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 Russell running on the Welsh Highland Railway (Porthmadog) in 1995 | |||||||||||||||||
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Russell is a narrow gauge steam locomotive originally built in 1906 for the North Wales Narrow Gauge Railways (NWNGR), but most famously associated with the original Welsh Highland Railway (WHR), and now based at the Welsh Highland Heritage Railway in Porthmadog.
A 2-6-2 T steam locomotive, the design of Russell is more closely related to Hunslet No 865 of 1905 otherwise known as Leeds Number 1, although certain engineering aspects can be more readily associated with design of locomotives supplied to the Sierra Leone Government Railway. One of the driving wheel centres bears the initials SLR, however this has been found to have been a later replacement and not as originally supplied. Originally built with air train brakes, it was converted to vacuum train brakes following the linking of the Welsh Highland and Ffestiniog Railways.
A character based on this locomotive (Fearless Freddie) appears in the children's TV series Thomas the Tank Engine and Friends .
The Ffestiniog Railway is a heritage railway based on 1 ft 11+1⁄2 in narrow-gauge, located in Gwynedd, Wales. It is a major tourist attraction located mainly within the Snowdonia National Park.
The Welsh Highland Railway (WHR) or Rheilffordd Eryri is a 25-mile (40.2 km) long, restored 1 ft 11+1⁄2 in narrow gauge heritage railway in the Welsh county of Gwynedd, operating from Caernarfon to Porthmadog, and passing through a number of popular tourist destinations including Beddgelert and the Aberglaslyn Pass. At Porthmadog it connects with the Ffestiniog Railway and to the short Welsh Highland Heritage Railway. In Porthmadog it uses the United Kingdom's only mixed gauge flat rail crossing.
The Porthmadog, Beddgelert and South Snowdon Railway (PB&SSR) was a 1 ft 11+1⁄2 in narrow gauge railway intended to connect Porthmadog with the North Wales Narrow Gauge Railways link terminus at Rhyd Ddu. Although some of the line was constructed between 1901 and 1906, it never opened and eventually became part of the Welsh Highland Railway.
The North Wales Narrow Gauge Railways (NWNGR) was a railway company that planned to build a number of inter-connected 1 ft 11+1⁄2 in narrow-gauge railways across North Wales. The first two of these lines - jointly known as the "Moel Tryfan Undertaking" - were authorised by Act of Parliament 1872 and were built and opened in the 1870s. The original main line ran from Dinas Junction to Bryngwyn and opened in 1877. The second line was a branch from Tryfan Junction to South Snowdon, though shortly after opening, the company designated the Tryfan Junction to Bryngwyn section as the branch, and the Dinas Junction to South Snowdon section as the main line.
The Croesor Tramway was a Welsh, 2 ft narrow gauge railway line built to carry slate from the Croesor slate mines to Porthmadog. It was built in 1864 without an Act of Parliament and was operated using horse power.
Porthmadog Harbour railway station in Porthmadog, Gwynedd, North Wales. It is the passenger terminus of two narrow gauge railways: the Ffestiniog Railway, which was opened in 1836 to carry dressed slate from the Quarries around Blaenau Ffestiniog to the sea port of Porthmadog, for export by sea; and the Welsh Highland Railway, incorporated in 1923, which ran to Dinas. After rebuilding in 1997-2011, the other terminus is at Caernarfon, in sight of the Castle.
Rhyd Ddu is a station on the narrow gauge Welsh Highland Railway, which was built in 1881 as the North Wales Narrow Gauge Railways Moel Tryfan Undertaking to carry dressed slate to Dinas Junction on the LNWR. It has also previously been named both "Snowdon" and "South Snowdon".
Dinas is a station on the narrow gauge Welsh Highland Railway, which was built in 1877 as the North Wales Narrow Gauge Railways Moel Tryfan Undertaking to carry dressed slate for trans-shipment to the LNWR. Passenger services ceased on 26 September 1936 until which time Dinas had been a joint station, known as Dinas Junction with the LNWR and later the LMS. In 1951, British Railways closed their part of the station but the line through the station remained open until the line from Caernarvon to Afon Wen was closed in 1964. The trackbed was subsequently developed as the Lôn Eifion tourist cycle route.
The Spooners of Porthmadog refers to the Spooner family of Porthmadog, North Wales who made important contributions to the development of narrow gauge railways both locally and throughout the world. James Spooner, together with his sons James Swinton and Charles Easton and other members of their family, constructed and managed the Ffestiniog Railway for over fifty years. In North Wales they were involved in the promotion of numerous railway schemes including many quarry lines, the Talyllyn Railway, the Festiniog and Blaenau Railway, the North Wales Narrow Gauge Railways and the Carnarvonshire Railway. Through publications and overseas family commissions they influenced narrow gauge railway construction in Russia, America and throughout the British Empire.
Beddgelert railway station is a railway station on the narrow gauge Welsh Highland Railway in North Wales.
Pen-y-Mount Junction station is the northern terminus of the Welsh Highland Heritage Railway (WHHR) in Porthmadog, Wales. With the opening of all three platforms, it has the most of any station in the Porthmadog area.
The Gorseddau Tramway was a 3 ft narrow gauge railway built in Wales in 1856 to link the slate quarries around Gorseddau with the wharves at Porthmadog. It was an early forerunner of the Gorseddau Junction and Portmadoc Railway and subsequently the Welsh Highland Railway.
James Ian Craig Boyd was an English author and narrow-gauge railway historian.
The restoration of the Welsh Highland Railway has a colourful and complex history. This article provides the modern history.
The Welsh Highland Heritage Railway is a short reconstructed heritage railway in Gwynedd, Wales. Its main station is in Porthmadog.
Moel Tryfan was a narrow gauge steam locomotive built for use on the North Wales Narrow Gauge Railways (NWNGRs) in 1874/5. The locomotive was an 0-6-4T single Fairlie locomotive built by the Vulcan Foundry near Manchester. It spent its entire working life on the NWNGRs and its successors the Welsh Highland Railway (WHR) and the Ffestiniog Railway (FfR).
The original Welsh Highland Railway (WHR) owed its existence to the narrow gauge railways and tramways built to serve commercial slate traffic from slate quarries and other mineral extraction operations along its route.
Carnarvon Castle railway station was opened in 1856 by the narrow gauge Nantlle Railway near the foot of what is today the Allt Y Castell which slopes down to Caernarfon's harbour area. It was the line's northern terminus and was the closest of Caernarfon's ultimately five stations to the historic town centre.
Hugh Beaver Roberts was a solicitor, originally based in Bangor, Caernarfonshire who became an entrepreneur involved in the construction of narrow gauge railways and the ownership of slate quarries in North Wales during the second half of the 19th century.