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In Search of a Tunnel
On Wednesday, Peter Dalrymple and I went in search of the
Tyler Hill railway tunnel.... half a century on from my last
viewing!
The route was a little different of course. Back in the mid
fifties, the line had only recently closed and the cinder track
provided a pleasant if lengthy afternoon walk all the way from
Whitstable harbour to Canterbury via the greenery of Blean
woods. With much of the track in private hands, it is now a case
of a swift drive to the outskirts of the city where
the tunnel's northern entrance can be found in the remains of a
heavily wooded cutting.
The first sight is perhaps a disappointment....
Photo by Peter Dalrymple © Peter
Dalrymple 2008
For
safety reasons, a heavy metal fence surrounds the brick arch. The structure is
also barely forty yards from a building site. In the 1950's, it was a remote and somewhat spooky
woodland location.
However, after a few minutes, the dense foliage
and steep embankments mask the outside world and a sense of
pure history takes over.
Photo by Peter Dalrymple © Peter
Dalrymple 2008
Things occur to you. For example, how did the people of 1830 manage to
construct all this without the tools of the modern day builders
that now toil on those new buildings above? How did passengers
survive the smoke and fumes in a tunnel that was barely large
enough to accommodate the railway carriages?
Photos by Peter Dalrymple © Peter
Dalrymple 2008
Our next task was to locate the southern (ie Canterbury)
entrance to the tunnel.
This was a little easier... thanks to my teenage memories as a
member of the Simon Langton 4th year football team! Our away
match at Archbishops School was overseen by the red brick arch
on the northern edge of the school playing field.
A quick drive down St Stephen's Hill and we were able to
enlist the help of a friendly member of the school staff who
escorted us to the precise location....
Photo by Peter Dalrymple © Peter
Dalrymple 2008
It was all so much smaller than I remember it from 1964!
But... wow! The school is so attractive now with new buildings
and lovely grounds. It is also proud of its part in railway
history and even has this monument on a paved area....
The plaque contains a copy of the original plan
and elevation. The original is held by Canterbury Museum.
This reminds us that the tunnel was just 9ft 3
ins high, 11ft wide.... and, at 828 yards, almost half a mile
long.
We would like to express our thanks to staff at Archbishops School for their help.
I am holding back some of Peter's photos for later
on!
North to Tyler Hill Road
The picture below shows the rail track leading towards
Whitstable from the northern entrance of the tunnel.
Photo: Dave Taylor
This section extends all the way to the Tyler Hill Road - the
east-west country road that links the villages of Blean
and Tyler Hill. (NB Throughout its course, this strip of track lies on
University of Kent land.
As such it is private property and not open to the public). The embankments are a little overgrown but still
intact. The
photo below was taken some time ago and shows a 'side on'
view of the line looking west from Calais Hill in the village of
Tyler Hill.
Photo: Dave Taylor
The embankments are marked by the line of trees. To the left,
the land dips into a narrow valley where the railway line
crosses the Saar Penn stream before making its approach to the
tunnel entrance. Fortunately, a public path traverses both the
field and the line at this point - enabling us to get a glimpse
of the surviving track....
Photo: Dave Taylor
I am sure that someone will correct me if I am wrong but I
suspect that Tyler Hill Halt station was located alongside a level
crossing that carried Tyler Hill Road over the railway track.
Recently, I discovered the following post card amongst my family
mementoes....
As you can see the platform construction was very similar to
Chestfield Halt on the main London-Thanet railway.
North of the Tyler Hill Road, the track now forms a driveway to
a private residence before being lost under farmland. It finally
reappears close to the winding pond at Clowes Wood.
Anecdotes....
As you will have guessed, we are heading towards a new
permanent article that traces the line in modern times. However,
as usual, we would like to include anecdotes and memories from
our readers.
Although many of us 'late middle agers' remember the Canterbury
and Whitstable Railway when it was still operational, most
memories tend to concern the decade or so that followed its
closure. It was then that the line served as a pleasant walk from
the harbour to the city of Canterbury. Springtime was a particular
delight with the fresh foliage adorning the trees of Clowes Wood
and carpets of bluebells and primroses smothering the woodland
floor.
That should get the ol' memory cells going. Now, it's over to you.
Update on Line Improvements
Since the above article was published we have received a very
welcome message from Jonathan Baker....
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You can now walk the section of the old line from Tyler hill
Crossing to the north portal of Tyler hill tunnel since the
vegetation has now been cut back. For most of the way there
is a four metre wide clear track. You can virtually see the north
portal from Tyler Hill road now.
It is advisable to wear good Wellingtons as a small section
around Oakwell crossing is flooded with water approx 200 mm deep.
This is caused by the raised level of the farm crossing acting as
a dam. A simple culvert and ditch system would alleviate
this. By the Spring this should be virtually dry as the vegetation
clearance has to a degree helped to drain the line. It is a lovely
section of the old line approximately 1000 metres long.
The section was cleared by the Community Payback offenders.
They also have recently cleared a further 600 metres of the
embankment parallel to St Michaels Road in Canterbury to the site
of the former Sandpit Crossing. This section is a pleasant
walk through a woodland setting in the urban area of St Stephens
Estate.
Jonathan Norman Baker
Whitstable
30 January 2009
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Many thanks, Jonathan. I have repeated your message in the
site Visitors Book to ensure that it reaches a wide audience.
Reaction on Tunnel Photos...
Comments on the Tunnels article are given below...
| Thanks guys. Good to 'revisit'
what's left of the tunnel and the line. I walked
through it in early 1965 with 2 friends and haven't been
back since.
Did you know that the tunnel was built from
opposite ends and they were only about half an inch out
when they met in the middle?
Who took the photo of you and Peter at Tyler Hill
Halt, Dave?!! Love the oil lamps.
If you use Google Maps, the satellite photos
(which appear to be quite recent) clearly show the
tree-lined route, apart from the very ends at Whitstable
and Canterbury which have been built on.
Canterbury West station is the original building
which issued the first railway season tickets in the world
for passengers on the C&W line.
Barry Freeman
Shaftesbury
Dorset
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| Our
Reply: Thanks, Barry. It was a long wait for a
train and we gave up in the end. I think there is
something wrong with the service these days.
That Tyler Hill halt photo is really weird. It
suddenly turned up in my mum's old photo box a little
while back... and yet I had scoured that box many times
over the years. It is possible that it had fallen out of
an old family postcard album. On the other hand, could it
be the ghost of Tyler Hill tunnel sending a post card from
beyond. The message on the back reads...
"Canterbury and Whitstable Railway Company
apologises for the delay to services. This is due to
leaves (and a housing estate) on the line" |
| I know I'm not quite old enough to
remember the Crab & Winkle but I enjoy trying to walk
along it.... well most of it!
My dad is old enough to remember as he used to walk
all the way along it when he was younger with his brothers
and friends. He said, one day, they decided to walk along
it but as they approached the tunnel, they heard a noise
and ran back towards Whitstable. It was getting darker and
there was lots of tall trees.
Elizabeth Hook
Native of Whitstable but living in Canterbury
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| Our
Reply:
I can just about remember the trains running circa
1952 as I used to watch them from my garden in Railway
Avenue. By then, it was just a 'goods' line. We have to go
back another generation for those that travelled on it as
passengers.
My mum used it as a kid to get to Canterbury. Terry
Phillips has recently sent me an old article in which
locals relate stories of travelling to school on it.
In his article on the line, Brian Smith mentions
that it closed to passenger traffic on 1 Jan 1931 (click
here to view). Between then and the last goods
train in 1953, the track was off limits to the public
apart from a few pedestrian crossings (such as the one at
All Saints church yard).
Thus, when the railway lines were removed, the
cinder track became a very popular walk for curious
locals. One of the advantages was that it provided a very
straight and reasonably level walk to the woods and
beyond. As I have mentioned, the floor of the woods was a
carpet of bluebells in those days and this prompted a lot
of people to stroll out there in springtime.
The woods themselves were pretty wild as they were
dense and there were very few pathways. It wasn't a place
to be after dark. Someone will no doubt correct me if I am
wrong but most of the ghost stories seem to have cropped
up during the mid-late 1950s.
Mind you, as you may have seen from discussions in
the Visitors Book, there have been various ghost stories
associated with the woods in general and some have been
linked to stories of escaping French PoWs who were hidden
amongst the trees during the Napoleonic wars. |
| Hi.
Excellent article and photos. I look forward to the
longer piece.
In the meantime, you and your online readers might
also want to look at the site of the Crab and Winkle Line
Trust at...
www.crabandwinkle.org
... where there's more information and photographs.
You might even want to encourage people to join the trust
- a local charity aiming to preserve the line as a
footpath for future generations, and to promote the
history of the line too: just as you are doing.
So many thanks!!
Marcial Boo
Whitstable
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| Our
Reply:
Thanks, Marcial. I must apologise for not including
a link to the trust web site in the article. The problem
is that everything I do at the moment has to be done very
quickly as I am trying to keep new items coming at the
same time as transferring material from old to new SW
sites.
At the moment, we are trying to collect information
and anecdotes via the Chat Column and, to date, quite a
bit of material is arriving from family photo albums etc.
We will coninue to show these in future Chat Columns in
order to generate yet more interest.
The anecdotes will be important because they will
demonstrate that the line didn't end in 1953. It continued
as a key facility for local people - providing a safe and
convenient walk into the woods and beyond. Hopefully, the
Trust will be successful in re-establishing that facility
and it deserves all the help we can provide.
Our eventual permanent article will take the form of
a menu leading to several articles. If you agree, one of
the menu options could link directly to the Trust
site.
If there is any other help that we can offer, please
do not hesitate to ask. That could include updates (or
links to updates on the Trust site), news, appeals and
events.
(NB I have repeated your message and my reply in our
Visitors Book. We have quite a few readers who show a
considerable interest in the line and hopefully, some will
join the trust.
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Hullo, Dave.
Thank you for posting a most interesting set of
photographs. Bearing in mind that the railway has been
closed something over 50 years, it is amazing how much
still survives - particularly the tunnel, but also other
features as well.
The halt photograph was of particular interest to me,
especially as it is captioned "Tyler Hill Halt".
The halt was officially opened as Blean & Tyler Hill
Halt on 1st January 1908 but was renamed Tyler Halt in May
1912 reverting to the previous title in December 1915. I
wonder if that enables us to pinpoint the date of the
photograph to that period? Somehow, I doubt it as local
parlance and the possibility of an imprecise approach by
the postcard publisher could well mean that the picture
was outside the period.
My own memories of the operating railway are in the last
years. I recall (vaguely) the train passing once each way
daily but my clearest memory was that of the very last
train of the emergency period of operation in 1953. The
loco went north with two brake vans only and returned with
about half a dozen wagons marshalled between them. There
was a rumour that the train would be carrying passengers,
no doubt because the "last train" in November
1952 had done so.
I remember once walking along the closed line from the Old
Bridge to the Harbour before the reopening. After the
rails finally disappeared, like many others I frequently
walked on the trackbed . Some lineside furniture such as
gradient posts survived until around 1959 as I recall. As
you say the line was a pleasant walk. Being a member of
the 3rd Whitstable Cubs I remember the "Sausage
Sizzles" we used to have on the old railway line on
some summer Saturday mornings. We even used to provide
entertainment; my piece-de-resistance was to sing
"Bird Dog" (as NOT recorded by the Everly
Brothers) using a frying pan as a microphone. On
reflection, to call that entertainment is an act of
charity.
I remember the demolition of the railway which was carried
out by a lorry mounted crane - a Jones KL44, in fact (how
sad is it, knowing that?) and my father took some pictures
at the Old Bridge. One appeared in the Meccano Magazine
sometime in 1954. I have also found one of the others
which I have sent to you; I am still looking for the
others and as soon as I find them, I will send them on.
The railway was an important component in Whitstable's
development as it ensured the development of the Harbour
and some early excursion traffic enabling the town to
develop in several ways. It was also played an important
part in railway history although the tunnel and its
restricted loading gauge helped to ensure it never quite
played a full role in the national network. At least one
railway historian has commented that the line ceased to
have any real importance after the main line was opened
but I would dispute that. The line was built to enable
Whitstable to be an outport for Canterbury and in
performing that role, the later railway developments in
Whitstable and, to a large degree, Canterbury are not
relevant.
With renewed thanks and best wishes,
Terry Phillips
Fareham
Hants |
| Our Reply:
Thanks, Terry. I am still gathering material on the
line and have some more fascinating shots to publish in
the next Chat Column. This will include your father's
photo of the Old Bridge.
Incidentally, there is a video called "Tony
Blake Introduces Whitstable on Old Film" and this
shows the demolition of the bridge in Old Bridge Road.
I am not sure whether it is still available or where it
can be obtained. |
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