Can't find the thread where the question was asked, but... it was along the lines of "how did the Dinorwic tramway get down to Port Dinorwic?"

Edit: I'll, er, start with the Padarn Railway...

The top of the Penscoins incline has sadly been lost to the Felinheli bypass, but a picture of what is used to look like can be found at this http://www.narrow-gauge.co.uk/gallery/show.php?cat_id=299&image_id=2576 . I seem to recall a photograph of the Penscoins engine shed on David Sallery's website, but I can't find it at the moment.

There is little left of the incline as it's now very overgrown: this is a view up through the trees and the gap where the incline used to run is just about visible:

🔗Personal-Album-2-Image-050[linkphoto]Personal-Album-2-Image-050[/linkphoto][/link]

The photo shows the remains of the buttress for an overbridge, which has recently been partially demolished. This is it from a bit further back:

🔗Personal-Album-2-Image-048[linkphoto]Personal-Album-2-Image-048[/linkphoto][/link]

The incline bed drops down behind the car park of the Halfway House pub in Felinheli - this is pretty much looking down it, with the pub car park on the right:

🔗Personal-Album-2-Image-047[linkphoto]Personal-Album-2-Image-047[/linkphoto][/link]

The tunnel portal for where the incline passes under the road is at the far end of the pub car park from its entrance - just behind a low wall is a drop of perhaps 15' to the bricked up tunnel entrance:

🔗Personal-Album-2-Image-052[linkphoto]Personal-Album-2-Image-052[/linkphoto][/link]

The passing of time has pretty much hidden the tunnel portal with vegetation: here's a rather poor pic:

🔗Personal-Album-2-Image-053[linkphoto]Personal-Album-2-Image-053[/linkphoto][/link]

At the other end, the tunnel originally came out behind the (former) La Voile restaurant / the new building alongside it - I think the building works have mostly hidden it, but I'll have a better look.

The route of the railway can be seen quite clearly on this extract from Flashearth:

🔗Personal-Album-2-Image-054[linkphoto]Personal-Album-2-Image-054[/linkphoto][/link]

Full version here - http://www.flashearth.com/?lat=53.186175&lon=-4.19983&z=16.8&r=0&src=msl 

A map of the railway is here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:PadarnRailwayMap.png 

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Vanoord,

The original question was on DP. Also, they were asking about the original route of the Dinorwic Tramroad, not the later Padarn Railway. The routes were quite different. The Tramroad left the quarry at a much higher elevation, took the route ofe present road (except for alterations done about 20 years ago) for about a mile or more, then went off on it's own route before descending two inclines near Deiniolen. Not sure what happened to it after that. I seem to think it approached the Port on the level, more or less where the later standard gauge route was, or at least, in same vicinity.

Interesting photos though!

It's my age 😉

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The descent to Port Dinorwic was via the Garth incline - I *think* it was somewhere in the woods to the north west of the centre of this map - http://www.flashearth.com/?lat=53.189478&lon=-4.168232&z=16.8&r=0&src=msl  - you can just about make out the line of the tramway to the south -east...

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This is an extract from the 1840 one-inch facsimile. I've added a bit of colour to show the original Dinorwic Railway in red. One quadrant also shows the Padarn railway - I've coloured it yellow.

[img]http://www.aditnow.co.uk/showimage?f=/community/Personal-Album-54-Image-048/[/img]


Graham

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Thanks for that Graham 🙂 - I'll compare it to a modern OS at home and report back...

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Hi all. I asked the original question at DP. The answers make sense. Looking at the Flashearth link, it appears that the tramway entered a tributary of the little valley (with a telltale line of trees heading towards it) now used as a landfill site exiting towards the bottom of Nant y Garth. I had noticed a potential levelled track type area to the east of the bottom of Nant y Garth, but was unsure. I've still to look at the altitude profile using Memorymap, but it does seem to be a good route to descend the escarpment.

However, the section between Clwt y Bont and the Nant y Garth tributary seem to be far from clear. I assume that the route headed towards Rhiwlas in some way.

Robin

Ah yes, I'd forgotten about this one: there are two variations of the route... I'll post up the pics a little later on 😉

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