The Congleton Railway

I spotted these whilst out walking a few days ago, but it was raining so hard that I couldn't risk getting the camera out of the bag. Today the sun was shining and so I was off up to Mow Cop Edge to get a shot. These are stone sleeper blocks from the Congleton Railway of c1807, now incorporated into a wall alongside the former route of this line. The track used was oval iron bars about 3ft long with a foot cast into the ends. The wheels on the trams were double flanged according to Farey in his General View of the Agriculture of Derbyshire vol 3 (1817). The line, which brought coal from Stonetrough Colliery in Staffordshire to a wharf on the outskirts of Congleton, had only a short life and was abandoned some time after the opening of the Macclesfield Canal in 1831