Cardiff Railway
From 1839, the trustees of the Marquis of Bute, operated a large dock operation in Cardiff, the "Bute Docks". This was very successful, but was overwhelmed by the huge volume of coal exported through Cardiff. At the same time, it was seen that railway companies, especially the Taff Vale Railway, were making money conveying the coal to the docks.
The Bute Docks company decided to build a railway from Pontypridd to their dock; they obtained an act of Parliament, the Cardiff Railway Act 1898, giving authority for part of the route in 1898, and changed the company name to the Cardiff Railway. To be successful, they needed to make a junction with their main rival, the TVR, at Treforest. A single mineral train traversed the junction in 1909 but legal challenges prevented any further use. The Cardiff Railway had built an expensive railway line that failed to connect with the collieries beyond Pontypridd. The company became part of the Great Western Railway in 1923.
A low-key passenger service was operated, and a colliery at Nantgarw was served until 1952. The passenger service was cut back to Coryton in 1931 and continues to operate today.
Bute Docks
Already in the 18th century, it was obvious that some improved means was needed to convey coal mined in the South Wales Valleys to wharves on the Bristol Channel. For many of the pits, Cardiff was the nearest and most convenient location, and in 1790, the Glamorganshire Canal opened from Navigation House to Cardiff.This represented huge progress, but the canal had 49 locks and did not directly reach the majority of the mineral sites. As iron smelting developed on an industrial scale, the demands of that industry too soon outstripped the transport facilities available.
The first large dock opened in Cardiff on 9 October 1839; it was named the Bute Dock after Lord Bute who was the principal owner. From 8 October 1840 the Taff Vale Railway opened, in stages, from Merthyr to the Bute Dock, later connecting in pits in the Rhondda and elsewhere. The Rhymney Railway too opened its line from the upper part of the valleys, also reaching the Bute Dock.
In 1850, the South Wales Railway opened part of its main line; instead of bringing down minerals from the upper part of the valleys, the South Wales Railway was a trunk line, conceived to connect London with Milford Haven, and from there to generate a transatlantic shipping connection. The South Wales Railway also required a dock connection in Cardiff, for minerals it brought there from along its own line, and this demand put yet further strain on the docks. A second dock was built, and as the Bute East Dock, it opened on 20 July 1855; the original Bute Dock was renamed the Bute West Dock.
From these years, there was continual feuding between the Taff Vale Railway and the Rhymney Railway. Finally, on 7 October 1871, the London and North Western Railway secured access to the docks by virtue of running powers over the Rhymney Railway.
Other docks
The Bute docks in Cardiff were not the only docks available. From the outset, Newport Docks had been a serious rival. Further west, the small harbour at Porthcawl, and the Port Talbot docks were important alternatives, although Porthcawl never developed much. Swansea too, after a late start, became the home of an important dock operation.Nevertheless, the huge expansion of South Wales steam coal overwhelmed the available dock facilities, and this led to corresponding hostility to the Bute Docks Trustees, who were seen with some justification as happy to take excessive charges for the use of the dock without making adequate steps to enhance the capacity, and more importantly, to modernise the mechanical handling facilities in their dock.
This feeling led to a long-standing desire to build alternative dock facilities in the Cardiff general area. These included Penarth Dock, developed by the Taff Vale Railway, Roath, also developed by the TVR and reached by the building of a new branch line opened in 1888, and Barry Docks. This last was an extensive dock facility laid out with plenty of space and the latest loading aids, with the benefit of new access railways not constrained by the capacity of the existing railways. The Taff Vale Railway had long been criticised for congestion of its lines leading to the Bute docks.
Building a new railway
Against this background the trustees of the Earl of Bute decided that they should build a railway line to get access to the lucrative traffic in coal and other minerals from the Rhondda and the upper part of the Taff Valley and the Cynon Valley. This, they believed, would enhance their income from transport to their docks as well as the operation of the docks as such. In 1885, they purchased the moribund Glamorganshire Canal and the Aberdare Canal, with the intention of converting them both into railway lines. This was not proceeded with at once, but in the 1896 session of Parliament, the trustees submitted a bill for the purpose.The Taff Vale Railway saw this as an obvious assault on its established near-monopoly in those areas, and sought to counter-attack by proposing yet another dock near Cardiff, on the east bank of the River Ely opposite Penarth, and a bill was submitted for this work in the 1896 session. Both this and the Bute Bills were rejected, however.
In the following session, both companies tried their proposals once again in Parliament, and this time the Bute Trustees were successful. Their act of Parliament, ', of 6 August 1897, authorised a line from a junction with the Rhymney Railway at Heath to the Taff Vale at Pontypridd, with a junction to the Taff Vale Railway at Treforest. The act authorised the change of name from the Bute Docks to the Cardiff Railway, although the dock operation was to be included in the new company's activity.
The Taff Vale Railway was alarmed at this development, as it could only result in traffic, and income, being diverted from its line to the Cardiff Railway. Having found success, the Cardiff Railway promoted a further bill in the following session, and was authorised as the ' on 12 August 1898 to build a railway from Roath Dock to its newly authorised line, joining the Rhymney Railway near the junction. Also proposed in the bill was a new line from Heath Junction to the docks, which would have made the Cardiff Railway independent of other lines at the southern end, but this was rejected by Parliament.
The junction at Treforest
On 30 January 1902, the board was informed that the construction to Tongwynlais was substantially completed, and, at this time, the company put details of its proposed junction with the Taff Vale Railway at Treforest to that company for approval.The terrain at the point chosen by the Cardiff Railway for its junction with the Taff Vale was extremely awkward. The Taff Vale Railway run down the west bank of the River Taff and was closely hemmed in by the hills to the west. Immediately to the east was the River Taff and the Glamorganshire Canal, and then the Pontypridd, Caerphilly and Newport Railway, and then more hills.
The Taff Vale Railway at this point was quadruple track, with the passenger lines on the east side and goods and mineral tracks on the west side. Immediately north of the proposed point of junction, southbound trains could diverge to the lines of the Barry Railway Company. It was a point of contention that many mineral trains were divided at this location, on the running line, with one portion for Cardiff TVR and one for the Barry line.
The Cardiff Railway proposed to join the passenger lines and then make crossovers to the mineral lines—the main object of their railway was of course the mineral traffic. The existing traffic on the TVR was remarkably intensive at this time, and the proposal alarmed the company. They examined the rights of the Cardiff Railway and saw that there were no running powers granted on their own line, nor powers to connect to all four tracks; moreover, they claimed, the alignment proposed by the Cardiff Railway was outside the limits of deviation permitted by the Cardiff Railway Act.
The question went to arbitration, and then to litigation, and judgment was eventually given against the Cardiff Railway. The CR now went to Parliament to seek the powers that had not been granted before, and they obtained an act of Parliament, the , on 4 August 1906, authorising the junction and crossovers they desired. However the junction was not to be opened until the Cardiff Railway had constructed exchange sidings on their own property short of the TVR main line, so that CR engines need not enter TVR tracks.
The space available for the purpose of building the sidings was constrained by the point at which the CR line crossed the River Taff, but the sidings were squeezed in. New proposals for the junction were submitted to the TVR, which again rejected them. The design was said to be dangerous; the location was very busy: 294 trains passed the location in 24 hours, and in addition the Barry section of many trains was separated there; long mineral trains were divided on the running line. The Barry Railway also objected, fearing interference with their own traffic. The exchange sidings were said to be insufficiently long to hold full length trains; the space available was clearly not long enough, unless the sidings were extended over the Taff, which would require a series of bridges for them. There was now a dispute about how long a standard wagon was, and whether new Railway Clearing House recommendations for wagon sizes had been allowed for.
Once again the matter went to arbitration, held by J. C. Inglis of the Great Western Railway, and at length Inglis found in favour of the CR in May 1908; it was now six years after the issue was first raised.
At this time the TVR offered to purchase the Cardiff Railway. With the CR docks operation, this would have been highly advantageous to the TVR, enabling them to take control of the transport of minerals to the docks and loading there. At the same time the Cardiff Railway was now in financial difficulty, having expended a major outlay on the railway and having gained no income from it. Terms were agreed, and the matter went to Parliament in the 1909 session, but Parliament rejected the proposal on the grounds of the reduction in competition that would be caused. The Barry Railway and the Alexandra Docks and Railway Company had opposed it, as well as the TVR.
Meanwhile, having obtained Inglis's adjudication in their favour, the Cardiff Railway laid in a temporary junction at Treforest. On 15 May 1909 a revenue-earning coal train from the Bute Colliery at Treherbert passed from the TVR system on to the Cardiff Railway. A directors' saloon was attached to the train and the Marquis of Bute and directors of the Cardiff Railway travelled in the train; the Marquis travelled on the engine for the actual crossing of the junction. Immediately after this apparent triumph, the Taff Vale Railway demanded that the temporary junction be removed, on the grounds that it was unauthorised and in a location not permitted by Parliament.