How Beeching’s cuts left train passengers in N.Wales with a 6-hour trip to go just 30 miles

WHEN Dr Richard Beeching took an axe to the British rail system in the mid 1960s he made getting around Wales by train significantly more difficult.

Once completed, just three main lines traversing Wales remained – the North Wales main line, another linking Aberystwyth with Shrewsbury and one stretching from Pembrokeshire to Cardiff and on to London.

In addition, the Cambrian Coast line remained to link Pwllheli , Harlech and Barmouth with the main Mid Wales route. The Heart of Wales line, from Shrewsbury to Swansea, was spared simply because of the number of marginal constituencies it crossed.

The result? A nation where north and south felt increasingly disconnected, as the rail lines which allowed for these crucial connections disappeared, undermining trade and collaboration between towns and cities.

The retention of routes that flowed west-east, along with the poverty of north-south road links, made it easier for those in the north to look to Liverpool and Manchester, pushed those in mid Wales towards Shropshire and the Midlands, and made London a focal point for those along what is now the M4 corridor.

You can travel by train from Edinburgh to London in the time it takes to get from Llandudno to Cardiff. Getting to either of those places from Aberystwyth involves going first to Shrewsbury. To those familiar with these journeys, this fact won’t initially seem shocking, such is its familiarity.

Half a century later, Wales still bears the scars to a quite ludicrous extent, as these three journeys symbolise.

Pwllheli to Bangor: There can be few places in the UK that take half the time to travel between by bike than they do by mainline train service. But Pwllheli and Bangor are two of those locations. They were once linked by the Carnarvonshire Railway, which went from Caernarfon through Penygroes, Nantlle and Bryncir to Afon Wen, where it connected with the existing Cambrian Coast line to Pwllheli.

If you fancy testing the bike v train challenge between these two points, you’ll probably find yourself riding along Lon Eifion, a national cycle route which follows the route along much of the old track bed. Google estimates the journey at a leisurely three hours, which is half the time it takes on the main line train alternative, which stops no fewer than 43 times on a journey that traverses Machynlleth, Welshpool, Shrewsbury, Wrexham, Chester, Rhyl and Llandudno before getting to its final destination.

However, there is a way to do most of this journey by train - on the narrow gauge Welsh Highland Railway, which chugs its way alongside Lon Eifion as it meanders from Porthmadog to Caernarfon (via Beddgelert and Rhyd Ddu) in about two hours.

Barmouth to Llangollen: If Michael Portillo had been making television programmes about Brit- ain’s most scenic railway journeys in the early 1960s, he would almost certainly have found himself on board a carriage travelling from Barmouth to Llangollen. Trains on this route left Barmouth hugging the very edge of the stunning Mawddach estuary, before heading from Dolgellau through the southern fringes of Snowdonia, passing Llyn Tegid in Bala through Corwen and arriving finally into Llangollen.

The post-Beeching alternative, while no less scenic, shuns the direct route of the line closed by Beeching in favour of the “three sides of a square approach” taking in a jaunt along the coast of Cardigan Bay, an eastward traverse of the country through Machynlleth, Newtown and Welshpool to Shrewsbury, before heading north to Ruabon. You’ll have to make your own way to Llangollen from there, since the eisteddfod town’s station is now only used for the Llangollen Railway. It’s a three hour journey, but only half that by road.

The end came in January 1965, with the track being removed four years later. These days, the only way you can pass along its route is on the Bala Lake Railway or Llangollen Railway, which use sections of its track bed, by bike along the Mawddach Trail from Barmouth to Dolgellau, or on a section of road close to Dolgellau which takes advantage of the earthworks to build the rail line back in the 1860s.

Aberystwyth to Carmarthen: Carmarthen is around 45 miles south of Aberystwyth and yet travelling between the towns by train currently involves spending the first two hours travelling north-east towards, and then across, the English border. After arriving at Shrewsbury, there’s time for a quick visit to the waiting room before embarking on a marathon cross-country slog through the likes of Hereford, Cwmbran, Cardiff and Swansea. By the time you arrive, it’ll be six hours since you set off (give or take the odd delay), you’ll have passed through nine Welsh local authori- ties and two English counties.

If you’d done the journey by car (1hr 20min) or bike (five hours, says Google), you’d have passed through two. And you’d have aligned yourself very closely to the crow flying the most direct 45-mile route between the two.

You’d have also aligned yourself fairly closely – for the second half of your journey, at any rate – with the train line that linked the two towns until it was closed to passengers in February 1965. That headed initially south east towards Tregaron, and then Lampeter, before moving back to the west through Pencader, Llanpumsaint and down to Carmarthen, where it connected with the route through to Swansea, Cardiff and beyond.

These days, its legacy can be found in another cycle path – the Ystwyth Trail – as well as bits of railway paraphernalia ranging from some preserved platforms in Llanilar or converted into a rugby club (Llanybydder), and a large goods shed in Lampeter.

But the story of this route is not quite finished. An ambitious campaign is gaining momentum to relay the track and re-open the connection at a cost that could reach £700m.