Sheffield Main Line Services

by Bob Pixton

Published 13 October 2020
A volume of a new and exciting series illustrating one of the country's best loved railway companies in the days of steam.It consists of maps, charts, timetables and photographs are used to give the reader a sense of a journey in time along the various lines that the GCR controlled. One main theme is passenger traffic via Penistone, down to Sheffield and east to Retford.

The movement of coal is another of the dominant themes in South Yorkshire.centred on Wath marshalling yard, wagons went west, up the notorious Worsborough incline to Penistone and then via the Woodhead tunnel, Mottram Yard to Godley on their journey enroute for Liverpool and Manchester. Another stream of wagons was east passing, the mecca for all GC enthusiast, Mexborough, and onto the Doncaster avoiding line then east to cross the River Trent at Keadby. Lines from the Coal Capital' of South Yorkshire, Barnsley to Sheffield, Wakefield and Penistone are looked at.

With the trilogy written by G. Dow's approaching its 60th birthday, it is timely that an illustrated history has been produced to bring to life some of the hidden recesses of this great company.

Joint Operations Around Manchester and in South Yorkshire, is the latest volume in a series of books by Robert Pixton, covering the lines across the Pennines, especially those of the former Great Central.

This volume looks at the joint lines that once served the area from Lancashire to Yorkshire, serving heavy industry and providing an intense passenger service in the 19th and early 20th centuries.

The lines and services declined on many of the branch lines and some of the cross country lines by the 1950s, heralding their final demise in the early 1960s, as a result of the Reshaping of British Railways.

Today there are still a few important corridors crossing this area of the north of England, which have become increasingly important in recent times as roads become more congested and bus services are cut back.