Location type

Name and dates

Description

This was a terminus with a loop and sidings and a goods shed. There was no platform, (nor was there a platform at Leadhills) but there was a slightly raised area of flattened ground alongside the loop. Access to the carriages was by means of steps on the carriages. The station building was a lean-to built onto the side of the goods shed, just to the south of the loop.

The station was associated with the lead industry in Wanlockhead and Leadhills. The site was remote to the town, on a hillside to the south east. There was a tramway serving the lead mines and smelter to the west of the station. Wanlockhead Tramway
Steam railcars were used in later years. The locomotive shed was at Leadhills.

The line closed in 1939. The trackbed remains vacant at present, a dirt road. The nearby narrow gauge Leadhills and Wanlockhead Railway [Preserved] is based at Leadhills.

This was the highest standard gauge summit in Britain at 1,498 ft. (Today the highest is 1,484 ft at Druimuachdar Summit on the Perth to Inverness main line.)

By comparison, the Cairngorm Mountain Railway climbs from Base Station at 2,083 ft to Ptarmigan Station at 3,599 ft.

Local

Leadhills and Wanlockhead Railway

HES - Wanlockhead Beam Engine

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