[slideshow]Members of the Middleton Life history project enjoyed a trip to the world’s oldest continuously working commercial railway on Saturday.
Unlike our trip to Middleton Park on Wednesday, the weather stayed mostly dry at Middleton Railway. We were treated to a talk on the history of the railway by one of the volunteers, Dave, who told us it was founded in 1758 and is now a heritage railway run by volunteers from The Middleton Railway Trust Ltd since 1960.
It was built to carry coal from the pits in Middleton woods/park into Leeds.
We also enjoyed a trip on the railway – if you haven’t had a go, do – it’s a lovely little trip!
One of our members, Martin, said that when they were building the M1 motorway, the powers that be apparently originally considered some sort of railway crossing as ther motorway went across Middleton Railway’s line. Imagine that – a railway crossing on the motorway! Can anyone shed any more light on this? Luckily they ended up building a tunnel for the railway!
