Southampton and Dorchester Railway

Planning and Construction

The Southampton and Dorchester Railway, operating in the counties of Hampshire and Dorset, received Parliamentary Assent in 1845 and opened in 1847. The railway was promoted by a Wimborne solicitor, Charles Castleman. It was known as Castleman's Corkscrew because of the circuitous route it followed to cover the population in the area it served, and only served the port of Poole via a branch to Lower Hamworthy, a ferry crossing from the centre of the town. Poole was then served by a branch from Broadstone to Bournemouth West.However, the rapid growth of Bournemouth as a town made the Ringwood line vulnerable to replacement by a newer service. The construction of a branch from Ringwood to Christchurch, later extended to Bournemouth East, only stimulated demand. In the late nineteenth century cutoff lines across Holes Bay, connecting the two Bournemouth lines and from Brockenhurst to Christchurch shortened the journey time to the new resort and all points west and left the line through Ringwood as a backwater.Subsequently passenger numbers fell and the services were withdrawn in the Beeching Axe purges.

Dorchester South

During the 1840s when the line was being planned Dorchester was intended as a station on the line from Southampton to Exeter rather than Weymouth. This resulted in the station being built off the line of the Weymouth branch, the curve to which was opened in 1857. Trains in both directions would draw into the single platform of a one sided station. Trains from Weymouth passed the station, then reversed in. Trains from Bournemouth would go in past the up platform to reach their own, then leave the station heading back toward Bournemouth and reverse to reach Weymouth. An 1877 accident brought criticism of this practice from the Board of Trade. As a result, in 1879 a separate down platform was built on the inside of the curve. The platform to allow up trains to call without reversing was not built until 1970. The original platform, still with the station booking office and buffet but devoid of track and aloof from the line it served, was demolished after a new building had been provided on the curve in 1986. By this time any prospect of westward expansion had long been abandoned.

The Line Today

The line is still open from Southampton to the site of Lymington Junction, a mile west of Brockenhurst. The line is closed from there to Hamworthy Junction and Holes Bay Junction north of Poole. Having used the new lines from Brockenhurst, trains on the South Western Main Line continue to Weymouth. Oddly. all mileposts west of Hamworthy still give the distances from London Waterloo via the no longer extant Ringwood route.The disused portion between Ringwood and Hamworthy Junction forms the Castleman Trailway. The line past the old Southampton terminus into the eastern docks is still used for occasional specials, [http://www.petermilford.co.uk/Steam/2007/34067/] and boat trains like that which connected with the maiden voyage of the Queen Mary 2 [http://www.thecunarders.co.uk/The%20Cunarder%20Boat%20Train.html] . These are sometimes operated using the stock of the Venice-Simplon Orient Express.

Further reading

*cite book|author=R.V.J.Butt, |title= The Directory of Railway Stations |publisher=Patrick Stephens Ltd |year=1995 ISBN 1 85260 508 1
* ISBN(no ISBN)

* ISBN 0 906520 97 5

* ISBN 853066966

External links

*cite episode
title = Castleman's Corkscrew
credits = Platform 14 Ltd
network = ITV Meridian
url = http://www.alongtheselines.co.uk/
series = Along These Lines
airdate = 2008-04-13
season = 1
number = 1