Starting Point - Shildon Station, 6 mile round trip.
Above - Display panel at Darlington station showing Locomotion, the Brusselton Incline and Skerne Bridge on the Stockton and Darlington Railway.
Continuing from my visit to the historic buildings around the Locomotion museum in Shildon. I did another walk in the town to visit a couple of the early railway routes of the Stockton and Darlington Railway that used rope worked inclines to cross hills to the west of the town. These were later abandoned when a tunnel was built to allow steam locomotives to work through to Bishop Auckland and beyond. The tunnel is still in use by trains on the Bishop Auckland branch.
Below - Next to Shildon station are the coal drops. I previously mentioned these on the tour of buildings around Shildon, I passed them again as this was where the route to the Brusselton Incline diverged from the later Bishop Auckland line and the Black Boy branch which I'll come to later.
Below - Looking back towards the coal drops a garden has been established around the trackbed.
Below - Alongside the path are some retaining walls, here there is an abutment of a footbridge over the railway which has been replaced by a modern bridge nearby.
Below - The roundabout next to the Hackworth Industrial Park established on the former Shildon Wagon Works site. The wagon wheels have the names of the railway companies that operated the works from the Stockton and Darlington to British Rail.
Below - Office building at the wagon works site.
Below - The former Mason Arms Inn, effectively one of the first ever railway stations as passengers would board trains here before the line was diverted to the tunnel and the current station was built.
Below - Information board opposite the former Mason Arms (click to enlarge).
Below - A signal and track panel opposite the Mason Arms.
Below - The track panel demonstrates the various arrangements of rails and sleepers that were tried on the route. The early iron rails breaking was a big problem on early railways.
Below - Buildings of the former wagon works now part of the Hackworth Industrial Park. The origins of the works went back to the S&D's engineering facilities and closed under British Rail Engineering in 1984.
West of Shildon is a range of hills to cross before reaching flat land beyond and more coal mines the railway served. At Brussleton an incline was worked by an engine at the summit built by Robert Stephenson until that engine proved too small for the growing volumes of traffic on the route.
Below - looking up the incline the remains of a bridge over the railway can be seen.
Below - Looking down the railway at the same bridge.
Below - The summit of the incline with the remaining engine house buildings on the left.
Left - The engine house building, the track would have run along what is now the roadway with the building extending over the track to house the winding drum.
Below - Site of the winding engine.
Below - Information board on the engine house (click to enlarge).
Below - Workers houses. A small community established here and after the route closed the incline up from Shildon was retained to supply the community with coal.
Below - The engine house and workers cottages.
Below - Another information board at the incline sumit.
Below - Heading west down the other side of the incline a row of stone sleepers can be seen.
Below - What looks to be a milepost at the side of a section of embankment.
Below - Brusselton lane has been widened and cut through the embankment on a new alignment alongside the original bridge in order to accommodate modern road vehicles. Steps descend the embankment to road level.
Below - A plaque next to the embankment showing it as a scheduled ancient monument.
Below - The original bridge over Brusselton Lane.
Below - West of the bridge over Brusselton Lane another small stretch of stone sleepers before the former railway disappears into the farmland.
Below - The footpath continues along the course of the railway through fields to Haggs Lane. This is the view west of Haggs Lane where all trace of the railway has disappeared into the fields. Further west there are some stretches of the trackbed that are now farm tracks, though I returned to Shildon station by the same route.
Below - Information boards at Shildon station (click to enlarge).
Below - Information about the walk along the Back Boy Branch.
The Black Boy branch follows a similar route to the later tunnel route below the town. Much of the former branch serves as a footpath between the station and the main street (Church Street). The path starts with a detour alongside the existing line around the sport ground, itself a facility established for railway workers.
Below - An aqueduct over the existing line into the tunnel beneath Shildon, seen from the footpath from the station that leads to the former Black Boy branch.
Below - Joining the former Black Boy branch and a straight tarmac path can be seen on what was once another incline.
Below - At the summit of the incline a plinthed replica wagon serves as a monument to the former railway.
Below - An information board at Rose Cottages which were built for railway workers at the incline top similarly to those seen at Brusselton. Rose Cottages were surrounded by a high hedge.
Below - There were a couple of inclines down to the collieries at Eldon. This path heads towards Eldon Lane on the course of the incline for a short way. Some building ruins in one of the farms were likely colliery related but Keep Out signs on the fence were quite clear. Just east of here another incline ran on what is now the course of the Eldon Bank road.
From here I returned to Shildon station for my train home.
