Split Screen Time Machine: Newport to Freshwater Railway Line 1945-2005

An split screen aerial journey from Newport to Freshwater along the old railway line using maps from 1945 - 2005.
Best viewed full screen HD 1080p setting.
Attribution: Google Earth mapping & data.
Music: A Long Journey by Manuel Igler under Creative Commons License

[@1962cheese]

Interesting to see Gate lane in Freshwater. Thank you.

[@neilfurby555]

Brilliant. What a wonderful path / cycle track this would be !

[@garrymartin6474]

The miles of hedgerow that have gone too ! Fascinating , thanks for sharing.

[@alisonlee3314]

Brilliantly done! It's interesting to see how much HASN'T changed......apart from the amount of silt in the river towards the end. I would live to see more of these.

[@cmp1821]

Beautiful thanks so much for sharing

[@captainbuggernut9565]

I find this fascinating and also very sad. Excellent video.

[@richardmasters3571]

What a clever idea and so well executed.

[@isleofwightdave2286]

Fantastic upload. Thanks for sharing.

[@garyeaton6172]

Well done I love how you’ve put this altogether love how a lot of the field systems have remained the same but vegetation as grown in parts

[@buttheadbevis]

I live in Freshwater. The River Yar is as it was back in 1945, it's just a low/high tide comparison.

[@ShizukuSeiji]

Fantastic video, and beautifully executed. It would be wonderful to see more of this kind of work.

[@alanjpoole7274]

Very good. How much wider the river was, coming inland from Yarmouth.

[@paulysleight]

Brilliant! Fascinating, seeing things that I thought would have changed beyond recognition are still the same, yet others like the Yar which I used to sail on 50 years ago now looks so different. Good work!

[@KempSimon]

Thanks for sharing this fantastic split-screen video compilation - something which I have never previously come across! If there was one railway line which should have been converted, in its entirety, into a foot path, bridle way and cycle track, when it was closed by the Southern Region of BR, it should have been Freshwater to Newport!

[@TheMichaelWilcock2016Railways]

Never seen this type of video before, thanks for sharing. Where can I find more ?..Mike in the Vale of Glamorgan

[@jokeyjon]

What is incredible is the difference in the Yar - looks a more than just a low tide/high tide difference.

[@johnbarcy5222]

Very good, well done. I went to school at Swainston near Calbourne and cross country runs were along the trackbed to 5 Houses, the ballast was mainly sea dredged aggregate and difficult to run on!

[@KempSimon]

The Isle of Wight's railway network was built - and operated - on the cheap! Rounded shingle pebbles, either sourced from the beach or dredged from just offshore, don't have the same holding power as angular chunks of Dartmoor Granite from Meldon Quarry!

[@johnbarcy5222]

@@KempSimon The F.Y.&N was inspected by Colonel Yolland 3 times before it was allowed open, most of the bridges had to be rebuilt because they used to unslaked lime in the mother!

[@KeepBizzy]

Excellent video

[@SussexHistory]

Interesting exercise. You might make it go back the other way, reversing the 'then and now'' to 'now and then' !

[@rancidschannel3206]

Hi can you highlight the location of Lee and Wellow sidings please

[@lasalleman]

Beautiful. Interesting how little the countryside seems to have changed in 50 years.

[@KempSimon]

Quite a few hedges have been grubbed up to make the fields larger and easier to cultivate with heavy machinery!

[@MidnightVisions]

Because the train was removed, the areas without train service stagnated, while those areas with train service grew.

[@neilphillips162]

@@KempSimon the UK government subsidise the farmers all over Britain, to grow more crops after ww2, now no subsidise the farmers are putting the headges back.

[@hrhbucket4268]

This thing all things devours: birds, beasts, trees, flowers; Gnaws iron, bites steel; grinds hard stones to meal; Slays king, ruins town, And beats high mountain down.

[@ridefree2153]

amazing. Why did isle close down 90%of its line?

[@nsuro80]

Some of the lines, like this one, were lightly used and were never profitable. Others that could (and should) have survived were killed by Beeching. The last surviving line, Ryde to Shanklin was also earmarked for closure by Beeching, but was saved due to local pressure groups.
As the islands population has grown, the importance of a decent railway is obvious (especially to Newport), but those in power never had the foresight to maintain the trackbed and in many places buildings now make reintroduction difficult.

[@szymonkoralewski4280]

Very nice,

[@angloaust1575]

The easy access to automobiles
Signalled the demise of the railways