The Bristol and Gloucester Railway was a railway company opened in 1844 to run services between Bristol and Gloucester. It was built on the , but it was acquired in 1845 by the Midland Railway, which also acquired the Birmingham and Gloucester Railway at the same time.

Legal and practical difficulties meant that it was some time before through standard gauge trains could run on the line; that only became possible in 1854 with the conversion of most of the line to mixed gauge and the opening of the Tuffley Loop.

Even then the station at Gloucester was awkwardly sited, until in 1896 a through station was opened; it later became known as Gloucester Eastgate station.

The Tuffley Loop and Eastgate station were closed in 1975. Part of the original line near Bristol was closed in 1970, trains being diverted over the ex-Great Western Railway route through Filton. However, the remainder of the route is in service currently as part of the busy Bristol to Birmingham main line.

Earliest railways Gloucester and Cheltenham Railway

In 1809 the Gloucester and Cheltenham Railway was authorised by the Gloucester and Cheltenham Railway Act 1809 (49 Geo. 3. c. xxiii). In reality it was to be a horse-operated plateway. Cheltenham was growing in importance because of the supposedly health-giving properties of the waters, and houses for well-to-do residents were being built, requiring the bringing in of stone for the building work and for roads, and coal for the residents. There were good-quality quarries already in existence at Leckhampton, high above the town, and Forest of Dean coal was available at Gloucester, nine miles away, brought there on the River Severn and later by canal. The Gloucester and Cheltenham Railway was built to serve these needs, by connecting the docks at Gloucester (under construction) and the Leckhampton quarries, with Cheltenham. The was completed in 1811.

Although alternatively referred to as a railway, railroad, or tramway, it was in fact a horse-operated plateway of gauge. A steam locomotive was later tried out, but the experiment was a failure because the locomotive was too heavy for the tramplates and broke them.David Bick, The Gloucester & Cheltenham Tramroad and the Leckhampton Quarry Lines, Oakwood Press, Usk, second edition 1987,

Coal tramroads at Bristol

In June 1828 two companies were incorporated by act of Parliament to build tramways to bring coal from collieries at Shortwood, Parkfield and Coalpit Heath, to the north-east of Bristol, into Bristol itself. The acts were the (9 Geo. 4. c. xciii) and the Avon and Gloucestershire Railway Act 1828 (9 Geo. 4. c. xciv), incorporating the Bristol and Gloucestershire Railway, which was to terminate in Bristol at Cuckold's Pill on the Floating Harbour, and the Avon and Gloucestershire Railway, whose terminal was on the River Avon opposite Keynsham, from where river boats would continue the journey. The two lines were to make a junction north of Mangotsfield, near the later Mangotsfield North Junction.

The lines were made with cast iron fish-bellied edge rails on stone blocks, and had a track gauge of ; they were single lines worked by horses. The Avon and Gloucestershire Railway was opened in July 1832 together with the part of the Bristol and Gloucestershire Railway north of the point of junction. The south-western part of the Bristol line was opened on 6 August 1835.C G Maggs, The Bristol and Gloucester Railway and the Avon and Gloucestershire Railway, The Oakwood Press, Witney, second edition 1992, , pages 11–24E G Barnes, The Rise of the Midland Railway, George Allen and Unwin Limited, London, 1966, page 96 onwards

Great Western Railway at Bristol In 1835 the Great Western Railway was incorporated, to build a trunk railway from London to Bristol. The engineer was Isambard Kingdom Brunel and the line was to be built on the broad gauge and it would use locomotive power. The line was opened progressively, but the portion in Bristol was opened on 31 August 1840, and the line opened throughout from London to Bristol on 30 June 1841.

Birmingham and Gloucester Railway In the 1836 session of Parliament, interests in Birmingham were promoting the Birmingham and Gloucester Railway; if they could reach Gloucester, then waterborne transport from there to Bristol would give a connection between the two great cities, also giving access to the transatlantic shipping trade at Bristol. It obtained its authorising act of Parliament, the Birmingham and Gloucester Railway Act 1836 (6 & 7 Will. 4. c. xiv), on 22 April.Colin Maggs, The Birmingham Gloucester Line, Line One Publishing Limited, Cheltenham, 1986,

Cheltenham and Great Western Union Railway

Even before the Great Western Railway had been authorised, people in Cheltenham had determined to promote a line from Cheltenham through Gloucester and Stroud to join the planned Great Western Railway near Swindon; accordingly they submitted a bill for the Cheltenham and Great Western Union Railway in the 1836 session of Parliament. It was passed as the Cheltenham and Great Western Union Railway Act 1836 (6 & 7 Will. 4. c. lxxvii) on 21 June 1836.E T MacDermot, History of the Great Western Railway: volume I: 1833–1863, part 1, published by the Great Western Railway, London, 1927, page 162 onward

Between Gloucester and Cheltenham The proposed alignment of these two proposed lines was almost identical between Gloucester and Cheltenham. Moreover, both companies proposed to acquire the Gloucester and Cheltenham Railway; this was not in order to use its main line route, but because of the access it had acquired to Gloucester Docks.

The Gloucester and Cheltenham Railway was purchased for £35,000 by the Birmingham and Gloucester company, which had got its authorising act first, but by agreement the Cheltenham and Great Western Union Railway Act 1836 set up a sharing of the construction of the new main line between Gloucester and Cheltenham, with the B&GR building the Gloucester station and the the Cheltenham station, both companies being able to use both stations, and to share in the use of the tramroad. The Gloucester to Cheltenham main line was to be built in two-halves by the respective companies, each having running powers over the other half. It would be built on the standard gauge, but the could lay additional rails at its own expense to enable its broad gauge trains to operate.Barnes, page 117 onward

In November 1837 the reported that the condition of the money market was such that they were going to be unable to build all of their line in the foreseeable future, and that they proposed to concentrate on the Swindon end. The Birmingham and Gloucester Railway were alarmed by this as they relied on the to build part of the shared Gloucester to Cheltenham line. The needed an act of Parliament and the Birmingham company secured clauses enabling them to build the relevant portion themselves if the did not proceed with the construction in a timely way. This motivated the to alter its priorities and it let contracts for construction and acquired land at Gloucester for the station. (It had been agreed that the two companies would have separate stations there and at Cheltenham.)

Bristol and Gloucester Railway formed The development of railways in Great Britain was gaining momentum, and it soon appeared obvious that a line between Bristol and Gloucester was appropriate. An attempt to get authorisation in the 1838 session of Parliament was unsuccessful, but on 1 July 1839 the Bristol and Gloucester Railway was authorised, to take over and extend the old Bristol and Gloucestershire coal line from Westerleigh to a junction with the Cheltenham and Great Western Union Railway at Standish. The length of new line was to be about . Because continuity with the Birmingham and Gloucester Railway was foreseen, the track was to be standard gauge.MacDermot, volume I part 1, page 208 onwardColin G Maggs, Gloucestershire Railways, Halsgrove (publisher), Wellington, 2010, Authorised capital was £400,000.

The was now (in November 1839) in serious financial difficulty, and it indicated to the Birmingham and Gloucester Railway that it would be unable to build the agreed part of the line at Gloucester. The Birmingham and Gloucester company decided to go ahead and build this itself, but first it approached the newly authorised Bristol and Gloucester Company, and they agreed to merge and to purchase the together. A parliamentary bill was put forward, but negotiations between the two main companies led to disagreement, and the idea was dropped.

The Birmingham and Gloucester Railway went ahead alone with the construction to Gloucester, and it opened there on 4 November 1840.Vic Mitchell and Keith Smith, Gloucester to Bristol: Midland Main Lines, Middleton Press, Midhurst, 2004,

By the end of 1841 the had done nothing tangible to construct its own line north of Kemble, and under pressure from others who relied on it, it obtained an act of Parliament, the Cheltenham and Great Western Union Railway Act 1842 (5 & 6 Vict. c. xxviii), authorising sale or lease of its undertaking to any of the neighbouring lines, and extension of time for construction and additional capital, requesting the Birmingham and Gloucester Railway to lay broad gauge rails between Gloucester and Cheltenham (at the expense of the ), and enabling the Bristol and Gloucester Railway to make the railway between Standish and Gloucester itself, as a standard gauge line, subject to the buying that back later if they wished. Negotiations were quickly opened with the Great Western Railway to acquire the 's line, and after some delay, this was agreed in January 1843. The resources of the would obviously enable them to complete the construction expeditiously.

The Bristol and Gloucester now saw that they were to run between the broad gauge at Bristol, and the broad gauge (ex-) at Standish and Gloucester. Isambard Kingdom Brunel had become the company's engineer (on 12 September 1839), and in April 1843, the Bristol and Gloucester decided to make its line on the broad gauge instead. A connection to the station at Bristol would be made, and the would complete the Standish to Gloucester line within a year and give the Bristol and Gloucester running powers to Cheltenham. The Bristol and Gloucester was to be given access to the stations at all these places. The arrangement was to last for 20 years for a rent of £18,500, rising by £1,000 after five years.

Barnes suggests that the decision was coerced. It is true that if the Bristol and Gloucester Railway had built its line on the narrow gauge it would have been isolated, and the could by-pass it by routeing broad gauge traffic through Swindon and the line. Nevertheless, the saving in capital on building the Bristol station and other facilities, as well as the avoidance of living in proximity to a hostile , were powerful in persuading the Bristol company to select this option; and Brunel had explained that transshipment of goods at the break of gauge to the Birmingham and Gloucester Railway would be simple: "a very simple arrangement may effect the transfer of the entire load of goods from the waggon of one Company to that of the other". Passenger transfer would be even simpler: passengers would "merely step from one carriage into the other in the same station and on the same platform".Quoted in MacDermot, volume I part 1, page 211