The Woodhead Route. Sheffield Victoria to Deepcar. Woodhead Railway Pt.1.

An authorised walk, following the old Woodhead route starting at the network rail compound at the side of Sheffield Victoria walking along the track thru to Deepcar passing several abandoned stations most of which are still in tact. Loads of clues still remain of the once busy route thru to Manchester and beyond.

Note: Although the Woodhead route is abandoned, this line is still used as a private siding to Stocksbridge steel mill, do not walk this line without consent from Network Rail. Thx.


A brief history....
The line opened in 1845. It was built by the Sheffield, Ashton-under-Lyne and Manchester Railway with Joseph Locke as its engineer. In 1847, the railway merged with the Sheffield and Lincolnshire Junction Railway, the Great Grimsby and Sheffield Junction Railway and the Grimsby Docks Company to form the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway; it changed its name to the Great Central Railway (GCR) in 1897. Ownership passed to the LNER in 1923 and, finally, to British Railways Eastern Region in 1948.

The original eastern terminus of the line was at Sheffield Bridgehouses railway station. By the time of the creation of the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway in 1847 a 0.6-mile (1 km) extension including the Wicker Arches viaduct, engineered by John Fowler, was constructed to the new Sheffield Victoria station, which opened in 1851.

Both goods and passenger traffic were very heavy; therefore, some sections of the line were quadrupled.

Electrification
Electrification was first mooted by the Great Central Railway, owing to the difficulties of operating heavy steam-hauled coal trains on the Penistone–Wath section (the Worsborough branch); a line with steep gradients and several tunnels. Definitive plans were drawn up by the LNER in 1936; many of the gantries for the catenary were erected before the Second World War.

The Second World War prevented progress on electrification, but the plans were restarted immediately after the war; however, this time with plans for a new double-track Woodhead Tunnel. TA second Thurgoland Tunnel was also required, as the existing tunnel had inadequate clearance for twin electrified lines.

The Manchester–Sheffield–Wath electrification project was finally completed in 1955, using overhead wires energised at 1,500 volts DC. Whilst this was tried and tested technology (and is still standard in the Netherlands), the comparatively low voltage meant that a large number of electricity substations and heavy cabling would be required

New electric locomotives for the line were constructed at Gorton locomotive works, Manchester. These were the EM1/Class 76, for freight trains and some passenger duties, and EM2/Class 77 locomotives for express passenger trains. A new depot at Reddish, situated on the Fallowfield Loop line, was built in 1954 to maintain the new locomotives and EMUs.

Closure

Having seen major investment in the 1950s, the line was controversially closed to passenger traffic on 5 January 1970. By the late 1970s, a large part of the remaining freight traffic consisted of coal trains from Yorkshire to Fiddlers Ferry power station near Widnes, which required a change to diesel haulage for the final part of the journey.

By the early 1980s, the combination of alternative available routes, an absence of passenger traffic since 1970 and a downturn in coal traffic across the Pennines, along with a need to eventually expensively upgrade or replace the non-standard electrical supply systems and Class 76 locomotives, resulted in the line's closure east of Hadfield. The last train operated on 18 July 1981 and the line was mothballed.

The tracks were lifted in the mid-1980s, ending any short-term hopes of reopening. Almost the entire line east of Hadfield has now been lifted, apart from a few short sections shared with other lines, notably at Penistone.