Liverpool and Manchester Railway

Illustration of the railway in 1830

During the Industrial Revolution, huge tonnages of raw material were imported through Liverpool and carried to the textile mills near the Pennines where water, and later steam power, enabled the production of the finished cloth, much of which was then transported back to Liverpool for export.[7][8] The existing means of water transport, the Mersey and Irwell Navigation, the Bridgewater Canal and the Leeds and Liverpool Canal, dated from the 18th century, and were felt to be making excessive profits from the cotton trade and throttling the growth of Manchester and other towns.[9][10] Goods were transported between Liverpool and the factories around Manchester either by the canals or by poor-quality roads; the Turnpike between Liverpool and Manchester was described as "crooked and rough" with an "infamous" surface.[10] Road accidents were frequent, including waggons and coaches overturning, which made goods traffic problematic.[11]

The proposed railway was intended to achieve cheap transport of raw materials, finished goods and passengers between the Port of Liverpool and east Lancashire, in the port's hinterland. There was support for the railway from both Liverpool and London but Manchester was largely indifferent and opposition came from the canal operators and the two local landowners, the Earl of Derby and the Earl of Sefton, over whose land the railway would cross.[9][12]

The proposed Liverpool and Manchester Railway was to be one of the earliest land-based public transport systems not using animal traction power. Before then, public railways had been horse-drawn, including the Lake Lock Rail Road (1796),[13] Surrey Iron Railway (1801) and the Oystermouth Railway near Swansea (1807).[14]

A replica LMR coach and Rocket at the Rocket 150 event

The original promoters are usually acknowledged to be Joseph Sandars, a rich Liverpool corn merchant, and John Kennedy, owner of the largest spinning mill in Manchester. They were influenced by William James.[15][16][17] James was a land surveyor who had made a fortune in property speculation. He advocated a national network of railways, based on what he had seen of the development of colliery lines and locomotive technology in the north of England.[18]

The Liverpool and Manchester Railway Company was founded on 20 May 1824.[19] It was established by Henry Booth, who became its secretary and treasurer, along with merchants from Liverpool and Manchester. Charles Lawrence was the Chairman, Lister Ellis, Robert Gladstone, John Moss and Joseph Sandars were the Deputy Chairmen.[20]

A bill was drafted in 1825 to Parliament, which included a 1-inch to the mile map of the railway's route.[21] The first bill was rejected but the second passed in May the following year.[22] In Liverpool 172 people bought 1,979 shares, in London 96 took 844, Manchester 15 with 124, 24 others with 286. The Marquess of Stafford held 1,000, making 308 shareholders with 4,233 shares.

Stephenson's viaduct crosses the Sankey Brook, and the remains of the Sankey Canal. The viaduct is in use to this day.

The first survey for the line was carried out by James in 1822. The route was roughly the same as what was built, but the committee were unaware of exactly what land had been surveyed. James subsequently declared bankruptcy and was imprisoned that November. The committee lost confidence in his ability to plan and build the line[23] and, in June 1824, George Stephenson was appointed principal engineer.[24] As well as objections to the proposed route by Lords Sefton and Derby, Robert Haldane Bradshaw, a trustee of the Duke of Bridgewater's estate at Worsley, refused any access to land owned by the Bridgewater Trustees and Stephenson had difficulty producing a satisfactory survey of the proposed route and accepted James' original plans with spot checks.[25][24]

The survey was presented to Parliament on 8 February 1825,[26] but was shown to be inaccurate. Francis Giles suggested that putting the railway through Chat Moss was a serious error and the total cost of the line would be around £200,000 instead of the £40,000 quoted by Stephenson.[27] Stephenson was cross examined by the opposing counsel led by Edward Hall Alderson and his lack of suitable figures and understanding of the work came to light. When asked, he was unable to specify the levels of the track and how he calculated the cost of major structures such as the Irwell Viaduct. The bill was thrown out on 31 May.[28][29]

In place of George Stephenson, the railway promoters appointed George and John Rennie as engineers, who chose Charles Blacker Vignoles as their surveyor.[30] They set out to placate the canal interests and had the good fortune to approach the marquess directly through their counsel, W. G. Adam, who was a relative of one of the trustees, and the support of William Huskisson who knew the marquess personally.[31] Implacable opposition to the line changed to financial support.[32]

The second Bill received Royal assent on 5 May 1826.[33] The railway route ran on a significantly different alignment, south of Stephenson's, avoiding properties owned by opponents of the previous Bill. From Huyton the route ran directly east through Parr Moss, Newton, Chat Moss and Eccles. In Liverpool, the route included a 1.25-mile (2.01 km) tunnel from Edge Hill to the docks, avoiding crossing any streets at ground level.[32] It was intended to place the Manchester terminus on the Salford side of the River Irwell, but the Mersey and Irwell Navigation withdrew their opposition to a crossing of the river at the last moment in return for access for their carts over the intended railway bridge. The Manchester station was therefore fixed at Liverpool Road in Castlefield.[34]

View of the Railway across Chat Moss, 1831

The first contracts for draining Chat Moss were let in June 1826. The Rennies insisted that the company should appoint a resident engineer, recommending either Josias Jessop or Thomas Telford, but would not consider George Stephenson except in an advisory capacity for locomotive design.[35] The board rejected their terms and re-appointed Stephenson as engineer with his assistant Joseph Locke.[36] Stephenson clashed with Vignoles, leading to the latter resigning as resident Surveyor.[37]

The line was 31-mile (50 km) long.[38] Management was split into three sections. The western end was run by Locke, the middle section by William Allcard and the eastern section including Chat Moss, by John Dixon.[39] The track began at the 2,250-yard (2.06 km) Wapping Tunnel beneath Liverpool from the south end of Liverpool Docks to Edge Hill.[40] It was the world's first tunnel to be bored under a metropolis.[41] Following this was a 2-mile (3 km) long cutting up to 70 feet (21 m) deep through rock at Olive Mount,[42] and a 712-foot (217 m) nine-arch viaduct, each arch of 50 feet (15 m) span and around 60 feet (18 m) high) over the Sankey Brook valley.[43]

The railway included the 4+3⁄4-mile (7.6 km) crossing of Chat Moss. It was found impossible to drain the bog and so the engineers used a design from Robert Stannard, steward for William Roscoe, that used wrought iron rails supported by timber in a herring bone layout.[44] About 70,000 cubic feet (2,000 m³) of spoil was dropped into the bog; at Blackpool Hole, a contractor tipped soil into the bog for three months without finding the bottom.[45] The line was supported by empty tar barrels sealed with clay and laid end to end across the drainage ditches either side of the railway.[46] The railway over Chat Moss was completed by the end of 1829. On 28 December, the Rocket travelled over the line carrying 40 passengers and crossed the Moss in 17 minutes, averaging 17 miles per hour (27 km/h).[47] In April the following year, a test train carrying a 45-ton load crossed the moss at 15 miles per hour (24 km/h) without incident.[48] The line now supports locomotives 25 times the weight of the Rocket.

The railway needed 64 bridges and viaducts,[4] all built of brick or masonry, with one exception: the Water Street bridge at the Manchester terminus. A cast iron beam girder bridge was built to save headway in the street below. It was designed by William Fairbairn and Eaton Hodgkinson, and cast locally at their factory in Ancoats. It is important because cast iron girders became an important structural material for the growing rail network.[49] Although Fairbairn tested the girders before installation, not all were so well designed, and there were many examples of catastrophic failure in the years to come, resulting in the Dee bridge disaster of 1847 and culminating in the Tay Bridge disaster of 1879.

The line was laid using 15-foot (4.6 m) fish-belly rails at 35 lb/yd (17 kg/m), laid either on stone blocks or, at Chat Moss, wooden sleepers.[50][51]

The physical work was carried out by a large team of men, known as "navvies", using hand tools. The most productive teams could move up to 20,000 tonnes of earth in a day and were well paid.[52] Nevertheless, the work was dangerous and several deaths were recorded.[53]

The railway passes the Bridgewater Foundry at Patricroft, pictured in 1839

In 1829 adhesion-worked locomotives were not reliable. The experience on the Stockton and Darlington Railway was well-publicised, and a section of the Hetton colliery railway had been converted to cable haulage. The success of the cable haulage was indisputable but the steam locomotive was still untried. The L&MR had sought to de-emphasise the use of steam locomotives during the passage of the bill, the public were alarmed at the idea of monstrous machines which, if they did not explode, would fill the countryside with noxious fumes.

Attention was turning towards steam road carriages, such as those of Goldsworthy Gurney's and there was a division in the L&MR board between those who supported Stephenson's "loco-motive" and those who favoured cable haulage, the latter supported by the opinion of the engineer, John Rastrick. Stephenson was not averse to cable haulage—he continued to build such lines where he felt it appropriate—but knew its main disadvantage, that any breakdown anywhere would paralyse the whole line.

The line's gradient was designed to concentrate the steep grades in three places, at either side of Rainhill at 1 in 96 and down to the docks at Liverpool at 1 in 50) and make the rest of the line very gently graded, no further than 1 in 880.[50] When the line opened, the passenger section from Edge Hill to Crown Street railway station was cable hauled, as was the section through the Wapping Tunnel, as the Act of Parliament forbade the use of locomotives on this part of the line.[54]

To determine whether and which locomotives would be suitable, in October 1829 the directors organised a public competition, known as the Rainhill trials, which involved a run along a 1 mile (1.6 km) stretch of track.[55] Ten locomotives were entered for the trials, but on the day of the competition only five were available to compete:[56] Rocket, designed by George Stephenson and his son, Robert, was the only one to successfully complete the journey and, consequently, Robert Stephenson and Company were awarded the locomotive contract.[57]

The line was built to 4 ft 8+1⁄2 in (1,435 mm) (standard gauge) and double track.[39] A decision had to be made about how far apart the two tracks should be. It was decided to make the space between the separate tracks the same as the track gauge itself, so that it would be possible to operate trains with unusually wide loads up the middle during quiet times. Stephenson was criticised for this decision;[39] it was later decided that the tracks were too close together, restricting the width of the trains, so the gap between tracks (track centres) was widened. The narrowness of the gap contributed to the first fatality, that of William Huskisson, and also made it dangerous to perform maintenance on one track while trains were operating on the other. To this day, adjacent tracks of British railways tend to be laid closer together than elsewhere.[58]

A replica of the Planet

The line opened on 15 September 1830 with termini at Manchester, Liverpool Road (now part of the Museum of Science and Industry in Manchester) and Liverpool Crown Street. The festivities of the opening day were marred when William Huskisson, the Member of Parliament for Liverpool, was killed.[17] The southern line was reserved for the special opening train, drawn by the locomotive Northumbrian conveying the Duke of Wellington, the Prime Minister, in an ornamental carriage, together with distinguished guests in other carriages.[59] When the train stopped for water at Parkside, near Newton-le-Willows, it was intended that the other trains should pass in review on the northern line.[60][61] It was easy for passengers to get down and stretch their legs, despite being instructed not to, particularly as there was an interval between the delayed passing trains. Huskisson decided to alight and stroll alongside the train, and on spotting the Duke decided to start a conversation. The Rocket was spotted heading in the opposite direction as people shouted at Huskisson to get back on the train.[62][63]

The Huskisson Memorial in 1913

The Austrian ambassador was pulled back into the carriage, but Huskisson panicked.[64] He tried to climb into the carriage, but grabbed the open door, which swung back, causing him to lose his grip. He fell between the tracks and the Rocket ran over his leg, shattering it. He is reported to have said, "I have met my death—God forgive me!"[63]

The Northumbrian was detached from the Duke's train and rushed him to Eccles, where he died in the vicarage.[65] Thus he became the world's first widely reported railway passenger fatality. The somewhat subdued party proceeded to Manchester, where, the Duke being deeply unpopular with the weavers and mill workers, they were given a lively reception, and returned to Liverpool without alighting.[66] A grand reception and banquet had been prepared for their arrival.

Stephenson's bridge over the Warrington – Wigan Turnpike Road (now A49) at Newton-le-Willows

The L&MR was successful and popular, and reduced journey times between Liverpool and Manchester to two hours.[67] Most stage coach companies operating between the two towns closed shortly after the railway opened as it was impossible to compete.[68] Within a few weeks of the line opening, it ran its first excursion trains and carried the world's first railway mail carriages;[69] by the summer of 1831, it was carrying special trains to the races.[70] The railway was a financial success, paying investors an average annual dividend of 9.5% over the 15 years of its independent existence: a level of profitability that would never again be attained by a British railway company.[71]

The railway was purposefully designed for the benefit of the public, carrying passengers as well as freight. Shares in the company were limited to ten per person and profits from these were limited.[72] Although the intention had been to carry goods, the canal companies reduced their prices, leading to a price war between them and the railway.[73] The line did not start carrying goods until December, when the first of some more powerful engines, Planet, was delivered.

The line's success in carrying passengers was universally acclaimed.[72] The experience at Rainhill had shown that unprecedented speed could be achieved and travelling by rail was cheaper and more comfortable than travel by road. The company concentrated on passenger travel, a decision that had repercussions across the country and triggered the "railway mania of the 1840s".[74] John B. Jervis of the Delaware and Hudson Railway some years later wrote: "It must be regarded ... as opening the epoch of railways which has revolutionised the social and commercial intercourse of the civilized world".[75]

At first trains travelled at 16 miles per hour (26 km/h) carrying passengers and 8 miles per hour (13 km/h) carrying goods because of the limitations of the track.[76] Drivers could, and did, travel more quickly, but were reprimanded: it was found that excessive speeds forced apart the light rails, which were set onto individual stone blocks without cross-ties. In 1837 the original fish-belly parallel rail of 50 pounds per yard (24.8 kg/m), on sleepers started to be replaced.[77]

The railway directors realised that Crown Street was too far away from the centre of Liverpool to be practical, and decided in 1831 to construct a new terminus at Lime Street.[78] The tunnel from Edge Hill to Lime Street was completed in January 1835 and opened the following year. The station opened on 15 August 1836 before it had been completed.[79]

On 30 July 1842, work started to extend the line from Ordsall Lane to a new station at Hunts Bank in Manchester that also served the Manchester and Leeds Railway. The line opened on 4 May 1844 and Liverpool Road station was then used for goods traffic.[80]

On 8 August 1845, the L&MR was absorbed by its principal business partner, the Grand Junction Railway (GJR), which had opened the first trunk railway from Birmingham to Warrington in 1837.[81] The following year the GJR formed part of the London and North Western Railway.[82]

In 2009, electrification at 25 kV AC was announced. The section between Manchester and Newton, including the Chat Moss section, was completed in 2013; the line onwards to Liverpool opened on 5 March 2015.[93]

The historic passenger railway station of Manchester Liverpool Road is a Grade I Listed building, and was threatened by the Northern Hub plan. This included the construction of the Ordsall Chord to provide direct access between Victoria and Piccadilly, in turn cutting off access from Liverpool Road. The Science & Industry Museum, that is based at the former station premises, had initially objected to the scheme and an inquiry was set up in 2014 to investigate the potential damage to the historic structure.[94] The chord opened in November 2017 without any damage to the original Liverpool Road station structures.[95]