lol: :lol: Images of black & white silent movie past before me. I have it on good authority the afore mentioned actually happened.

Long may the line continue.

PS: Teigl, You may well be right about the track, it's taken a very short time to get it back on line, as it were.

I take it said resident would prefer thirty HGVs passing their home every day rather than one train....

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Well said AR.... Toadstone, what the driver said was true no easy stopping on the way down. Track was in pretty good nick for the main part I hear but yes it was very quickly put right.... hopefully!! 😉

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I take it said resident would prefer thirty HGVs passing their home every day rather than one train....

Indubitably but there are 30 HGV drivers who would like too 😉 😉

Seriously you're quite right it is just a question of balance in all things.