Snowdon Mountain Railway
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Rheilffordd yr Wyddfa |
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Snowdon Mountain Railway in June 2012
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| Overview | |||
| Type | Rack and pinion mountain railway | ||
| Locale | Gwynedd | ||
| Termini |
Llanberis Snowdon/Yr Wyddfa |
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| Operation | |||
| Opened | 1896 | ||
| Owner | Heritage Great Britain | ||
| Operator(s) | Heritage Great Britain | ||
| Technical | |||
| Line length | 4 mi 55 ch (7.5 km) | ||
| Number of tracks | Single track with passing loops | ||
| Track gauge | 800 mm (2 ft 7 1⁄2 in) | ||
| Rack system | Abt | ||
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The Snowdon Mountain Railway (SMR; Welsh: Rheilffordd yr Wyddfa) is a narrow gauge rack and pinion mountain railway in Gwynedd, north-west Wales. It is a tourist railway that travels for 4.7 miles (7.6 km) from Llanberis to the summit of Snowdon, the highest peak in Wales.
The SMR is the only public rack and pinion railway in the United Kingdom, and after more than 100 years of operation it remains a popular tourist attraction, carrying more than 130,000 passengers annually. The line is owned and operated by Heritage Great Britain, operators of several other tourist attractions in the United Kingdom.
The railway is operated in some of the harshest weather conditions in Britain, with services curtailed from reaching the summit in bad weather and remaining closed during the winter from November to mid-March. Single carriage trains are pushed up the mountain by either steam locomotives or diesel locomotives. It has also previously used diesel railcars as multiple units.
The SMR was the inspiration for the fictional Culdee Fell Railway, appearing in the book Mountain Engines, part of The Railway Series written by Reverend W. Awdry.
The idea of a railway to the summit of Snowdon was first proposed in 1869, when Llanberis was linked to Caernarfon by the London & North Western Railway. In 1871 a Bill was put before Parliament, applying for powers of compulsory purchase for a railway to the summit, but it was opposed by the local landowner, Mr Assheton-Smith of the Vaynol Estate, who thought that a railway would spoil the scenery.
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Wikipedia