The Peak District has always been a formidable barrier to transport
links across it, particularly railways. The first crude horse-drawn
tramways fed canals on its eastern and western flanks, but in 1830
- only five years after the Stockton & Darlington Railway
opened - a standard gauge line climbed over the top of the Peak
District and down the other side on fearsome inclines to connect
canals at Cromford and Whaley Bridge. Sheffield and Manchester were
connected in 1845 by the first line across the Pennines through the
notorious Woodhead Tunnel, followed by a gradual infilling of lines
connecting Peak District towns and villages. Some of them became as
famous as the Settle-Carlisle route, such were the engineering
difficulties of driving a route through the limestone dales. The
line between Dore and Chinley was the last main line in England to
be driven across the Pennines in two huge tunnels. At its height
the Peak District railway system encompassed a narrow gauge light
railway for tourists, cable-hauled inclines to export limestone,
seven of the UK's twenty longest railway tunnels, and Britain's
first all-electric main line. The birth of British Railways in 1948
and the subsequent Beeching axe were the death knell for many of
these unique railways. Today some of the tracks can still be
followed on foot, bicycle or horseback thanks to the Peak District
National Park and other leisure organisations. The historic
tunnels, viaducts and stations on the most famous routes have been
restored and reopened as long-distance footpaths and heritage lines
- a renaissance to be enjoyed by today's tourists.
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