High Royds Hospital Railway

 Starting Point - Menston Station. Out and Back walk. About 2.5 miles.

Current Map 1893 Map (hospital on bottom left of sheet)

This short walk from Menston on the Leeds to Ilkley line takes in the site of an unusual little industrial railway, the High Royds Hospital Railway.

High Royds Hospital was a huge mental asylum complex situated just south of Menston. The railway connecting it to the Midland Railway route just south of Menston Station was built in 1883 and initially used to supply building materials to the site. The hospital admitted its first patients in 1888 and once the hospital was complete the railway was used mainly for supplying coal to the hospital. At first a steam locomotive was employed on the line, probably one of the contractors engines that would have been used on the construction phase. It was soon found to struggle with the incline up to the hospital and in in 1897 the line was electrified and an electric locomotive used. This too wasn't powerful enough and was replaced with a more powerful English Electric locomotive in the 1920s. 

The railway was used until the 1930s, by which time road transport was more practical. This closure was short lived though as it was re-opened in 1939 due to wartime fuel shortages and remained open until 1951. Interestingly that would make it an NHS run railway in its final days and as such a nationalised railway (just like all the colliery railways) before the mainline railways were nationalised.

The hospital itself remained in use until 2003, the last of the Victorian asylum system in use. The site is now being converted to homes.

We join the hospital railway at the back of High Royds Memorial Garden. This was once the asylum burial ground. The graves were unmarked, just a memorial stone at the western edge of the garden stands. The chapel is still intact and the site is kept as a memorial to those who lived and died in the hospital.

Below - The chapel at High Royds Memorial Garden. In the doorway of the chapel an information board provides more information about the railway.

The railway ran immediately behind the burial ground. A couple of bits of track were found and have been turned in to a memorial for the railway. (though looking at them they were probably more modern track components left behind from work on the nearby mainline).

Heading toward the mainline we find the remains of a bridge where the railway crossed Mire Beck and a gatepost that would have separated the hospital railway from the mainline exchange sidings. There would have been a couple of sidings at this point alongside the Midland line (which can still be seen here), one siding for full wagons and one for empties to return.

Continuing back past the memorial garden we see the top of a filled in bridge where the line passed under Bradford Road.

The cutting has been filled in almost to the top of the arch of the bridge. At the other side all trace of the bridge has gone as a road junction has been built here.

Across the road is the former asylum grounds and a footpath follows the course of the railway.

One of the buildings the railway served was the laundry building and this building is still in situ. The arch doorways for the railway vehicles are evident.

Continuing to the main approach road the grandeur of the site is still evident. The complex of buildings below housed the administration buildings.

Below - A couple more of the hospital buildings.

Below - Entrance to the Sports and Social Club. The hospital had extensive recreation facilities including a ball room, these facilities have been preserved. The tile work on the outer wall is a remnant of a network of covered corridors that once connected the various buildings of the complex.

More about the railway line can be read on the Menston Memorial Garden website and this shows pictures of the electric loco in action. It also has a better map which labels the various buildings of the hospital and isn't split across a few sheets like the OS map on the link at the top of the page. 

There is also a High Royds Hospital website containing history of the hospital and access to the digital archive.