The North Yorkshire Moors Railway is a historic heritage railway and our vital infrastructure only has a finite lifespan. To ensure we can run safely for future generations, we need to continuously invest in maintaining the many structures that carry the railway, alongside ongoing maintenance works to care for it and prolong its life.

Some of our bridges are over 150 years old and many were second-hand even before they were installed in their present locations. The metal structures are starting to show their age and renewal is essential to ensure we can keep running well into the future.

The Yorkshire’s Magnificent Journey project funded us to replace three of the vital bridges along the route - bridges 27, 24 and 25, all designed by Cass Hayward of Chepstow.  

Bridge 27 - completed in 2021

Image of Bridge 27 during installation

 Image showing corrosion on the steelwork.

Carrying the 180-year-old railway over the Eller Beck at Goathland Station, this 20 metre bridge is best recognised as the iconic track leading to Hogsmeade Station, where the young wizards embarked for Hogwarts in the Harry Potter movie, The Philosopher’s Stone.

The bridge was suffering corrosion to significant parts of its early steelwork. Although early bridge design often includes some tolerance that enables the use of heavier axle-load steam engines like we run today, there were still areas of concern. Structural assessments and reviews of its condition led to the conclusion that the bridge was past economic repair if it was to continue carrying heavy steam locomotives.

Cleveland Bridge was appointed to fabricate and install a new 84-tonne single span bridge structure. They also dismantled and removed the old bridge and earthworks and pre-cast concrete parts for the bridge as well as casting its new deck in situ.

You can watch a time-lapse video of the bridge replacement here:

Bridges 24 and 25 - completed in 2022

These two bridges both of which lie south of Goathland station, were the next to be replaced after bridge 27. Although some strengthening work had previously been undertaken on bridge 25, we assessed that more remedial work was required to ensure that both bridges could continue to be used by passenger trains hauled by heavy steam engines.

You can watch the video of the installation of bridge 24 here:

Our bridges are absolutely crucial for an operating railway and ensuring that future generations can enjoy this historic route. Your donations are vital to help us make this route sustainable and enable us to continue operating for the next 50 years.

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Your donation makes a vital difference to help our railway survive for future generations.

 

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