East Kent Light Railway
The East Kent Light Railway was part of the Colonel Stephens group of cheaply built rural light railways in England. Holman Fred Stephens was engineer from its inception, subsequently becoming director and manager. The line ran from Shepherdswell to Wingham (Canterbury Road) Station with a branch from Eastry through Poison Cross to Richborough Port. Built primarily for colliery traffic within the Kent Coalfields, the line was built with many spurs and branches to serve the mines, with cancelled plans to construct extensions to several others. The success of Tilmanstone colliery allowed the main line of the railway to continue operation until 1986. A remainder of the line became the East Kent Railway, a heritage railway, in 1987. History Pre WW1 The East Kent Light Railways (official title) was originally conceived before the First World War as a network of lines in East Kent linking at least nine proposed collieries in the newly discovered Kent coalfield to a new coal port at Richborough Port. In order to exploit the coal measures under the rural Kent countryside collierries needed to be built and then shafts sunk, and the use of the rural roads to achieve this caused great damage, so the railways offered a potential benefit during the construction phase, though clearly the long term benefit would be in taking the produced coal to markets. It was originally called the East Kent Mineral (Light) Railways when first proposed in 1909. The progenitors were Christopher Solley of "Sandwich Haven Wharves Syndicate" at Sandwich, who dreamed of his town becoming a great port again, Arthur Burr of "Kent Coal Concessions Ltd", the original promoter of the Kent coalfield. and the "St Augustines Links Ltd", which was meant to have laid out a golf course. The proposed route of the East Kent Mineral Railway was announced in 1910, as follows : Railway 1 of 10.25 miles was from Sheperdswell to the banks of the River Stour on the Stonar side of Sandwich via Tilmanstone and Woodnesborough collieries. Railway 2 of 11.5 miles from Canterbury West via Sturry, Fordwich, Wickham, Ingham, Wingham (Colliery), Staple, Ash and then to join Railway No 1 near Sandwich. Railway 3 of 0.5 mile was a branch to joint Railways 1 and 2 near Eastry. Railway 4 of 2.5 miles was a branch from Railway 1 to Guilford colliery linking it with Tilmanstone. Railway 5 of 4 miles was a branch from Railway 1 at Eythorne to the brickfields near Northbourne Rectory Railway 6 of 2 miles was a branch from Railway 2 to an area between Goodnestone and Sandwich where test borings had shown coal Railways 7 to 10 were minor loops and branches 'to facilitate traffic on the principal lines near Wingham, Eythorne, Sandwich and Sheperdswell' In October 1910 it was announced that the line from Canterbury to Wingham would not be built due to 'serious objections from the War Office and the Ecclesiastical Commissioners'. Plans for Railway No 3 and the Eastern part of Railway No 5 were