Plateway

A plateway is an early kind of railway or tramway or wagonway, with a cast iron rail. They were mainly used for about 50 years up to 1830, though some continued later.

Plateways consisted of "L" shaped rails where a flange on the rail guided the wheels in contrast to edgeways, where flanges on the wheels guide it along the track.

Plateways were originally horsedrawn, but cable haulage and locomotives were sometimes used later on.

The plates of the plateway were made of cast iron, often cast by the ironworks that were their users. Wrought iron rail plates were introduced on some lines from the 1840s particularly on lines where locomotives were introduced On most lines this system was replaced by rolled wrought iron (and later steel) "edge rails", which along with realignment to increase the radius of curves converted them to modern railways better suited to locomotive operation.

Plateways were particularly favoured in South Wales and the Forest of Dean, in some cases replacing existing edge rails. Other notable plateways included the Hay Railway, the Gloucester and Cheltenham Railway, the Surrey Iron Railway, the Derby Canal Railway, the Kilmarnock and Troon Railway, the Portreath Tramroad in Cornwall and lines at Coalbrookdale, Shropshire.

The plates of a plateway generally rested on stone blocks or sleepers, which served to spread the load over the ground, and to maintain the gauge (the distance between the rails or plates). The plates were usually made from cast iron and had differing cross sections depending on the manufacturer. They were often very short, typically about 3 feet (914 mm) long, able to stretch only from one block to the next.

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