Port Talbot Railway and Docks Company
The Port Talbot Railway and Docks Company was formed in 1894 to secure the means of bringing minerals, chiefly coal, to the harbour in South Wales. It took over the docks at Port Talbot that had been operated by the Port Talbot Company. It opened its main line in 1897 and reached a connection with the Great Western Railway Garw Valley line the following year. A branch line to collieries near Tonmawr also opened in 1898. The lines were extremely steeply graded and operation was difficult and expensive, but the company was successful. Passenger operation on the main line started in 1898, but this was never a principal part of the business. For some time most of the passenger train service was operated by a railmotor that was the largest ever to work in the United Kingdom. Also in 1898 the Ogmore Valleys Extension line, a part of the PTR&D, was opened. It had been projected as a defensive measure against competitive incursion, and it led from Margam Junction towards Tondu.
When the mineral activity in the area declined after 1960, so did the PTR&D system, and the OVE lines and the dock lines at Port Talbot are the only remaining tracks in use.
The controlling shareholder in the company for many years was Emily Charlotte Talbot, an unusually powerful woman for the times.
Port Talbot Dock Company
inherited the Penrice and Margam estates in West Glamorgan in 1813. The Margam estate straddled the outcrop of the South Wales Coalfield, and had considerable mineral potential.Transport of coal and other minerals away to market was hampered by the poor conditions at the nearby Aberavon harbour, and after a false start, the Aberavon Port and Harbour Act 1836 was obtained to carry out improvements, and to call the harbour Port Talbot. The works included straightening out the course of the River Avon towards the sea. In fact the scheme was grossly undercapitalised and there appear in addition to have been financial irregularities; the Port Talbot Company went into receivership in 1858, which lasted until matters were regularised in 1863.
In that year, a railway connection to the South Wales Railway was constructed, and improved appliances for the loading of coal to ships were installed. The branch line opened formally on 1 September 1864.
As time went, on Christopher Talbot became a major creditor of the company, as it failed to honour rent and debenture payments. When the company proposed improvements to the harbour in 1876 he obstructed most elements of the scheme, especially those involving major expenditure, and continued in that attitude to most proposals. The Rhondda and Swansea Bay Railway was building its line, destined to connect the Rhondda Fawr with Swansea Bay; the wanted to develop Aberavon but Talbot resisted that. The matter continued without any progress, and as Talbot became older, he became even more difficult to negotiate with. Meanwhile the condition of the harbour deteriorated and ships' masters were unwilling to trade there because of the poor conditions.
In frustration, the obtained an authorising act of Parliament, the Rhondda and Swansea Bay Railway Act 1890, permitting development of the harbour. Naturally the Port Talbot Company, as owners who were against the improvements, were given what amounted to a veto. However Talbot had died on 17 January 1890 at the age of 86, and his unmarried daughter Emily Charlotte Talbot inherited his considerable wealth, nearly £6 million.
From this time, two major attempts were made to achieve a negotiated working arrangement between industrial promoters and Emily Talbot. The second would have involved the formation of a Port Talbot Docks and Railway company. Neither of the schemes came to reality.
Formation of the Port Talbot Railway and Dock Company
The mineral development of the area above Port Talbot demanded action of some kind, and in the 1894 session of Parliament, opposing Bills were considered. One was by the Great Western Railway, and one was by the Port Talbot Company. They were for railways from Port Talbot to Maesteg, and improvements of the harbour at Port Talbot, and they were clearly mutually exclusive. The PT scheme was to extend its railway beyond Maesteg to join the GWR Blaengarw branch at Pontyrhyll, and to acquire running powers over the Blaengarw line and also the GWR main line from Port Talbot into Swansea. It was this scheme that was approved, with the gaining royal assent on 31 July 1894, but the running powers into Swansea were not included. The Port Talbot Company was restructured into the Port Talbot Railway and Docks Company. The authorised capital was £600,000, of which Emily Talbot was entitled to over 20% by virtue of shares, and money owed to her by the old company.A contract for the work was let to S. Pearson and Son in the amount of £527,000. The firm had been selected in advance, and no competing tenders were sought; this fact led to some controversy at a Board meeting, and the resignation of a director.
Opening
Construction was fairly straightforward, and the first revenue traffic was conveyed on 30 August 1897, entering the Port Talbot North Dock lines via Copper Works Junction, that is, the southern route. The line opened as far as Lletty Brongu for mineral traffic the following day, 31 August 1897. In the middle of January 1898 the mineral working was extended to the Garw at Pontyrhyll Junction.Whitworth and Blaenavon
Even as the PTR&D main line was under construction, controversy had arisen over access to pits further north, in the vicinity of Tonmawr. The South Wales Mineral Railway had been built, passing the area since 1863, but connected collieries complained that the inconvenience of the rope worked Ynysmaerdy incline on that line limited their trade. In 1885 the Rhondda and Swansea Bay Railway opened its main line up the Cwmavon valley, but passed some distance to the south of the pits. Nonetheless the R&SBR became involved in discussions about connections to the pits, but in the end declined to assist.After considerable negotiation, the PTR&D agreed to build a line up Cwmavon from Tonygroes, paralleling much of the R&SBR line, but then turning north to run parallel to the South Wales Mineral Railway. At what became Blaenavon Junction the new line forked, continuing on one arm to Blaenavon where there were pits. The other arm continued a short distance to Tonmawr, making a junction there with the SWMR. By this time the Tonmawr Colliery branch of the SWMR had closed. A short distance further on along the SWMR line a new PTR&D branch to Whitworth Colliery was made, taking over the existing private railway of the Whitworth Colliery estate as part of the scheme.
All of this, after much argumentation in Parliament, received royal assent on 7 August 1896 as the and probably opened in June 1898, and the line opened on 14 November 1898.
Passengers
The company wanted to start passenger operation and Lieutenant Colonel Yorke made the Board of Trade inspection in January 1898 and sanctioned the running of passenger trains on the main line. They started running on 14 February 1898.A portion of line at Port Talbot between Duffryn Junction and Copper Works Junction in the new dock area was opened on 10 August 1898. This gave the PTR&D access to the docks without running over R&SBR tracks.
From 1 June 1898, the PTR&D passenger trains started running to the disused R&SBR Aberavon station. There were four return services a day, with an additional Saturday afternoon return trip, and from 5 March 1898 a Saturday evening return trip as well.
Ogmore Valleys Extension Railway
In 1895, promoters associated with the Barry Railway proposed a London and South Wales Railway. This was to by-pass the Great Western Railway by building a new line from Cogan, near Cardiff, to the Metropolitan Railway north of London. The motivation in this was dissatisfaction with the Great Western Railway, which had a monopoly of rail transport from South Wales to London and Salisbury.Swansea was not to be left out: the Vale of Glamorgan Railway, controlled by the Barry Railway, proposed a westward extension from their line, through Porthcawl to join the Rhondda and Swansea Bay Railway. Together the two schemes would provide a new line from Swansea to London. The VoGR part would bisect Emily Talbot's lands and put the PTR&D at a disadvantage.
Accordingly, a defensive scheme was proposed by her advisers. A railway was designed to traverse her lands broadly giving the alignment sought by the VoGR scheme, and running powers on it would be offered to them, enabling the PTR&D to retain control locally. The proposal extended to building as far as Tondu, and after negotiation the GWR agreed to facilitate traffic from its L&OR lines to the OVE route.
This plan was submitted for the 1896 session of Parliament in parallel with the London and South Wales Railway scheme. The London and South Wales Railway proposal was withdrawn when the GWR gave certain undertakings, but the OVE was considered to be worthwhile in its own right, and it was authorised on 20 July 1896 as the . As well as the new construction the powers included acquisition of the Cefn and Pyle Railway, a horse tramroad leading from ironworks at Cefn to Pyle GWR station. This was to be converted to main line standards as a locomotive line.
The OVE line, the property of the PTR&D, was probably opened on 19 December 1898, for goods and mineral traffic only.
Worked by the Great Western Railway
Notwithstanding the wording of the Company title, Railway and Docks, the dock activity was clearly more important and more demanding of directorial time, and in 1902 the Great Western Railway had enquired whether the PTR&D would wish the GWR to work the railway for them. This was not considered appropriate at the time, but towards the end of 1907 the idea found more favour.Running powers and the working arrangements were agreed on 24 January 1908, but for financial calculation were considered to have been operative from 1 January 1907. At first the railway operation in the immediate docks area at Port Talbot was excluded, but this proved to raise practical difficulties and on 9 August 1911 it was agreed that the GWR would work all the railways activity; the agreement was backdated to 1 January 1911.
From the GWR's point of view, this was advantageous because of the rival Barry Railway's ambitions to expand to the west; the GWR's domination west of Porthcawl effectively suppressed that intention.