Wildlife Warriors Dry Stone Walling Demonstration Session

 

Saturday 8th June at 2:00pm is the next date for our very successful Wildlife Warriors ecology based activity sessions.

 

Charnwood Borough Council's Environment Officer Tim Adkin will be with us to show the ancient art of dry stone walling. Those attending the event will all be able to try their hand at restoring one of the dry stone walls that runs alongside the Nunckley Trail.

 

We have had a lot of interest for this event from adults as well as children, so we have decided to open up the event to people of all ages.

 

The Nunckley Trail is wheel chair friend and the dry stone walling area is directly alongside, so even if your disability would normally prevent you for trying out something like this, please come along and give it a go.

 

For H&S reasons children under the age of 14 must be accompanied by a parent/carer.

 

Mountsorrel Bond Lane to Ruddington and Beyond...

The Mountsorrel Railway is of course connected to the Great Central Railway. Now after many years of planning, the GCR has been able to make a start on reconnecting to the Great Central Railway Nottingham - crossing the Midland Main Line at Loughborough on the way. 

 

The GCR is entering a partnership with Network Rail to build a bridge over the Midland Main Line at Loughborough. Design work is underway and the new structure is expected to be in place by mid 2015.

 

When the project is complete it will create an 18 mile long main line railway with a connection to the national network at Loughborough. Who knows, in the future it may be possible to catch a train from Mountsorrel halt to eventually reach London St Pancreas and beyond!

 

For more information see www.gcrailway.co.uk/unify

Project Progress Update

Project volunteers have been hard at work both with various tasks on the track to bring it up to passenger train standards and also to complete the Nunckley Trail foot path that runs next to the line.

Young Ecology Group volunteers bring another bag of chippings for the Nunckley Trail

Despite track laying itself being completed in February, there is still much to do before passenger trains can run. The team have been shovelling ballast from the sleeper tops to allow them to dry out, adjusting track keys, correcting track alignment issues, installing check chairs to allow a third rail to be fitted on the tight curves either side of Swithland Lane. The check rail is important to help limit track wear that would otherwise occur on the tight curves.

Project volunteers fit check chairs to the tight curves on the Mountsorrel Railway.

Over the coming weeks we will be installing a buffer stop and a sand drag at the end of the line and preparing for a tamper to visit, which will line and pack the track.
 

The Nunckley Trail is fast approaching completion. The half mile long foot path that runs alongside the railway for some of it's length, will be open to the public on the days that the railway is operating.

A test passenger train with three BR mark 1 coaches passes alongside the Nunckley Trail.

The trail has been fenced from the railway thanks to a grant from Toyota at Derby which paid for the materials. The path surface has been covered with many hundreds of wheel barrows of wood chippings, which have been donated by various local tree surgery organisations.

Toyota of Derby have kindly sponsored 200m of fencing materials for the Nunckley Trail

The trail winds it's way through the woodland alongside the line taking in both ecological and historical areas of interest. Loughborough University have kindly sponsored the creation of 16 information boards which will be erected at points of interest alongside the trail nearer to completion.

The trail has a picnic area, rest benches and is wheelchair friendly. Sadly the first of our benches was stolen before it could be installed. The rest have been very securely fixed into the ground!
 

Project volunteer Carole Armour tries out the Nunckley Trail

Alongside the trail our Ecology Group volunteers hope to create a sensory area and we are working with Leicestershire County Council to create a wild flower meadow.

Volunteers working on the Nunckley Trail

With the help of Railway Vehicle Preservation volunteers based at the Great Central Railway, we are  restoring the original junction gate that used to mark the boundary between the Mountsorrel Railway and the Great Central Railway. Only the metal work from the original gate could be saved but great care has been taken to restore the new timbers to match the originals.

The 16 feet long restored junction gate that will soon span the branch line track at the junction with the GCR.

  

We still need new volunteers to help with either the completion of the railway or the ecology work we are doing. If you would like to get involved, even if only on an occasional basis, please send an email to the project leader Steve Cramp.

Steam Trains on the Mountsorrel Railway

April 27^th and 28^th saw demonstration steam trains run along the Mountsorrel Railway as part of a GCR gala for the first time.

Port of Par tank engines Alfred and Judy, on loan to the GCR from the Bodmin and Wenford Railway, spent the two days running trains along the line with the three restored Mountsorrel Granite Company wagons.

 As restoration of the line is not quite complete, trains only operated over the first ¼ of a mile to the farm track accommodation crossing. The steep 1:61 gradients on the branch line certainly put the little engines to the test as you can see on the Youtube film below!