Starting Point - Handyside Bridge. Finishing Point - Site of Egginton Junction station. Distance 9.7 Miles
From 1878 the Great Northern Railway's Derbyshire and Staffordshire extension connected their Friar Gate station in Derby to Nottingham and on to their main line at Grantham. West of Derby the GNR continued to Eggington Junction where it met the North Staffordshire Railway giving it access to Burton on Trent, Uttoxeter and the GNR branch to Stafford. On this bike ride I follow the former GNR between Derby and Eggington Junction. Intermediate stations were provided at Mickleover and Etwall, though these were officially closed to passengers as early as 1939 after services were withdrawn in 1928. Derby Friar Gate closed to passengers in 1964 and freight in 1967 but the line from Friar Gate to Eggington remained in use as a test track. In the 1970s it was cutback to Mickleover and it closed completely in 1990. The route now largely forms the Great Northern Trail cycle route. More information about the line and a collection of old photos can be found on the old-dalby.com website.
Needless to say there has been some development on the railway through the centre of Derby. I begin by heading to Handyside Bridge just north of the city centre. This took the GNR line over the River Derwent. The Riverside Path from which I accessed it follows the sidings that connected factories along the river to the GNR via a headshunt and spur on the north side of the bridge. A footpath was cantelevered off the south side of the bridge but now the railway is gone the path uses the main span. Handyside Foundry that made the bridge girders were situated just north of Derby and made several structures for the line and other railways.
Below - The Handyside Bridge
Below - The wider abutment shows where the footpath was once on the south (left in the photo) side of the bridge.
Derby Friar Gate
Below - From Handyside Bridge I went to Friar Gate Bridge (also made by Handyside). Here two bridge spans took four tracks over the road of the same name. The gap between the spans being where the centre island platform of Friar Gate station was on the south (right on the photo) side of the road.
Below - The former taxi entrance to the station.
Below - The pedestrian entrance to the station on the left.
1914 Map (bottom right of map)
Below - The south side of the former station. Entrance buildings have been removed.
Below - At present the large Goods Depot building still stands, just about. No doubt it will keep having fires until developers have a blank canvas to work on.
Below - On Great Northern Road this building looks like it would have been used to power hydraulic capstans used to manoeuvre wagons around the goods shed.
Below - From Great Northern Road a footpath to South Street provides better views of the old Goods Depot.
From here I took a detour to Markeaton Park as a stretch of the old line has been redeveloped with a school and industrial units. At the park I visited Famous Trains, a permanent model railway exhibition. I picked up the trackbed again on the west side of Kingsway where a cyclepath runs alongside Mackworth Allotment. The path runs along the south side of the overgrown trackbed. The connecting path to Richmond Park Road crosses a filled in bridge before the path heads south through Mickleover Meadows emerging on to Onslow Road and Station Road, detouring around the site of Mickleover Tunnel.
Mickleover
Below - The walls of the filled in bridge taking Station Road over the former railway.
Below - The Great Northern Hotel still in business.
Below - The former Mickleover Station.
Below - Footings of a structure at the goods yard site. In later years as the terminus of the test track a two road shed was built on the goods yard site.
Below - Brick piers for the farm access bridge west of the station site. A little further along was a similar footbridge.
Below - Remains of a signal west of Mickleover station.
Below - Former farm track bridge.
Below - Bridge carrying the former railway over Heage Lane.
Below - Former footpath bridge.
The Etwall Bypass cut across the railway once it had closed, the cycle track does a dog leg to pass under the new road on a bridge clearly designed so that the railway couldn't be re-instated. The path then passes under the former Sutton Lane bridge (below).
Etwall
Below - The bridge carrying Hilton Road over the former railway. This was the site of Etwall station.
Below - Oldfield Lane bridge.
Below - Another old signal post, this time a concrete one.
Below - The chimney of the former Egginton Dairy.
Below - The path emerges on to Egginton Road. Here the dairy chimney is seen from the bridge over the former railway.
Below - The former dairy site.
Egginton Junction
Below - The former station site seen from Egginton Road bridge. The former station buildings can be seen amongst the trees and are now a house. To the left were platforms for the North Staffordshire Railway line. That line survives as the Derby to Crewe line.
Egginton
Below - The level crossing for the former NSR line on Egginton Road. The buildings on the left were the original NSR station opened in 1849 and closed in 1878 when the GNR line was built and the above station was built.
Sadly there is quite a detour to pick up a footpath along a stretch of trackbed of the NSR line in to Burton on Trent at the Rolleston on Dove station site. The path runs from Dovecliffe Road to Princess Way and is called the Jinny Nature Trail. Princess Way is built on the former railway route. Figuring on doing this as an explore around Burton on Trent instead I returned the way I came to Derby and a train home along the former Midland Railway route.
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