The Rhymney Railway (RR) was a railway company in South Wales, founded to transport minerals and materials to and from collieries and ironworks in the Rhymney Valley of South Wales, and to docks in Cardiff. It opened a main line in 1858, and a limited passenger service was operated in addition.
The first line was dependent on the cooperation of the parallel Taff Vale Railway (TVR) for part of the transit, and this relationship was uneasy; the Rhymney Railway built an independent line to Cardiff in 1871. Better relations were created with the London and North Western Railway (LNWR), and later the Great Western Railway (GWR), and two important joint lines with the GWR were built: the Taff Bargoed line (1876) and the Quakers Yard and Merthyr Joint line (1882).
Although the Rhymney Railway network was never large, it was remarkably profitable, and paid excellent dividends for most of its life. Dependent on mineral traffic for its own success, it declined in the 1970s, but the main line from to remains in heavy use as a local passenger line.
Before the Rhymney Railway
The head of the River Taff valley, at Dowlais, Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney, was the scene of huge expansion of industrial iron founding from 1760 onwards. All the ingredients were close at hand: iron ore, coal, timber and limestone. One particular resource needed to be provided, and that was transport to market. For some time this was done on the backs of animals; the road system was extremely poor in the area, and the provision of a turnpike helped, but pack animal transport was nonetheless expensive.
Canals were built: the Glamorganshire Canal and the Monmouthshire Canal. Tramroads were already in existence to bring the minerals to the ironworks, and now they could be built to convey the finished product to the canals. The authorising acts of Parliament for the canals included clauses empowering pit owners to build a connecting tramroad to the canals if the canal company failed to do so, provided the pit was within a certain distance of the canal. Compensation was to be paid to landowners over whose property the tramroad might pass, but no further legislative authority needed to be sought.
In 1800 the iron-founding industry was established at Rhymney, and this encouraged the inclusion in the Monmouthshire Canal Navigation Act 1802 (42 Geo. 3. c. cxv) of a tramroad connecting Nantybwch to the Union Iron Works in Rhymney. There were soon several ironworks in the immediate area, and a small network of tramroads developed to serve them. In 1815 the Bryn Oer Tramway was opened, connecting the ironworks northward to Trefil and on over the hills to Talybont, where a connection was made with the Abergavenny Canal.
In 1825 the Rumney Railway was incorporated. It is usually referred to as the "Old Rumney Railway", and had no organisational connection with the later Rhymney Railway. It opened about 1826, running from Rhymney to Pye Corner, on the margin of modern Newport, where it joined the Sirhowy tramroad.
The conveyance of the output of the ironworks at Merthyr and Dowlais remained a serious issue, and eventually, in 1840, the Taff Vale Railway was built as the solution to the problem. In that year and the following year the line was completed between Merthyr and Cardiff Docks. Then in 1847 the Newport, Abergavenny and Hereford Railway opened its Taff Vale Extension Railway, a long route from Pontypool in the east to Crumlin in the west at first, then extended into the Aberdare valley intersecting many valleys and connecting with many railways.
In 1850 the South Wales Railway opened part of its main line, between Chepstow and Swansea. This was built to the broad gauge and was intended as a trunk railway, connecting the network of the Great Western Railway with Milford Haven, and running through Cardiff.
Rhymney Railway proposed The Taff Vale Railway had a branch line to Llancaiach, where there were productive collieries. This spate of railway building in South Wales, mirroring that in England, encouraged thoughts of a railway serving the Rhymney ironworks. An agreement was reached with the Taff Vale Railway that it would convey the Rhymney traffic over its line from Llancaiach. Separate dock facilities at Cardiff would be provided, at what became Bute East Dock.
A bill for the Rhymney Railway went to Parliament in the 1854 session and received royal assent on 24 July 1854 as the (17 & 18 Vict. c. cxciii). It was to build a railway from the Rhymney ironworks, down the west bank of the River Rhymney, to a junction with the Newport, Abergavenny and Hereford Railway near Hengoed. This main line was to be long, and there was also to be a branch from Pont Aberbargoed up the Bargoed Rhymney valley to Ysgwyddgwyn. Share capital was to be £100,000.
The maritime destination which the line was to reach was described in the act as "the ports [plural] of the Bristol Channel" and the armorial bearing of the company included the coats of arms both of Cardiff and Newport, although no reason has been recorded for the Newport connection.
The connection to the NA&HR at Llancaiach was refused on account of objection by that company, so the Rhymney Railway was without the route to the docks that it sought. It returned to Parliament the following year. It almost doubled its extent by obtaining the (18 & 19 Vict. c. cx), giving sanction to build on from Hengoed to Walnut Tree Bridge, joining the Taff Vale Railway near Taff's Well, a line of , with a branch to Caerphilly and a branch connecting north to west on to the NA&HR at Hengoed. In addition there was a branch from Crockherbtown Junction, immediately north of the present Cardiff Queen Street station, to the Bute Dock. Running powers were granted over the Taff Vale Railway between Walnut Tree Bridge and Crockherbtown Junction.
The authorised share capital was more than doubled, an additional £130,000 being authorised by the Rhymney Railway Amendment Act 1855.
The engineer for the works was Joseph Cubitt; the Earl of Bute was the owner of the Bute Docks and his trustees built the branch to the docks, leasing it to the Rhymney Railway at 4% on capital of £67,633.
Construction proceeded but the cost of the work proved to be considerably underestimated, and the (20 & 21 Vict. c. cxl) was obtained to increase the share capital to £300,000. The Bute Docks branch was the first to be completed, being ready in September 1857, although the Rhymney Railway itself was not yet in a position to make use of it; some Taff Vale Railway traffic passed over it.
The approach to the junction with the TVR at Walnut Tree involved excavating a cutting to the extent of of earth.
Opening of the line Thursday 25 February 1858 was fixed for the opening: 24 wagons loaded with 150 tons of Rhymney iron formed the first train, followed by a second of 40 mineral wagons containing 240 tons. The line was single-track throughout.
Passenger traffic started on 31 March 1858. There were two trains each way daily, taking 90 minutes for the from Cardiff to Rhymney. Three weeks later the service was augmented to three passenger trains each way daily. The Cardiff station was at ,The site is now occupied by the Knox Road multi-storey car park. and the trains ran non-stop from there to ; from there the stations were , , , , , and . At Hengoed the trains made connections with the Taff Vale Extension line trains.
The Caerphilly branch was opened in 1859.
From the outset the company was in difficulty. The capital expenditure had far exceeded the budget for the work, and interest and other prior charges exceeded the net income, particularly as mineral traffic did not develop as rapidly as had been hoped. Friction developed with the Taff Vale Railway from an early date, and the Rhymney's dependency on the TVR for working its traffic over the TVR main line left the Rhymney vulnerable.
The Bute Trustees approached the Rhymney company with an offer: to lease the undertaking for 250 years retrospectively from 1 January 1860; to deal with all prior charges and in addition pay 5% on the ordinary stock from the beginning of 1865, rising gradually to that figure in the meantime. This offer was remarkably advantageous to the Rhymney's proprietors, but in 1860 and again in 1861 Parliament refused to sanction the arrangement, and the Rhymney Railway was left to resolve its problems alone.
Financial strains Frustrated with the difficulties of operating over the TVR into Cardiff, the Rhymney Railway submitted a bill in the 1861 session to build an independent line between Walnut Tree and Cardiff, but this failed in committee, although a further extension of authorised capital was permitted. The Bute Trustees evidently wished the Rhymney Railway to succeed, for they now agreed "in consideration of the capitalisation of the rent due to them" that dividends and other interest payments should have precedence over their own financial claims. The Bute Trustees were already giving the Rhymney company considerably better terms for using the dock than they had granted to the Taff Vale Railway; this was a sore point with the TVR company.
From 1862 the profitability of the company eased a little and a modest dividend was paid. However the operating difficulties over the TVR section only became worse; and in 1863 the Rhymney Railway submitted a bill to make the direct line to Cardiff from Caerphilly. On 25 July 1864, the (27 & 28 Vict. c. cclxiv) was passed, with further capital of £210,000. The running powers between Walnut Tree and Cardiff would be extinguished, except for traffic to the new docks at Penarth, from the date of opening of the direct line. A separate act of Parliament on the same day, the Brecon and Merthyr Railway (No. 1) Act 1864 (27 & 28 Vict. c. cclxv) gave permission for a short stub to make a connection east of Caerphilly with the Brecon and Merthyr Railway's Caerphilly branch.
In fact the construction of the line proved very difficult at a time when money was becoming very scarce; as well as labour problems the Caerphilly Tunnel gave exceptional difficulty. At in length it was a hard drive, and an unknown spring in the middle during construction proved difficult to get under control.The spring gave of water annually for locomotive purposes in later years.
Brecon and Merthyr Railway
In 1859 the Brecon and Merthyr Tydfil Junction Railway (B&MR) had been incorporated, to build a line from the north at Brecon, into Merthyr Tydfil, Dowlais and Rhymney. At first this appeared to complement the Rhymney Railway's activity, but the mood gradually changed and in 1863 the B&MR acquired the Old Rumney Railway, with the obvious intention of reaching the docks at Newport and competing directly with the Rhymney Railway. In self-defence the Rhymney Railway, seeing this coming, had obtained powers in the (24 & 25 Vict. c. cxliv) for a Bargoed Rhymney branch line, covering pretty much the same terrain as the B&MR intentions.
The wasteful competition was abated when the two companies agreed reluctantly to cooperate. The Rhymney Railway built the southern part of the route from Bargoed to Deri Junction, there to form an end-on junction with the B&MR line. (The location was later the site of station.) The Rhymney's part of the line opened in March 1864. The B&MR was approaching from the north, and was ready for traffic in 1865, but legal complications prevented actual opening until March 1868.
Mutual running powers were agreed, in the Rhymney's case as far as Pantywaun Junction, above Deri (where the Dowlais Ironworks railway system made a junction with the B&MR line), although in practice they were only used as far as Fochriw Colliery.
The Deri branch of the Rhymney Railway was doubled in 1909.
London and North Western Railway