| Manchester-sheffield-wath Electric Railway |
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Information AboutManchester-sheffield-wath Electric Railway |
| CATEGORIES ABOUT MANCHESTER-SHEFFIELD-WATH ELECTRIC RAILWAY | |
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| woodhead line | |
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THE ROUTE The main route ran from Manchester London Road (later Manchester Piccadilly ) over the Pennines, through the impressive Woodhead Tunnel to Penistone, where the Wath line split. The main line then proceeded through Sheffield Victoria Station and on to Rotherwood exchange sidings. The Wath line ran from Penistone to Wath Marshalling Yard in the heart of the South Yorkshire coalfields. Minor electrified branches off the main line ran to the locomotive depot at Reddish, Glossop (for local passenger trains), Dewsnap sidings (all at the Manchester end) and Tinsley Marshalling Yard (at the Sheffield end) ELECTRIFICATION Although planning started in the 1930's, depression and war intervened and the route was not completed until early 1955 (although the official opening was in 1954). The system was electrified at 1,500V DC, similar to the Dutch style of electrification that had also been used on the LNER's pre-war Newport-Shildon line and the post-war London Great Eastern suburban electrification. (This scheme had the advantage that Regenerative Braking could easily be employed to feed power from a descending train to an ascending train in the same block of line). Two classes of locomotive were built: EM1 (Class 76) Bo+Bo (the + signifiying that the bogies were articulated) mixed-traffic and EM2 (Class 77) Co-Co for express passenger. In 1965 the scheme was extended to take in the brand new Tinsley marshalling yard in Sheffield. Interestingly, the overhead line equipment on this section was designed to be easily convertible to 25kV AC electrification. CLOSURE Electric trans-Pennine passenger services ceased after just 16 years in 1970, partly due to the cost of providing an electrified link into Sheffield Midland station as Sheffield Victoria was slated for closure, and also ostensibly to free up train paths for freight. A local electric service remained at the Manchester end of the line. By 1981 freight traffic had declined so much that the route was closed; only the Manchester local passenger trains were left running with BR citing that the cost of replacing the out-of-date and non-standard equipment on the main section of the line was prohibitive. In 1986 the remaining equipment at the Manchester end of the line was modified to the by now standard 25kV AC, thus ending the use of 1,500V DC overhead electrification in Britain. RE-OPENING? In the early 21st century there have been several projects mooted to re-open the route, one as a non-electrified regional passenger route, and one as an electrified long-haul freight and passenger route, however none of these has yet got beyond the drawing board. |
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