Exploring East Norton Tunnel (& bridges!)
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- Опубликовано: 28 авг 2024
- Join me as I explore the trackbed and tunnel at East Norton where the Great Northern London and North Western Railway used to run. Closed in 1953 this once busy line has now been closed for nearly 70 years. I went along to see how the infrastructure has survived after all that time, and was surprised at what i found...
Thanks for taking us through this lovely tunnel Middy. It's interesting why those bridges all required 3 arches and were built on an angle too.
Thank you for watching I can only imagine they were easier to build with the arches and used less materials? Tbh I cannot say for sure but its a recurring theme
The line closed to passenger traffic in 1953 but carried freight trains until the mid 60s. I often used to see a southbound freight train in the early evening usually a mineral train with an Austerity 2-8-0 on the front when I was out on my bike in the Tilton area in the early 60s. Not sure if the line was pulled up at the same time as the line to Belgrave Road in Leicester which ran from the LNW&GN at Maresfield Junction but that was removed around 1965 or 66. I walked some of the line in about 1970 including East Norton Tunnel and the track was gone by then. The tunnel looks very much the same as it did then apart from the heavy growth of bushes and trees. I was amazed then that it was in such excellent condition and both the tunnel and the over bridges looked as though they had been pointed up and had quite a bit of repair work done not long before closure. There was a chicken farm on the trackbed at East Norton Station taking up most of the station yard with large sheds. Hallaton Station just to the south was still pretty much complete right up until the line was ripped up, probably because it was some distance away from any large town so there were fewer vandals about to wreck it. There were several freight trains a day almost up until the line was abandoned.
Thanks for some more memories rekindled by the video. Keep up the good work!
Excellent stuff. Thanks.
Thanks for watching glad you enjoyed it 👍
I love this tunnel! Have visited it a few times, walking from where you did, but never got to it, thanks to undergrowth! Now I know how - slip and slide, like you did! Thanks for a great video.
Thanks for watching. It's a lovely old tunnel and definitely worth a visit
Another brilliant and fascinating video Middy. As Rod Smith has said here in the comments, this section of line ( Marefield to Hallaton and Market Harborough) lasted longer than 1953 and was used by through freight trains for some time after. The last freight ran on November 4th 1963 and by this date were chiefly heavy Iron Ore services using the joint line as a through route heading to and from the blast furnaces at Scunthorpe. I walked the tunnel way back in 1995 with the lady who eventually became my wife. I remember that day well because I also got 4 numbers up on the National Lottery and won £91-00! Must also make mention of Rod Smith who has also commented on this great video.Rod was head of our railway club at school way, way back in time! Cheers Rod!
Thanks for watching and for your kind comments. I stand corrected and accept I got it slightly wrong! Like everyone I learn from every explore and Wikipedia only says so much!! Thanks again and I hope you will watch future videos👍
Great explore ! I accidentally ended up here instead of mapperly tunnel by clicking the wrong link on Saturday ! One of the best mistakes I ever made ! It was a good tunnel to explore !
Great video 👊🏾
Thanks for watching. It really is a beauty although I do recommend going to mapperley just to see it before it gets closed up for good
What amazing bridges and tunnels you came across great to see them still marking the old historical line 😄👏
Thanks again for watching. Totally unspoilt by graffiti and just kept in lovely condition. The tunnel is used by the farmer for storage and is dry, just a bit of a mission to get there!
Great video as usual, well worth another visit I think 🤔👍
Thanks for watching. It certainly is such a lovely unspoilt example
I used to play there as a child I lived at east norton Station cottages from 1972 - 1996 my grandad work on the railway there in the 50s
Thanks for watching. You could probably tell me more about the area than what I could find on the Internet! Hard to imagine a railway even being there now!
You’ve unearthed even more beautiful looking railway relics for our viewing pleasure. Those bridges and that tunnel are absolute gems.
Thanks David. The tunnel was the aim for the day so imagine my delight when I found out I would pass so many glorious old bridges on the way! One of my favourite explores to date 👍
Nice explore mate 👍.
Thank you and thanks for watching 👍
Ooh another tunnel, great video. Love seeing the old bridges. Nice to see them all still standing and no graffiti.
Those bridges are absolutely lovely totally unspoilt and considering their age and pack of maintenance in great condition. The tunnel was incredible.thanks as always for watching 👍
That really is a glorious walk, it's nice that the track bed is kept open for easier access. Great that there is no graffiti either, mind you it is a fair way from anywhere!!!! Looks like the last part before the tunnel was a bit of a slog, did you go up and over the bridge before coming down the other side, that looked like your best option. There used to be an old Massey Ferguson tractor in the tunnel too, I think it was at the end you entered, but that appears to have gone now. Great effort, well done.
Thanks as always. Yes you come off the track and around the tunnel entrance then down again as the track is impassable at the last bridge. Lovely old tunnel and the walk alone through those bridges is glorious. The tractor is now on the track bed in the bushes for some reason. Well worth a visit 👍
@@MiddyExplores Blimey, around the tunnel entrance (over the top of it?) that should be interesting😆. I'm planning a mid-winter visit so the undergrowth at the last bridge may well have grown back🤞.
Nice video, with some out takes at the end 🤣
Thanks for watching. Glad you enjoyed it and the best outtake of the day was me standing on my glasses after falling over! Unfortunately the camera wasn't rolling!!!
Nice to see bridges and tunnel with no stupid graffiti middy
Thanks for watching. It absolutely made my day to see a set of bridges and a tunnel unspoilt by idiots!! A lovely walk and explore
This looks quite a remote location. But you found another lost treasure. Such a shame it's lain disused for so long.
Thanks for watching. Yes it's away from everywhere really a bit of a hike but worth it.
I wonder how long those bridges and tunnels will last in the future,perhaps another 100or 200years ,,, they do,nt build them like that these days..
Thanks for watching. They have lasted the last 70 years with hardly any maintenance and they still look superb so I dare say you are right!
@@MiddyExplores I might take a ride out and check them out,,,Do,nt worry I do,nt do Graffiti....
Is that off A47?
The old station is at the side of the A47 the tunnel is a short walk away.
The line closed to passenger traffic in 1953 but carried freight trains until the mid 60s. I often used to see a southbound freight train in the early evening usually a mineral train with an Austerity 2-8-0 on the front when I was out on my bike in the Tilton area in the early 60s. Not sure if the line was pulled up at the same time as the line to Belgrave Road in Leicester which ran from the LNW&GN at Maresfield Junction but that was removed around 1965 or 66. I walked some of the line in about 1970 including East Norton Tunnel and the track was gone by then. The tunnel looks very much the same as it did then apart from the heavy growth of bushes and trees. I was amazed then that it was in such excellent condition and both the tunnel and the over bridges looked as though they had been pointed up and had quite a bit of repair work done not long before closure. There was a chicken farm on the trackbed at East Norton Station taking up most of the station yard with large sheds. Hallaton Station just to the south was still pretty much complete right up until the line was ripped up, probably because it was some distance away from any large town so there were fewer vandals about to wreck it. There were several freight trains a day almost up until the line was abandoned.
Thanks for some more memories rekindled by the video. Keep up the good work!
Thanks for watching and the wealth of information! I had planned to visit the station but the weather beat me ! Long story but it stopped the day! I am hoping to visit again in the future to explore more.
Regular passenger services finished in 1953 but unadvertised workers trains carried on until 1958 into Leicester and Market Harbourough also Holidays specials ran out off Leicester Belgrave Road to the East Coast up until the closure of the line.
@@streetscrambler8075 I used to live next to the Belgrave Road line in the 1950s and 60s and frequently travelled to Skegness and Mablethorpe from Humberstone Station. I still have a few photos of trains on the embankment East of the station behind our house. Sadly the embankment is long gone and now Coleman Close but the memories are still there along with a tape recording of 64736 the regular J39 on the evening goods stalling outside the house! The regular locos on the workmen's train from John o'Gaunt to Leicester were J6 0-6-0 64202 and 64178 in the late 50s. The latter being a very late withdrawal for the class in 1961 I am told. The excursion trains ran on summer Saturdays and Sundays and produced some interesting locos such as K2 2-6-0s, "Loch Quoich" being one I noted. I can't imagine anyone these days wanting to go to Skegness from Leicester in a non corridor suburban quad art set, but I can remember that two of those sets formed a regular departure one year 1958 I think. They arrived behind L1 2-6-4T 67788 on a weekday afternoon and stayed most of the summer though the loco went back light to Colwick after bringing them. Another set of empty stock came in behind an L. M. S. 2P 4-4-0 40404. As far as I know they were the only members of their classes to go over the G. N. line the 2P being extremely unusual as almost all locos were L. N. E. R. until the L. M. S. "Flying Pigs" began bringing timber trains from Boston to Hollis's Timber siding near the old G. N. locoshed off Ulverston Road.
On one occasion returning from a holiday in Norfolk in the early 60s we travelled over the L. N. W. line from Peterborough to Market Harborough which the G. N. and L. N. W. Joint line connected to before joining the Midland line north of Harborough and waiting for the road at the junction on the joint line was B17 61660 with a freight it was only days before it was withdrawn and was minus its name plates "Hull City".
I was always fascinated by the trains at the back of the house and eventually worked on the railways as a result. Though I now live in North Yorkshire I still remember my childhood in Leicester fondly. They were good days but it was a completely different world then!
@@rodsmith3911 reading your comments Rod it’s obvious that you have many happy memories of the line and makes me wish l could have been there to witness it all as well, l wish someone would invent a Time Machine so we could all go back in time to see it!!