The layout is set in Bethania, a real hamlet alongside the Afon Glaslyn up the valley from Beddgelert in an area known as Nant Gwynant. Today it has a chapel that's been converted into a tea shop, a bunkhouse, a few cottages and a car park as it sits at the start of the Watkin Path up Snowdon.
At the end of the 19th century the North Wales Narrow Gauge Rlys gained the rights to build a rly from Porthmadog to Betws Y Coed through Nant Gwynant and Capel Curig. Bethania assumes that this line was built and a success and Bethania had a private line to the South Snowdon Slate Quarries. Sitting at the foot of the Watkin Path up Snowdon it will also have a small tourist appeal. At the minute I'm not sure whether to set it around 1910 (clean-ish locos and stock) or in the early 1920s assuming there has been a resurgance in slate and tourist traffic (clean-ish locos and stock and some ex-WD stock).
The track diagram gives an idea of roughly how it will look. The masterplan is to be as accurate to history as I can. The chapel and terrace will be modelled, NWNGR locos and stock will be used in NWNGR livery. This will be a bit of a challenge as it was influenced so much by the Portmadoc Beddgelert and South Snowdon Rly and later the Welsh Highland Railway, none of which would have existed had the NWNGR been a commercial success. That said Russell will be an allowed compromise, as will the assumption that a link was built between Beddgelert and Rhyd Ddu.
Hopefully more to follow!
3 comments:
Please do keep posting- it looks like an interesting project. I'll have to look Bethania on Google Earth in my coffee break...
It does seem that everyone has the same idea all of a sudden. Our plans are separated by 80 years so I expect our layouts will look totally different. I'm currently thinking of setting my layout at Pen-y-Gwryd but that might change. Colin and I have both replied to your post on my blog with some information about plans
I walked up Snowdon from the car park near Bethania last summer. It will be interesting see a layout based somewhere I've been.
Hi, now I understand exactly where your looking to model I can describe the plans I have to you. The railway was planned to run between the road and river and thus in front of the chapel. After skirting the south side of Llyn Dinas, it crossed the Glaslyn just after the east side of the lake. On the north bank of the river there was a planned station (no idea why as there is nothing there - maybe a nice view of the lake? or future slate quarrying?). Then it runs between road and river gradually getting closer to the road which it runs almost next to past the chapel at Bethany. North-east of here the river takes a sharp 90 degree turn and the railway doesn't, it continues parallel with what is now the watkin path. At the next field boundary where the path splits (a track heads north-east towards Hafod y llan) the railway splits too with a station on the main line and a short spur on the left hand side to what is labelled as a goods siding (presumably for transfer from the south snowdon quarry via its tramway and inclines). The station is at GR 627509, the goods siding at 62751. Both the loop at the station and goods siding are shown as 3 chains long.
The main line then continues north-east and crosses the Glaslyn north-east of Hafod y llan at 632513. Then continuing to a terminus at 638515 (south-west side of Llyn Gwynant).
Railway No 2 (from Portmadoc)is shown as 11 miles long in total. Other stations on the section never built were at the south-west side of Llyn Dinas and in Beddgelert at 594482.
So, this beings me to the following conclusions for your layout as proposed, compared with the plans I have for NWNG Rlys No 2:
- the railway would most likely have been between the road and river and south of the chapel not north of it as your plan assumes
- the junction for the south snowdon quarry line would have been much further away from Bethania than on your plan (and would have led to an exchange siding)
- there would indeed have been a station in the area but not next to the chapel, it would have been further up at the junction between main line and goods siding.
- the railway would not have crossed the Glaslyn as shown in your plan. It does so over 1Km away from Bethania nearer hafod y llan
- The loop and goods siding are separated by the spur line and not at the same place as shown in your plan.
This above is not meant as a criticism and indeed your plan is very nice from an operating point of view. Of course as it never happened anyway, you could claim that your plan would have been the way it would have been built, I am just trying to use the info I have on the deposited plans (which received parliamentary approval) to try and work out the most likely scenario.
For info too the land used for your station at Bethania is not even in the limits of deviation and thus would certainly have required a complete new application to parliament to be built, and I suspect that the gradients required/excavation necessary would make that station site unworkable and thus the site north-east of Bethania would be much more likely.
Hope this helps/is interesting anyway.
Cheers,
Colin
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