Avon and Gloucestershire Railway

In the latter years of the eighteenth century, coal pits were opened up in what became the northern and eastern parts of the Bristol Coalfield and the Somerset Coalfield. Extracting the coal was only part of the process, and bringing it to market was the necessary next step; before proper roads existed, land transport of heavy bulk materials posed huge challenges, although rivers and canals provided a partial solution.

The important industrial city of Bristol generated a massive demand for coal, for domestic and industrial purposes, and the proprietors of pits in the Coalpit Heath area, about nine miles (14 km) north-east of the city, turned their attention to wagonways and tramways as a solution to their transport problem. Numerous schemes were put forward, but none gained the necessary financial support until the Bristol and Gloucestershire Railway (B&GlosR) was formed, in October 1827.

It was to be a horse-operated railway, running from pits in the Coalpit Heath area to a wharf on the Floating Harbour in Bristol. During the meetings to determine the support for the proposed railway, the Kennet and Avon Canal company had expressed a desire that here should be a branch to the River Avon, with which the canal connected, near Keynsham, and this was apparently agreed to. This was to enable the canal company to convey coal to Bath and further east to the Wiltshire towns it served.

At the meeting it was decided that construction of the Keynsham branch of the B&GR line would be handed over to a separate company, the Avon and Gloucestershire Railway (A&GR). The A&GR would have running powers over the section of the B&GlosR to reach the collieries. The Kennet and Avon Canal Company (K&ACC) agreed to subscribe £10,000 towards the project, which was estimated by John Blackwell to cost £20,226 11s 2d. The promoters obtained an act of Parliament, the Avon and Gloucestershire Railway Act 1828 (9 Geo. 4. c. xciv), for their line on 19 June 1828; the parliamentary expenses were paid by the canal company.

As was usual at this date, maximum toll rates were stipulated in the act, as well as wharfage and warehousing; cranage was also specified: 6d for under two tons; 1s 0d for less than three tons; 1s 6d for less than four tons; and so progressively advancing 6d per ton.

The A&GR would run from a junction with the B&GlosR line at Mangotsfield (close to the site of the later Mangotsfield North Junction on the later main line railway) and follow a southerly course to the River Avon. Any coal from Coalpit Heath for the A&GR line would therefore travel over the B&GlosR line as far as the junction.

The majority of the shares in the new company were in the hands of the K&ACC and within a year the canal company bought out all the privately owned shares, so that they owned the A&GR outright. Following this, the K&ACC borrowed £20,000 to help fund the building of the A&GR. They borrowed a further £10,000 in 1831 and another £10,000 in 1832.

Mission creep followed, as several branches were proposed in October 1829, including a three-mile (4.8 km) branch to Wick Limestone Rocks; this was not in fact built. A 43-chain (0.54 mi; 0.87 km) branch to Soundwell Colliery from Siston Common was built, as was a 25-chain (0.31 mi; 0.50 km) branch to Londonderry Wharf on the River Avon; also proposed at this time was a Shortwood Colliery branch from Mangotsfield; this was actually built by the B&GlosR.

The railway seems to have been operating to full capacity from the beginning, and all the wagons were fully in use. From the opening until May 1835, receipts amounted to: tonnage (i.e. the toll for materials carried): £3,041 15s 3d; hire of wagons: £1,072s 5d; rent: £989 15s 0d. These sums probably exclude the Londonderry branch, which was treated as a separate entity. It was said that the opening of the line resulted in a reduction in the price of coal delivered to the K&ACC of three to four shillings.

The B&GlosR company had opened its line in 1835, and this resulted in considerable abstraction from the A&GR line tonnage carried had reduced to less than half. Suggestions were made of improper favouritism of the B&GlosR line as the destination for coal produced, although the reduction may simply have been the result of a cheaper route to market. The A&GR reduced some tonnage rates, and inevitably their income suffered.

Maggs states that "Most of the money loaned had been paid off... but it was impossible to pay off the capital expenditure." This appears to mean that the company's bank loans and personal loans had been cleared, but a specific loan from the K&ACC for the construction of the line had not. In June 1843 the K&ACC, as parent company, decided to write off a £45,000 sum due from the A&GR as a bad debt.