Snowdon Mountain Railway

Railway Station in Llanberis

The Snowdon Mountain Railway begins at the station , which is located in Llanberis near the station of the Lanberis Priozernaya Railway and has two platforms. Immediately after the station, the path takes a steep climb with a slope of 1: 5.5, runs for some time among the village blocks and gardens, and then, turning to the southeast, it approaches the first station - “ Waterfall station ”. The station was built to give tourists a convenient approach to the waterfall , which is located near the railway, but now it is closed, although the platform and station building are in order. Behind the Vodopadnaya line runs across the bridge over the river, which marks the beginning of its mountain section itself, where the slopes averaged 1: 7.86 ^[1] . Further, the path rises to the Hebron junction , named after the nearby Hebron Chapel . During the construction, it was assumed that freight trains loaded with local agricultural products would run from this place to Llanberis. From Hebron the line goes to the Halfway junction , marking about half the way to the summit and located at an altitude of 500 m above sea ​​level . All this time, the path has a hillside east of itself, rising up, and to the west the same, but going down. Near the exit, if you go along the footpath along the railway track, the Halfway Cafe is located.

After the “Intermediate”, after a while, the Rocky Valley Halt platform lies among giant boulders , after which the line goes to the mountain range and follows along it to the Clogwyn junction , overlooking the Llanberis pass and the Clogwyn Du'r Arddu cliffs , which have always attracted climbers since 1798 . Further, the path climbs to the terminal station " Summit ", located at an altitude of 1065 m above sea level, which is 20 m below the very top of Snowdon - 1085 m. Next to the station platforms is the tourist complex " Hafod Eryri " equipped with the eponymous and very popular cafe ^[2] . From here, a mountain trail leads to the very top, and if you go down to Lake Llyn Quellin , you can get to the Snowdon Ranger station of the Welsh Upland Railway .

In 1869, the London and Northwest Railway connected Llanberis with Carnarvon , which greatly increased the number of people wishing to climb the highest mountain in Great Britain, Snowdon . This circumstance, however, did not initially lead to any action, as the local landowner George William Duff Assheton Smith believed that the railway could spoil the landscape. By 1894 his opinion had changed, and on November 16, Snowdon Mountain Tramroad and Hotels Co. was formed Ltd ”, which allowed to extend the railway line to the top. In December of that year, Essheton-Smith's daughter - Enid - took off the first shovel of turf at the site of the future station in Llanberis ^[3] .

The winter of 1894-1895 was harsh by local standards, but by the summer of 1895 the laying of the track had been completed. Bridges were built longer between Llanberis and waterfalls - they were completed by January 1896 . Then the first train climbed to the top, but the installation of signals and fences continued and the line was completely ready for Easter that year. On March 27, Colonel Francis Marindin of the Trade Commission conducted an unofficial inspection of the road, because an official one was impossible - since the line was built on private land, there was no special Parliamentary Act on it. Marindin advised to stop the movement in a strong wind. On April 4, during a test drive, a train from a steam locomotive and two wagons crashed into a boulder that rolled onto the rails and went off the rails . The accident occurred on the way to the top, the workers were able to put the cars on the rails and the train continued on. On April 6, the opening of the road took place and on that day a new accident occurred: now the locomotive went off the rail and tipped over from the slope down, the car brakes worked, but one of the passengers who unsuccessfully jumped out of the car died ^[4] . After that, the line was closed, an investigation was conducted, which showed that lighter cars should be used, and brake grips should be installed along the gear rack. In April 1897 the road was reopened and since then there have been no accidents on the road.

The road during construction was equipped with a gear rack for the Abta system, and in Switzerland , tank engines adapted for working with such a rail were purchased at Schweizerische Lokomotiv- und Maschinenfabrik. In 1895-1896, the Swiss built 5 locomotives for the line, the first of which received the abbreviation of the name of the landowner's wife as a name: “LADAS” - L aura A lice D uff A ssheton S mith ( Laura Alice Daf Escheton Smith ), and the second - his daughter's name: "Enid" ^[3] . The “LADAS” steam locomotive at number 1 was precisely the locomotive that crashed on the opening day, while the remaining locomotives continued to regularly deliver passengers to the summit of Snowdon until World War II . In 1922 - 1923, they added three more tank locomotives made by the same Swiss factory, and in 1935 a cafe was built near the top of the station ^[5] . When the shortage of coal related to wartime savings began, the road was temporarily closed.

The movement resumed in 1946 , but due to the continuing shortage of coal, locomotives tried to heat used army boots . In 1962, they closed the regular gauge line from Carnarvon to Llanberis for passenger trains, but this did not reduce the influx of tourists to either Snowdon or the Snowdon Railway. Since 1986, the line began to buy diesel locomotives ^[1] , and since 1995, auto trailers . In 2006, the old cafe on the top was dismantled and in June 2009 a new one was opened in its place ^[5] . All the time allotted for construction, only working trains went to the terminal station, for the passengers the Kloguin station became the terminal.

Passenger traffic along the Snowdon Road is carried out seasonally: from May to October ^[6] , which is associated with strong winds that rise in the winter, and periodically occurring snow drifts . The wagons are not attached to the locomotive, but rest on its front buffer ^[4] so that when lifting a steam locomotive or locomotive pushes the car up, and when lowering it restrains its movement down. The trip takes 2½ hours if the passenger travels to the terminal "Summit" station (including 30 minutes at a cafe), 2 hours to Kloguin, or 1½ hours if the "Rocky Valley" platform becomes the terminal. At this time, the descent also enters back to Llanberis ^[6] . Tickets should be booked ahead of time, due to the obvious limited seating in the cars ^[6] . The road participates in the Wales Great Narrow Gauges marketing program.

• Patrick Whitehouse, John Snell . Narrow Gauge Railways of the British Isles. - David & Charles, 1994 .-- ISBN C-7153-0196-9.
• Keith Turner . The way to the stars - the story of the Snowdon Mountain Railway. - Llanrwst: Gwasg Carreg Gwalch, 2005 .-- ISBN 0-86381-954-0 .