Strathspey Railway (preserved)


The Strathspey Railway in Badenoch and Strathspey, Highland, Scotland, operates a heritage railway from Aviemore to Broomhill, Highland via Boat of Garten, part of the former Inverness and Perth Junction Railway which linked Aviemore with Forres. It is one of only a handful of primary/secondary main lines to be preserved in Britain today.

The route

The Strathspey Railway operates from platform 3 of Network Rail's Aviemore railway station. Until 1998 the railway's southern terminus was Aviemore Speyside about 300 yards further north. Aviemore Speyside is no longer in regular use, although its platform has been retained as a fallback in case of problems with access to the Network Rail station. Coaling of the steam locomotives is carried out at a facility constructed in 2014 on the site of the former Aviemore Speyside station building. Its signal box, which was formerly at Garve West and transported from there in 1986, was retained when the station itself shut. New features are gradually being brought into service at the Aviemore site controlled using traditional British Railways mechanical semaphore signalling.
From Aviemore, the line passes the four road locomotive shed which was constructed by the Highland Railway in 1898. The original purpose of the shed was to house locomotives for the lines to Perth and Inverness. It was common for original Highland Railway engines to be allocated to the shed and in London, Midland and Scottish Railway days it housed Stanier Black Fives, Pickersgill Bogies, Caley 439 tanks, Caley 812 classes, and Fairburn tanks. In British Railways days the shed was allocated the shed code '60B'. These days the engines that are in traffic on the Strathspey Railway still bear the 60B shedplate on their smokebox. There is also a carriage maintenance shed which was erected and opened for use in 2005; this shed allows the railway's volunteers and staff to work on its fleet of coaches indoors. On the opposite side of the line is a three road carriage storage shed erected and opened in 2011; this allows the coaches to be stored under cover and protected from the weather.
The former engine crew hostel, called Spey Lodge, stands just to the north. This building was erected by the LMS during the Second World War to provide railway crews with a safe and cheap option for accommodation whilst rostered to work locally. The British Railways Staff Association For Scotland then took it on to provide holiday accommodation for railway staff and their families. It was saved by the Strathspey Railway Company during the 1970s and gradually the facilities have been upgraded by volunteers. Spey Lodge now fulfils its original role again, providing hostel accommodation for engine crews and other volunteers working on the railway.
After Spey Lodge, the railway passes the site of the new Aviemore Hospital then crosses Dalfaber level crossing, an Automatic Open Crossing, Locally Monitored. This level crossing was not originally part of the railway, but was installed after the development of the Dalfaber Estate in the 1980s. After crossing the road and passing the adjacent Cairngorm Brewery the line climbs through Granish Moor. This heather moor affords views of Cairngorm Mountain and the line runs parallel to the Speyside Way, a popular walking and cycling route. Once into the forest at the north end of the moor, the line descends past Boat of Garten golf course and into the village of Boat of Garten itself.

Boat of Garten

The extensive Boat of Garten station features its original buildings, dating from 1904 by the architect William Roberts and is a category B listed building.. The modest station building houses a booking hall and ticket office/shop plus toilets and the waiting room which still has its open fire. A recent addition is a coffee shop in the old gas house on platform 1. It was originally a parallel junction between the Highland Railway's main line from Perth to Forres and the Great North of Scotland Railway branch to Craigellachie - this was the original Strathspey Railway, the company being a subsidiary of the GNSR. Today there are two passenger platforms and the yard stores the majority of the SR's out of use rolling stock.
Boat of Garten also has the railway's only water column where the locomotives stop to take water on their way north through the station. There are two signal boxes, Boat of Garten North and Boat of Garten South and signalling uses traditional British Railways mechanical semaphore signalling; it is the crossing point on the line when there are two trains running. Both single track sections are currently worked by staff and ticket with the section from Boat of Garten South to Aviemore Speyside about to be converted to Electric Key Token working.
Most of what visitors to the railway see today is original from the days of British Railways. The main layout of the station has not been altered significantly, with the exception of the extensive yard behind the signal box. The turnout that formerly allowed access to the yard without having to access the headshunt was removed before the line closed and there are no plans to re-install it. A new storage shed was built over the first three tracks of the yard in 2018-2019 to provide additional covered accommodation.
Leaving Boat of Garten, trains cross the road on the new single track box-girder bridge and pass the site of the original GNSR engine shed; long demolished, it is now the site of a permanent way depot. The track had been lifted and structures demolished by British Rail after closure of the line in the 1960s. The railway now passes through mainly farmland following the River Spey on the re-laid track, which was mostly recovered from Kincardine power station in Fife in the 1990s. The tracks to Craigellachie and Grantown had originally left the station extending in a double track formation as far as Croftnahaven, where the GNSR line turned sharply south east and crossed the River Spey. This arrangement was adopted because a signal box for a junction here was deemed too expensive.

Broomhill

The line reaches its current terminus at Broomhill, in countryside roughly halfway between the villages of Nethy Bridge and Dulnain Bridge. The replica station building has been reconstructed on the foundations of the original. The run-round loop is beyond the station. It is anticipated that this will be removed when the extension to Grantown is complete. Broomhill was used as the station for Glenbogle, in the BBC series "Monarch of the Glen".

Future extension

In July 2006, the Scottish Executive made a firm commitment to re-aligning the A95 at Gaich, near Grantown. This move would allow the extension of the SR to Grantown along the original Highland Railway line to Dava and Forres. It is not now intended to reconstruct the former Grantown-on-Spey West railway station, now in an industrial estate; instead it is proposed to construct a new three platform terminus on a greenfield site about 3/4 track-mile further north. Track that was lifted from the Stirling to Alloa railway when it was relaid for a new passenger service has been donated to this project.
The BBC reported that the £2.9m road scheme would involve the rail line going under the A95. The then Transport Minister, Tavish Scott, said the project would be ready for construction by 2008/9 and funding had been allocated for 2009/10. Former Strathspey MP, Danny Alexander, speculated that the proposed rail link between Aviemore and Grantown would be good for tourism.
By May 2007 the trackbed had been cleared north of the Broomhill loop as far as the bridge over the River Dulnain. New fencing, mileposts and drainage works were progressing and it was hoped for track laying to start later in 2008. Travelling by road along the A95 from Grantown towards Aviemore, new fencing marking the new track alignment could be seen.
In October 2008, it was announced that the steelwork of the former Merry Street Bridge in Motherwell had been donated to the railway by Network Rail. In February 2014, the Strathspey Railway used this steelwork to replace the missing bridge over the River Dulnain. The bridge was installed, with the railway working with Colas Rail, who provided one of the few rail cranes in the UK capable of lifting the bridge into position. Following the installation, track has been laid across the bridge to the north side of the River Dulnain. No further construction work on the extension can be carried out until the Scottish Government grants the appropriate Statutory Order. Because the entire extension lies within the Cairngorm National Park, the formal application has had to be delayed so that additional wildlfe and environmental studies can be undertaken.
However, Transport Scotland since notified the railway that the project has been reevaluated in late 2008 and was now estimated to cost £5.3 million, leading Transport Scotland to consider the extension project too expensive to pursue. The railway was faced with raising £1 million by 31 December 2009, to fund construction of a planned tunnel on the extension, but even if the funds were raised, construction was not guaranteed to occur. In June 2016, the entire project, including the re-aligned A95 and new bridge at Gaich, track and new station, was estimated at £13.5M
Management for building the extension is being undertaken by The Strathspey Railway Charitable Trust. All the various fundraising efforts are co-ordinated by the SRCT, including a charitable appeal. They also manage the negotiations with the various landowners and public bodies required to push the line through to Grantown-on-Spey.

Strathspey Railway Association

The role of the Strathspey Railway Association is to provide funding and volunteers to run the Strathspey Railway. It is the biggest shareholder of the Strathspey Railway Company. Members fund various projects on the railway through an annual subscription and donations. A quarterly publication, "The Strathspey Express", is published by the Association to give members regular updates from the railway as well as articles of general railway interest.
Most of the people who work on the railway are volunteers belonging to the Association. Spey Lodge is managed by a sub-group of the Association to provide accommodation for volunteers.

Locomotives and rolling stock

Steam locomotives

Stations