Manchester–Sheffield–Wath electric railway

The Manchester–Sheffield–Wath electric railway was an electrification scheme on British railways. The route featured long ascents on both sides of the Pennines with the long Woodhead Tunnel at its central summit close to the Woodhead pass. This led to the route being called the Woodhead Line.

The main route ran from Manchester London Road (later Manchester Piccadilly) over the Pennines, through the Woodhead Tunnel to Penistone, where the Wath line split. The main line then proceeded through Sheffield Victoria Station and on to Rotherwood sidings. The Wath line ran from Penistone to Wath marshalling yard in the heart of the South Yorkshire coalfields.

Minor electrified branches off the main line ran to the locomotive depot at Reddish on the Fallowfield Loop line, to Glossop (for local passenger trains), Dewsnap sidings (all at the Manchester end) and Tinsley Marshalling Yard (at the Sheffield end).

Following developments with electric traction in the USA, the Great Central Railway (GCR) first considered the electrification of the line before the First World War. No detailed plans were drawn up, but by the 1920s the high levels of heavy freight traffic made steam operation increasingly problematic. Plans were interrupted by the 1923 grouping of the railways, which saw the GCR absorbed into the London and North Eastern Railway (LNER).

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