RAILSCOT | Barnstaple And Ilfracombe Railway

Barnstaple And Ilfracombe Railway

$Preservation attempts having failed, Ilfracombe station is bulldozed into rubble in September 1976. Hopefully, the station nameplate (cast concrete and far too heavy to <I>rescue</I>) has survived somewhere.<br><br>[Mark Dufton /09/1976]$
$A forlorn Barnstaple Town station photographed from a rickety signal post on 8th September 1976. Although the line through here to Ilfracombe closed in 1970, its infrastructure remained in limbo as preservation attempts continued up until 1975. A final train was run that year, then the track was removed and the cause was lost. The station building remains in a restored form, as do part of the canopy and the signal box.<br><br>[Mark Dufton 08/09/1976]$
$Looking as if it has received a direct hit from a missile, the terminus at Ilfracombe undergoing demolition on 8th September 1976. We might imagine a prophet of doom here on a summer Saturday in 1956, trying to convince station staff struggling with thousands of arriving and departing holidaymakers that, 20 years in the future, three men and a bulldozer would be busy wiping the premises off the map forever. The equivalent challenge in 2009 is to try this at a motorway services area on the M6...<br><br>[Mark Dufton 08/09/1976]$
$Closed in 1970 along with the line to Ilfracombe, the Barnstaple Town station building still stands on Castle Quay. Since closure, the restored structure has seen use as a restaurant and later as a school. The former station is seen here in June 2002. [See image 26577]<br><br>[Ian Dinmore 05/06/2002]$
$The magnificient South approach to Ilfracombe (1 in 36 down; the factory slightly left of centre is built on the former station site).<br><br>[Ken Strachan //2007]$
$The open bore of Slade tunnels, just South of Ilfracombe (the East bore - looking South).<br><br>[Ken Strachan //2007]$
$GWR Ilfracombe Poster from 1882.<br><br>[Ian Dinmore //2016]$
$One of only two 'Signal Court's in the UK. This signal, which presumably used to have a longer ladder, once stood at the Southern limit of Braunton station, on the line from Barnstaple Junction (behind photographer) to Ilfracombe. [Ref query 11455] The station building and goods shed still stand.<br><br>[Ken Strachan 28/08/2016]$

All photographs of this railway in date order.