Starting Point - Cowes Town Quay. Walk to Wootton station site. Distance 7.8 Miles
Heritage Railway: Wootton to Smallbrook Junction. Island Line: Smallbrook Junction to Ryde Pier
Below - 1914 Railway Clearing House map of the Isle of Wight railways. (Picture from Wikipedia, Public Domain)
Cowes
Cowes station was the first to open on the Isle of Wight in 1862 on the then Cowes & Newport Railway. This line was soon extended to Ryde and at its peak the island had 55 1/2 miles of railway. Now it just has 8 1/2 miles of electric railway along the east coast and 5 1/2 miles of heritage railway, though many of the closed lines are now footpaths.
Below - I arrived at Cowes on the Red Jet catamaran service from Southampton. Next to the ferry terminal this hand crane made by Isles of Stanningley has been restored on the Town Quay.
From Town Quay it's a short walk to Terminus Road where the railway station once stood. The station closed in 1966 along with the line to Smallbrook Junction south of Ryde. All trace of the station has been demolished and a M&S Food store now occupies the site.
Below - Blue plaque at the site of Cowes station.
From here I walked to St Mary's Road. The station approaches have been built up but a section of trackbed at the back of the houses on Gordon Road survives as a small green. The track went from an embankment to a cutting before entering a tunnel under Mill Hill Road here but has since been landscaped.
Below - The south tunnel portal survives on the corner of Newport Road and Arctic Road in the small Arctic Park.
Mill Hill
Below - A station was provided at Mill Hill, popular with the workers at the nearby shipyards. Part of the platform edge can be seen in Arctic Park which had been established on the former station site.
The back gardens of Arctic Road and Tennyson Road now extend over the trackbed and the route is picked up with the Fraser Close to Arctic Road Footpath. At the corner of Arctic Road is the entrance to the Red Squirrel Trail which follows the former railway route.
Medina Wharf
A small halt was provided for workers at Medina Wharf. South of here the line remained open for freight for about a year after the line closed to passengers in 1966. The wharf handled coal imports, some of which were then forwarded to Ryde.
Below - The site of Medina Wharf Halt.
Below - On the left the gates at the former entrance to the Medina Wharf sidings can be seen.
Below - A former lineside telephone box at the site of the connection between the sidings and the main line.
Below - A yard lamp at the site of the sidings.
Below - Remains of signal cable runs.
The line continues on a small embankment for a while without much in the way of engineering works.
Cement Mills
Below - The site of Cement Mills Halt, the platform was on the left where the blue sign is now. A wind turbine factory now occupies the site of the cement works.
Below - Information board at the side of the path.
Below - South of the station some of the old cement kilns survive.
Below - A modern footbridge has been built on the supports of the old viaduct.
Below - What looks to be remnants of a lineside hut.
Below - At the site of the junction with the Freshwater line remains of the signal post on the east side of the line (shown as SP on the old map) can be seen. The signal post was made with recycled rails, an example of this type of signal can be seen in a photo taken at Haven Street on the heritage railway further down the page.
Newport
Industrial units have been built on the site of the engine shed and the Riverway road has been built on the site of the line.
Below - The site of Newport station. Medina Way has been built through the station site.
Below - Beneath the road surface would have been the south entrance to the short tunnel under Fairlee Road. A footpath has been built on the course of the line through Newport and a new pedestrian tunnel entrance built to connect to the old railway tunnel.
Below - The curved pedestrian tunnel seen joining the old railway tunnel under the road.
Below - The original north portal of the old railway tunnel.
Below - The cutting north of the tunnel has been filled in and the path is now above the old railway trackbed that has been thoroughly landscaped over.
Below - The path along the railway ends at Mews Lane necessitating a walk along North Fairlee Road alongside to the west.
Below - The farm access bridge over the railway seen from North Fairlee Road.
The former railway is accessed again from Belmont Lane. A post office museum has been established at the corner of the road in the former Lodge.
Below - It seems sensible that this bridge over Belmont Lane (now a footpath) is not in pedestrian use. Access to the embankment was on the left here.
Whippingham
Below - Old railway cast iron fencing near the site of Whippingham station.
Below - The former Whippingham station.
Fattingpark Bridge taking Park Road over the railway has been demolished and the path crosses at road level.
Below - Farm access bridge over the former railway.
Wootton
The station at Wootton was originally on the west side of Station Road with a goods siding on the east side of the road. The Station Road bridge has been filled in and the heritage railway now runs to a new station on the east side of the road.
Below - Site of the original Wootton station looking towards Newport. The path climbs to meet Station Road at road level.
From Wootton I returned to Newport to walk another section of abandoned railway from Newport to Sandown. I had travelled along the line east of here on a previous trip with a ride on the Isle of Wight Steam Railway.
Below - The former Ryde Pierhead Tram (I'll come to this later) at Wootton station on the steam railway. Originally this Drewry built railbus was petrol powered but has been rebuilt with a diesel engine in preservation.
Haven Street
Below - Originally Haven Street had a single track platform with a siding for a gasworks. The site of the gasworks is now occupied by the sheds for the heritage railway and museum building. Original engine servicing facilities on the route would have been at Newport and Ryde St Johns. Note the signals of the same type as the remains of one seen approaching Newport.
Below - Steam hauled train approaching from Wootton with the rail access to the museum building on the left.
Ashey
Ashey station survives but trains just stop on request and I didn't stop off here. A short branch ran to a chalk quarry and this survives as a footpath. From the look of the map this just ran through the fields with no engineering works until a short tunnel under Ashey Road in to the quarry. The tunnel appears to have been filled in.
Smallbrook Junction
There wasn't originally a station where the Cowes line met the Ventnor line. Both lines were single track and north of the junction the line was two tracks, as it still is today. The two tracks were originally operated as independent single track lines though as the line from Cowes was run by the Isle of Wight Central Railway and the line from Ventnor by the Isle of Wight Railway. After they both became part of the Southern Railway in the 1920s grouping crossovers were provided at Smallbrook Junction to run as a conventional two track railway north of the junction, but only when traffic increased in the summer holiday season.
Below - The steam train arriving at Smallbrook Junction where the engine runs round the train to return to Wootton. Passengers for Ryde now change on to an electric train from Shanklin on the former Ventnor line.
Below - The end of the steam railway with the mainline on the right. There has been consideration of extending the steam railway to Ryde. It could be done reasonably easily by returning to the old method of working the two tracks independently north of the junction. Mainline trains pass at Brading so it would not affect services to convert one of the tracks to heritage railway.
Ryde St Johns
Ryde St Johns station opened in 1864. It was originally the Ryde terminus and passengers would change for a horse drawn earlier version of the Ryde Pier Tramway to the esplanade and pier. In 1880 the mainline was extended to the pier with the construction of a tunnel. It is this tunnel that has restricted the height of Island Line trains since, now resulting in three generations of converted London Underground stock operating the line since 1966 when the network was cut back to Ryde to Shanklin and the line electrified.
Below - Ryde St Johns shed is now the maintenance depot for the Island Line stock operating between Ryde and Shanklin.
Ryde Esplanade
Below - Esplanade station. Only one platform is used now, the crossover from the two track section is behind be here. The station provides connections with the Hovercraft to Southsea. This is the last regular scheduled passenger hovercraft service in Europe and provides the fastest connection to the mainland.
Ryde Pier
Ryde Pier is effectively three piers built alongside each other, the 1814 vehicle access to the ferry terminal, the 1864 former tramway (which is now pedestrian access) and the 1880 railway.
Below - Train from Shanklin in Ryde Pier station.
Below - The former Pier Tramway route. The tramway was cutback to run between Pier Head and Esplanade when the railway extended to the pier. It closed entirely in 1969 and was derelict for many years before becoming a pedestrian walkway.
Below - The former tramway in 2003 seen from the same location. Pedestrians had to dodge the vehicle traffic on the 1814 vehicle pier. Over the years the pier tramway used horse haulage until 1886, electric trams between 1886 and 1927 and finally the petrol railcar seen earlier on the heritage railway. The railcar would have had a trailer, a replica of which is currently under construction.
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Below - One of the previous generation of ex Underground stock on the pier in 2003 looking across the former tramway pier. It can be seen that there was no deck on the tramway pier at that time and it can be seen where the tracks used to be.
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