Mansfield Road Tunnel & Nottingham Victoria Station
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 7 ก.ค. 2022
- Please watch: "The Most Beautiful Closed Railway in the UK? Scarborough to Whitby Railway Episode 2"
• The Most Beautiful Clo... -~-
Mansfield Road Tunnel, closed and left to ruin since 1968 once the Great Central Railway closed to rail traffic forever.
In this video we take the oppertunity to descend into the depths of Nottingham and walk the full length of this once busy mainline tunnel. Beggining at the site of Carrington Station, by the Northern portal, we follow the tunnel via its full route before appearing at the Southern Portal & the former site of Nottingham Victoria Railway Station, closed in 1966.
Filled with historic images and actual footage, and set to a absorbing soundtrack, this is THE Mansfield Road Tunnel Explore.
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#mansfield #rod #tunnel #railway Additional Music by Scott Buckley - released under CC-BY 4.0.
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As a teen me and my mates climbed down the rock face near the car park and walked that tunnel many times , once without a torch as it was fully open then. Great memories.
I lived in the Victoria Centre Flats when I was student at Trent Poly 1974 -5. The shutting of a central railway system through the centre of a major city shows a) the sheer stupidity of Beeching and b) the total lack of foresight this country continues to have over railways. The amount of congestion that would be avoided if the system was still open would reduce an enormous amount of pollution. Trams cannot go though the Victoria Centre car park area as the floor height is too low, another priceless example of poor urban planning. If things had been thought through Carrington station area would have had a tunnel built in before infilling. I despair of the uselessness of planners.
The management of BR's Midland Region was dominated by former LMS employees. That sealed the GC's fate, that and the Clean Air Act which reduced London's reliance on coal.
Maybe I'm getting old, but there's not much better than sitting down on a Sunday evening, a nice curry and a Trekking Exploration video of an abandoned railway tunnel in Notts.
Made me very emotional seeing what we had and , what I had traveled through on quite a few occasions, being destroyed forever
Thank you very much for watching Trevor
Used to love knocking about in this tunnel during the late 1980`s started off the the Clarendon College end (north) and walked through to Victoria Station opening this was prior to the multi story carpark which is there now. The city end only had a normal size door opening so was really dark for us walking toward the city but due to the north end being fully open we could see for on the way back (the candles were done by the time we got to the city) I also remember seeing massives rats running about at the station end lol.
I used to stand at the end of the platform as a lad and watch the engines come and go through the tunnel magic times and this video brings it all back thank you.
Thankyou. Thing that gets me is that all those 60s photos look so permanent and bring back memories of childhood. Everything built out of bricks, rock and mortar. Yet now replaced by a multi storey carpark built of concrete full of rapidly rusting cars that the govt wants to ban!! Heaven help us. So thought provoking - thanks again!
Glad you enjoyed it and thanks very much. The photos and photographers back then, we owe them 🙂
I remember walking over the station from the bus station, through the indoor market and over the platforms to Mansfield road to catch the Trent bus home, it was a magnificent station.
I am old enough to have travelled on a Grantham line train from Victoria but sadly was too young to remember it! My earliest memory of the station was walking over this bridge in late 1968, as the shopping centre was rising around it. I was fascinated by the huge tower cranes and you could peep through holes in the boards that then lined the old pedestrian bridge across the station and see the construction works. It was then that I learned from my grandma the story of the lovely old clock tower and the station. We would later pass under the huge blue brick viaduct at Bulwell on the upstairs of the Hucknall bus. The bridge had to remain in place until the walkway through the centre by the clock tower could be opened, to maintain the public right of way (the railway was required to build the bridge when the station opened, apparently, for the same reason to maintain an ancient right of way).
I remember when I was a kid 1980 ish & standing at the edge of the original multi storey & looking out over a vast overgrown waste land which was the old cutting when the tunnel portal was still open in all Its glory.
As a child, I often travelled from Kirkby-in-Ashfield Central to Victoria. The last bit of the journey: Sherwood Rise tunnel, the "ghost station" at Carrington and then Mansfield Road tunnel was very frightening for me and gave me nightmares. Worst of all was on the return, when the wheel tappers hit the wheels at the start of the tunnel, creating huge echoes in the darkness. I got used to it eventually and it was a lot better than going by bus!
Great video Ant,
I doubt that the Victoria shopping centre will be there in another 50 years time (online shopping, cost of travel etc) but the tunnels will still be there.
As others have said, what a great opportunity is waiting to be had by converting the tunnel into a car free access to and from the centre on Nottingham, the only problem is that we don’t have councillors with vision to make this happen.
Take a look at the Keswick to Threlkeld railway trail project and what they did after Storm Desmond hit in 2015, that’s what I call vision.
My great great grandfather helped build the GCR all across Nottingham from the South to Watnall area. Ironically I live on bagthorpe curv and have 2 of the bricks from the Colin Street viaduct. I often travel to work above this tunnel and see the remaining viaduct arches every day. How wonderful to see possibly some of his work. Thank you so much for taking the time to make this video and others like it.
Great video as usual. The old footage takes me back. No tunnels here in DK except under the Great Belt. What bothers me is the GCR was built for speed and therefore if kept open could have been developed instead for HS2. But they couldn't look so far ahead in time then.
Great video, Ant! I remember, in the late 50s going to Nottm Victoria to meet my sister who was returning from a school trip and seeing the "Master Cutler" come in from London. Went to the Clock Tower Restaurant a few times after the rest of the station had gonem when I could afford it! Services to the south stayed open for a while after Victoria went and I used Nottm Arkwright St station to get to Bedford a few times before that went too.
Thanks
I lived in Nottingham 93-96, while doing my doctorate at the Uni. I always wondered about that tunnel, the portal of which I used to see down there.
It wasn't clear in the video though how you got into the tunnel.
Well done Ant for bringing the holy grail of Nottinghams tunnels to life for us, I've been fortunate enough to have walked thurland street and mapperley tunnels but this one has always held my fascination, as I was born the year Victoria station closed and being deprived of the chance to see it first hand I'm now a happy chappy , thank you Ant.
Thanks Phil I'm really pleased that you enjoyed it. Now I just need to do Thurland 🙂
me and my mates use to walk this back in the early 80's, we also use to do the tunnels by the broad marsh shopping center..just want to say a big thank you for bringing back some memories , we use to climb down the carved sand stone steps to get to the victoria tunnel..
What a shame that this tunnel only saw about sixty-nine years of trains, Ant. What surprises me the most is that there doesn't appear to be any air shafts on this 1000+yards tunnel, meaning that conditions inside must have been absolutely choking, especially with locos opening up when leaving Victoria station. Fifty years this year of the shopping centre, one of the most expensive projects outside London, at the time of its construction. I travelled all the way from Buxton in November 1972 with a friend and went in the place. It was hard to imagine a main line station ever being there, apart from the clock tower. I did think the centre was impressive, but I've not been in there since that 1972 time. Many thanks for doing this video, its great, Ant.
The lack of airshafts is because the area above was already built up before the railway came. The tunnel is underneath Mansfield Road for most of its length and even in 1896 this was a main artery.
Given how busy the line was in its hey day that is unbelievable! Steam would condense but smoke would hang about, surely there must have been some ventilation?
I recall in the 60's there would be a layer of smoke in the top half of the south tunnel so you could only see daylight through the bottom half!
@@davidshaw3303 Neither Mansfield Road nor Sherwood Rise Tunnels had any ventilation, train crews would get a very short respite while going through Carrington Station!
Thank you for a really informative and interesting video, I really enjoyed watching it. It's such a shame what this country has done to its railway infrastructure. The Great Central Railway would have been a real asset now.
Thanks very much Simon. I absolutely agree about the route too 🙂
I just found this and this is my type of history I like. Good old nottingham. .
Fantastic! I first saw the Victoria end tunnel mouth in the early 70's, when I was knee high to a grass hopper, and ever since have wanted to explore it. Thanks to your video, I am one very happy 50 + feller tonight! You're a star, Ant!
Another excellent video. It makes you wonder how different Nottingham City centre would have looked if they'd kept open the GC vs the Midland line. The GC was the newer and arguably the better line - efficiently being held aloft on curving viaducts. The current tram line drops down onto the former GC at Weekday Cross and ironically a new bridge had to be built over Nottingham (Midland) Station for the recent tram extension and effectively replaced the old GC structure which was removed in the 1980's
I must have caught one of the last trains from Victoria Station to London in 1966 because I was 9 when I had my first visit to London and that confirms the year. We must have gone from Victoria because we passed my grandparents' house in West Bridgford.
Thanks for taking us on that visit and thanks to those photographers who took those amazing films and pictures documenting the railway. Great video as usual Ant
no boring walks for you, knowing your history always something to see and look forward to. people and council short-sighted, should have foreseen influx of traffic and kept these lines open as an alternative.
Thanks so very much David 🙂🙂
Fantastic and very interesting video, i lived in Hucknall up until i got married 40 years ago and used to see the tunnel during regular trips to Nottingham via Victoria Bus station. There,s so much history in Nottingham. 👍
I remember catching a train at Nottingham Victoria for the seaside when we were only children, then came the wrecking balls! I have lived and worked on the railway almost all my working life! Be cool Ant, if you were to do some history on the great central, between the M1 bridge and the site of the old Lutterworth station, down to Northamptonshire.
Another brilliant video Ant. Thank you I'd love to do what you do traveling every where 👍👍
As a kid growing up in Hyson Green during the 70's an 80's I remember exploring the tunnel with one of my friends. We'd hop over the wall at the northern entrance, where Carrington Station used to be. I remember it being very dark and quite scary going through the tunnel. At the southern end, the entrance was boarded up, but there was a door in the boards that wasn't locked. Coming out of the tunnel, I seem to remember a turn table to the right.
Superb vlog.. Great to see the old photos and film footage when the railways were railways plus trains were proper trains. People might think it looked dinjy and dirty back then, but to me there was a real sence of beauty.. This was an age in railway history that to me was the best times.
That brought back memories of my youth, 1978 going down the bank at Carrington Station and entering the old tunnel and going through to Victoria and back, thanks for bringing back the good old days.
Looking forward to more videos
Thanks very much Richard i'm pleased that you enjoyed it :)
I did the same from Victoria great adventures when your a kid we used to drop down from the carpark on to a shopping trolly wedged between the concrete the enter walking up to sherwood Carrington
my dad worked on the vic centre in the 70's and we used to go in all the old tunnels when we were kids....
Finally after travelling into Notts down Mansfield Rd for most of my younger years before moving away I get to see inside the tunnel. I remember as a kid always going to the edge of the car park and looking at the painted loco on the boarded-up tunnel entrance wondering what was inside, and now I know! Thank you. I also remember going past a gated entrance on the left of the road, somewhere opposite the cemetery, that had steps doing down. Always wondered what it was for, but no mention of it in the video so I guess not related to the tunnel. Amazing video!
Brilliant video,with great music and old pictures,very interesting.All now sadly lost,for the sake of modernisation,ha,ha.
Thanks very much Michael I'm glad you enjoyed it 🙂
Really enjoyed this Ant, loved all the photos and videos at the end, I was definitely born in the wrong era. Would love to go back in time and see it all first hand!
Thanks very much Tim and I absolutely agree
Fabulous, Ant. Perhaps the closure of the Great Central was B.R's worst mistake of all over the last hundred years? It puzzles me too why some of it could not have been used for HS2 - a line with no steep gradients or tight curves.
Thanks Ant, for that well crafted video. A sad story, probably an unnecessary scrapping of a useful railway system!
Thanks very much Michael. I absolutely agree
Nottingham Victoria would make a station for HS2.
A really fascinating video. I well remember this tunnel but never travelled it. I was at Nottingham College of Art until 1965 and used to walk down Shakespear Street and through the station over the high level pedestrian bridge, over the trains, and come out the other side to the bus station on Huntingdon Street. I worked at Trent Polytechnic from 1970 and remember the Viccy Centre being built. Haven't been back to Nottm in many years now. Thanks for posting.
Hi Ant. Just watched the video. It was great that you were given the opportunity to walk this tunnel.
It's a great shame that something like this is not used to preserve the heritage of this section of the Great Central Railway.
It would probably cost too much to renovate the tunnel and bring it up to the safety standards expected these days.
I had in mind a heritage museum of the heyday of the line brought to life by modern technology. To be an addition to the stirling work done on the railway itself from Ruddington heading to Loughborough and then on to Leicester.
Keep these videos coming. 👍
Absolutely brilliant
Thanks very much Kevin
Thanks for sharing a view of my city I have never seen. Growing up in the '60s near Beechdale Baths I was always taken to the Midland station, I never saw Victoria station and was never aware of what came before Vic Centre.
so sad to see a tunnel that will never get used i was born in 71 that was after the years the station closed but it wonderful to see history of long forgotten areas like this brilliant thanks ant
Thanks very much Jan 🙂
'worked Annesley - Woodford's (windcutters) thro' there, as a fireman, also a few turns, station pilot, in that tunnel, used to be a large bell, so the driver knew he could 'set back' safely.
Loved this beautifully made video along with some wonderful pictures of this sadly lost railway. What a terrible waste.
Thanks very much I'm glad you enjoyed it 🙂
Another great & fantastic video of Mansfield Road Tunnel & Victoria Station!.🚩🚩
Thanks very much 🙂
Fantastic, thanks for showing us this great piece of history!
Shame it's been left to deteriorate, wouldn't it make a perfect cycle / walkway route into the city centre.
Put some railway memorabilia in there and make it like a historical journey... a cafe at either end.....
My thoughts exactly. It would be perfect as an access route into the City
@@TrekkingExploration Such a missed opportunity, would make a great tourist attraction as well.
Wouldn't take much at all to make it suitable, with some cool lightng and a roadway / pavement, for cycles, eScooters and pedestrians, covered out of the weather, there's even room for a miniature railway track, that could take paying customers on a period miniature train ride into the city centre.
There's loads of space to integrate that into the Victoria shopping centre end and the new development at the college end would be easy to integrate into whatever they are proposing to do there!
Sadly I don't think they have the vision or the will to do it.
Thank you for a fantastic video, it brings back memories to me, I spent many an hour on Victoria Station trainspotting. It was the worst thing that could have happened when that station was closed, it was a great station.
always love your adventures Ant, wherever a person might end in the world as an old east Midlander, he or she can always come here to relive old memories. Brilliant, tour- de-force , a 'remembrance of things past' I thought had been lost forever -
Nice opening pictures.
Thank you Mark
Truly fantastic video with cracking photos of the past many thanks 👍
Thanks so very much glad you enjoyed it 🙂
Just brilliant Ant 👍🏻🙂 What a collection of video's and photo's to have with your epic tour. Really good look at the tunnel and your walk up top helped me see where it is.
The glory of Beeching,and very short sighted vision! In an alternate reality,those shopping centers would have been built on air rights,and the tunnels would have been used as a subway,and the stations retained for interchange with other transit! Full electrification,and 5 or 6 minute service,no problems with traffic congestion,but one can dream,of better things 🤔! Consider,Victoria Station,as it stood,had 80 times the capacity of that car park! With no vision,the people perish,and politicians are notorious for that!! Thank you,and George Dow,who wrote a trilogy on the Great Central,would be proud of you! Thanks very much😇😇😇😇😇!
16:36 Maybe they were digging from each end and the two tunnelling gangs didn't quite meet up properly and so had to put in the S bend to join up.
That's a good point 👍
Oh wow! What a wonderful opportunity you were given! Excellent video!
Thanks so very much
Great video,Ant, brought back a few memories,as,when we were children we would sit on the wall and watch the steam trains go through the tunnel,very noisy and lots of steam 😃 x
Excellent video, thanks for bringing this much missed era of history back to life for us 👍
Thanks Nigel glad you enjoyed it
Outstanding video and all the old pictures how it once was. Meriden, Kansas
Thanks very much Jerry 🙂
Beautiful. always excellent videos.
Thank you very much Carl :)
Hello Ant - greetings from Poland
That was absolutley fantastic. The trek right through the tunnel was superb. What really made this video for me were all the still photographs and snippets of film from the good old days when Nottingham Victoria was operational and the tunnel was in full working order.
Thank you so much for producing another brilliant video. Your commentary and explanations of what we were looking at were exceptional. Thank you so
Nice video Ant , brought back some great memories, walked through there a few times in the mid 70s , there was some huge steps carved out of the sandstone to climb up to street level , like the way you came up top to give some perspective
Great vid…One of your best.
Thanks very much John
That was some video, fantastic Ant, lots of information has usual, thanks again. Chris
Thanks very much Chris
Great video. As a Nottingham local myself i have always wanted to see inside that tunnel so thank you for doing this. I have been into Mapperly tunnel a couple of time and it''s really inteeresting especially when you get to the Trash heap
Carrington must have been a lot like Hadley Wood on the ECML. Tunnel at each end of the platforms, plus a bit of bare track. Was an incredible place to hear the approach of Deltic powered expresses from the South! Full bore, howling like banshees! Heading for the peak of the Northern Heights at Potters Bar. Happy to say all bores still running live traffic daily.
Love it. The music is down to a tee
I tried something a little different to the normal stuff with the music so I'm pleased it works 🙂
Am I remembering right that the OLD Victoria Bus and Coach Station had a good view of the Southern Portal? Seem to remember being there in late 80s/Early 90s as a kid and being able to see it.
It certainly did. I remember that place with fond memories. Thank you for watching
Incredible, thank you.
Thanks very much Peter
Great explore and it’s amazing it’s still intact after all these years 👍
Thanks very much Andrew
All I can say about this video Ant, is that it is beyond excellence. One of the very best videos I have seen on the subject. Cheers, Bob
I loved putting this one together so I'm glad you enjoyed it too
There’s a scene in top gear where Richard Hammond burst through a wall into a shopping centre in a tank - petition to repeat this here and bulldoze the Victoria centre.
As a kid that mural of the stream train used to fascinate me, before the new car park was built we took a trip to look at it.....Why they removed the painting is beyond me
I remember that too looking from where the old bus station was
@@TrekkingExploration It was an advert for Nottingham Bulding Society
I’ve been waiting for you to do this video for some time ( since the Sherwood rise tunnel) did you use the entrance I said to you in that video or was it another one. one query for you, facing rock cemetery theirs a house with gates built into the wall With steps going down. I’ve always been told since I was a kid it’s an entrance to the tunnel for service work but you didn’t show it on your video, this has intrigued me for over 50 years as to did it go to the tunnel or could it possibly been to an air raid shelter!!!. Great video Ant I love the tunnels of Nottingham and there’s still quite a few of them todo 👏👏👏👍
superb video !
Thanks very much 🙂
I've been waiting for you to walk this part of Nottingham's history. Much appreciated!
Very enjoyable as always Ant!
Another cracking video, Ant!
Thanks very much Stephen
I think it's surprising that there's very little coverage of the southern tunnel out of Victoria Station/Centre on towards The Meadows and Colwick.
Great footage of a forgotten gem of Nottingham. I think, many will probably disagree, this country would be more economically viable if most of these old railways were put back into use.
A car economy does nobody any favours, an economy supported by a decent efficient transport system will benefit everyone and the environment we all live in.
It would be nice to break with the norm of leaving our children with less than we had when we were born.
Great footage / photos at the start of your vid!!! Very sad state of affairs 😐🚂🚂🚂
Glad you enjoyed it 🙂
Really really interesting. What a fab tunnel and enjoyed your commentary and history. The old photos of times gone by with your atmospheric music. Brilliant. Thank you Ant, excellent.
Thanks very much Shirley that means a lot
Ah thanks, fabulous! Am I the only person who has cried over the remains of the Bowstring Bridge in Leicester?
Thanks very much for watching 🙂
Thanks for the repeat trip, Ant! Always great videos! Enjoy the weekend. Cheers mate!
Glad you enjoyed it Martin
Very nice, very informative. Being in the tunnel added greatly to the vid. What is your soundtrack please?
As expected another sensational video. Thanks for your efforts
Thank you so very much 🙂
One thing that’s amazed me about this tunnel is the length with zero ventilation shafts. Must of been a nightmare for drivers of steam lockos
I bet it got very thick with soot and steam/ diesel especially with those curves
Another great video. Keep up the fantastic work.
Thanks so very much 🙂
Lovely video and fascinating archiive footage. What a pity such tunnels have to remain neglected and unused!
Thanks very much Malcolm 🙂
Amazing. Great video and some interesting old photos. Nice one Ant
Thanks very much Martin I'm glad you enjoyed it 🙂
Absolutely brilliant! How on earth did you get permission? Or is it better not to ask?
GOOD TO JOIN YOU. Cheers
This brought back lovely memories
Thanks very much I'm pleased you enjoyed it
That was absolutely brilliant, so atmospheric and historic. It never ceases to amaze me where you can find a shopping trolley, obviously a drunken night out!!! Nice to hear ALW chirping away in the background👍. Those tunnels under Nottingham are unbelievable and the fact that they are still there and walkable is something else - thanks for posting Ant.
The branding on the Tesco trollies dates back to the late 60s / early 70s I think there was 5 of them. Glad you enjoyed it 🙂
Brilliant video Ant, love all the old photos and videos, reminds me of when I was a kid just seeing the end of the steam era. Suprising how dirty things looked back in the day with the photo technology.
Thanks very much Steve. I'm pleased that you enjoyed it :)
The trolley may have come from Scan, one of the first supermarkets in Vic centre, my grandad used to lock up in the evenings
There were a couple all unidentifiable however the rest had Tesco branding on from the 1970s
wow Ant I'm so jealous that you went in there I went to hairdressing college in 1991 and I recall the tunnel blocked up and there being a train painted on the front and I was hooked back then knowing as much as I could about that beautiful station the only person I know who travelled on it was my mum going to Wales as a young lady with her brother to meet my great uncle Harry amazing to see in side of I'm.going to get over to there one day soon I know I can't go in but just want to look at it again thanks so much for sharing xxx
@6.34 the orange marks on both sides look like steam locomotives with carriages behind them.
Nice to see you do this one mate. I used to skive off school and mess around in there back in early 00s 😂as you could get in through vic end. Never walked the length of it though didnt have a torch and was to scared lol. Great video as always and thanks for sharing.
Thanks so very much. The Victoria end is just a metal sheeted mess now.
Absolutely fantastic Ant. In the 1980’s while visiting one of my sisters who was living at West Bridgeford I was fascinated with the Creat. Central and Victoria station / shopping centre. I spent time in the car park wondering about the tunnel and where it went etc. No internet in those days and not easy to find photos. We visited Loughborough and saw the beauty of the Great Central railway. I cannot thank you enough for this wonderful video exploring the tunnel and the historical photos and footage. Really really loved it so much.
Thanks very much John that means a lot. I tried my best to bring it all to life the best I could
Been waiting ages for this one so glad they gave u Permission to go down and have a look Thought it might never happen. The pictures are amazing great to see what once was 👍
I never thought it would. Now I have to find the next big thing 🙂
@@TrekkingExploration I was coming home by train today from Birmingham to Nottingham noticed lots of old Disused lines knocking about maybe u can have a look at some of the lines in the Future