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The Last Train

The Last Train

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David H Thomas

David H Thomas


Premium (Pro), Sandwich, Kent, EUROPE

The Last Train

This is not the best of photographs but has a lot of personal significance. Saturday 9th March (2024) probably the last passenger train (and possibly one of the last train of any type) travelled along the Cwm Bargoed branch line in South Wales.

The line opened in 1876 - the last scheduled passenger train was in June 1964. I was carried on that last scheduled train as an unborn baby.

Since then the line continued to serve the Dowlais steelworks, and the opencast mines that operated at the head of the valley. The last of these mines - Ffros-y-Fran - closed last year, its last major customer, the steel works at Port Talbot due to close this month. So the future of this line is now very uncertain.

The trains were a figural part of my growing up. We lived adjacent to the line and I recall as a child our house literally shaking as the heavy coal trains would pass full throttle to tackle the fierce 1 in 40 gradient of the line, the steepest in Wales.

The landscape has changed a lot since I grew up here. The trackside is now heavily wooded, giving few clear lines of sight for photographs. The mines that lined the track have gone, replaced by careful landscaping.

The photo it taken as the train passes the site of the Taff Merthyr Colliery halt, built to take miners to and from the mine that would have been in the valley below the track. I put here a link to how this area used to look - possibility in the 1950's: https://www.treharrisdistrict.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/6938137058_d06e31d5ee_o.jpg

The two locomotives on this train (one at the back) are working hard to draw the thirteen carriage train. Inevitably for Wales in March it is raining, but we got a cheerful wave and toot on the horn from the driver.

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Mots clés

europe united kingdom & ireland wales industry & technology railway subjects world

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Information

Sections Subjects: Railway Voyage: Wales
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Exif

APN DSLR-A700
Objectif 18-250mm F3.5-6.3
Ouverture 6.3
Temps de pose 1/125
Focale 75.0 mm
ISO 400

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