Brill Tramway

From Railways

[edit] Route Summary

Status: Closed and lifted.
Operator:
At Closure: LPTB
Previous: Metropolitan Railway
Oxford and Aylesbury Tramroad

North of Aylesbury, at Quainton Road, was a 6.5-mile (10-km) branch railway. It started life as the Wotton Tramway built and run under the auspices of the Duke of Buckingham.

[edit] History

After the completion in 1868 of the Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway, the Duke of Buckingham had built a light railway to provide freight access by rail to his estates at Wotton. It was this line the Wotton Tramway which was the inital basis of the route.

The original Quainton Road station was north of the Quainton-Waddesdon road, and wagons from the Brill line reached it by means of a wagon turntable; there was no direct access.

The extension to Brill gave access to a brickworks there. Extenson of the line followed and opened in 1871. Following public demand passenger facilities were provided early in 1872.

In 1894 the line was taken over by the Oxford and Aylesbury Tramroad Co who rebuilt the existing tramway. It was always the intention that the Tramway would in due course run to Oxford; in spite of the scheme being once again proposed in 1899, it never came to anything.

When the Metropolitan Railway took over the line in 1896, it doubled the main line from Aylesbury and resited the station to its present position, replacing a level crossing with the present road overbridge; a running connection between the Brill line and the main line was constructed at that time. From April 1899 the tramway was operated as a branch of the Metropolitan mainline (sometimes known as the Brill Branch).

In 1935 on the creation of the LPTB control was transferred to it from the Metropolitan and Great Central Joint Committee which had taken it over in 1906.

The whole branch was closed on 1st December 1935, traffic having ceased the precceding day.

[edit] Stations

There were stations at

• Quainton Road
• Waddesdon (originally Waddesdon Road)
• Westcott
• Church Siding
• Wotton
• Wood Siding
• & Brill.

[edit] Locomotives and rolling stock

As an independent railway a variety of small steam locomotives were used on trains but once part of the Metropolitan Railway A and B Class locomotives were used on trains. Carriages built for the O&A remained in use after the take-over, these two were eight wheeled carriages that had the wheels mounted directly onto the chassis and did not have bogies.