good morning ladies and gentlemen you did not ask for this video
however we are bringing it to you anyway the quirky story of how east
grinstead got its railway and then built an extension there on into Tonbridge wells
my name is paul and I'm rebecca and we make videos about old abandoned railways and canals and all
sorts of roads and roman and otherwise stuff that falls into our net so join us on today's
adventure when we start here three bridges near Crawley where the railway peeled off and went to
East Grinstead and on there after and we've also got a special guest today yeah join us today etc
wait what i didn't say roll the vt what does that mean um and it's kind of in my head from
like years ago roll the vt like an intro right geo transmission you just made that out of me
yeah it's probably good maybe we would impress if it was right all right roll roll the vt
now the people of east grinstead wanted a railway 1845 and they knew that railways were being built
around them and of course they were missing out they were missing out on all the industry and
the businessmen there were very very keen to get this going ahead it took a long time oh here we
are but we'll carry on with that story in a second but we're at the first station along this line uh
that's the station master's house is the station masters house just there
and ahead of us we've got the station building and quite possibly our guests for the day
there he is look can you can you see it is that he's there somewhere it looks kind of
like a little silhouette out there chris how are you doing very well good to see you yeah and you
what have you been up to lovely day for it uh well apart from recovering from covet um
just having a little nose around Rowfant station and here we are Rowfant station right behind us
it's it looks quite quiet around here chris is it did it serve anybody other
than it's one of those great stories of a wealthy landowner insisting of having their own station
saying yes you know you can run away through my territory as long as you put the station exactly
where i want it which is to serve roe found house which is a short distance to the north and uh this
this particular bit here that we're looking at which said that his football had somewhere to wait
so there's no door no door no accidents oh he's yeah there's never any access in it's just so
that his his coach driver whatever could sit and wait for the master coming back from london on
the train yeah this is a little place to sit out the rain it's a nice touch that's lovely isn't it
should we walk around that way and crack on towards east grinstead is that
it's not eastern it's next though it's grange road what's the next station nothing left to
he didn't live here or anything this was just his his station building that's right yeah so
the great big manor house is off just very short distance to the north yeah and um opened in 1855
this line if you think of it as the line between three bridges in east grinstead
uh although the station at grange road didn't open until 1860 right and then the whole thing between
three bridges right the way towards grownbridge was all closed in January 1967 and what they
started doing was pulling up the line in i think late 1967 yep from the east and so they worked
in this direction okay and they didn't manage to pull it all up until 1970 took him quite a while
so we arrived in east grinstead now the story of east grinstead and how it got its railways is
probably best described with an incredibly high quality graphic totally not me fudging it with
a powerpoint presentation so all of the lines of east grinstead look a bit messy from above
so let's untangle it firstly and in from the east weighing in at 230 sorry from the east in
1855 we have the original east grinstead railway station set up and ready to go
now they want to extend the line so the station and the line needs complete realignment
come 1866 they do just that and the station moves north by around 30 to 40 yards
here is a shot of the original 1855 building because it's still standing here today
sadly the same can't be said for the second station just that bit further north it now
sits where this road cutting would have been but what it does mean though is we've got a lovely
before and after shot so all is well until the lewes and east grinstead railway want to join
the party and they do so from the south a year or so before the croydon oxford and east grinstead
railway joined from the north now we have a requirement for a station to serve those lines
and whilst we're there let's also build a new one for the original east to west free bridges line
so from 1883 both high level and low level stations are open despite the northern
section of the northern line not being open for a further year lastly we have this gorgeous curve
over here to deal with which connected the croydon oxford and east grinstead line to the free bridges
line now around this curve there is quite a curious feature so let's go and take a look
right we had no intention of waffling at all at east grinstead we're gonna do some
wonderful graphics and a nice overlay but chris said you need to come and see
this wonderful piece of brickwork is that the right way a little bit further than i thought
it was a little bit off the beaten track but i i assure you it's worthwhile this is we're on St
Mary's loop uh and really this is just a retaining wall but it is a glorious retaining wall isn't it
built to you know post nuclear standards i mean it's gonna be it's gonna outlast everybody yeah
all right all right all right all right all right right so chris said we're not gonna do forest road
because it's rubbish and there's nothing there so we shall insert some wonderful gorgeous picks
here here right now yep golden decks can you see the gorgeous picks are they great oh look
at that picture rebecca look at that picture oh yeah that's cool that's a lovely picture
lovely picture right so we are onwards now to hartfield which is lovely is it yes okay
so we've left east grinstead i presume now we're on a later the later extension that's right yeah
so this was uh the previous one was opened in 1855. i think this is 1816 maybe a little
bit later in that 1860 something slightly further back just outside of east grinstead uh a great big
garden we ran up to the track bed of this railway and that was owned by dr richard beeching so uh he
could he could see at the end of his garden one of the lines that he was going to that's crazy
rather excitingly we do have hartfield that's right
home of pooh bridge winnie the pooh and uh a lovely station building yeah nice nice bridge
up here yeah and yeah we can see coming up is a very gorgeous masonry or certainly amazing on
the outside yeah uh picturesque brisk uh bridge brisk brisk bridge bristol bridge
right so heartfield there it is through the hedge now a playschool so we're not
going to get too many shots of the station open okay because it's open and there's
kids in and out that'd be a bit weird um however we're just scouting to the north
and they've retained it they've got the good shed still which is council buildings
yeah nice job and retaining the good shirt actually all the character of that is still there
yeah as far as platform goes there's nothing remaining in the kind of kid's garden if you
like but just coming up ahead here you have a nice view of the what does remain
so we were sat having some lunch early and we're talking about um the economics of making railway
videos and we put ours out on youtube chris does his videos you may have already seen if you
haven't have a look at the link in the description below chris you do your videos in dvd form that's
dvd vhs betamax whatever you want oh hello this is betamax wonderful so what we're trying to
say is if you want to see a detailed video about this line you want to relax in front of your tv
you need to go to chris's website or ebay which is best do you think yeah ebay is good whichever ebay
is good and buy the dvd links in the doobly-doo thanks rebecca and uh by the detailed review of
this railway because then you'll see all the bits that we tend to miss because we run out of time
and we end up being a bit stupid throughout the day don't rebecca we do not how dare you sorry
uh i think you're wonderful
right final stop of the day final station of the day chris is now you're gonna pronounce
it's not me because I'll get it completely wrong with him with him with the m station
and yeah we can see the platform on our right hand side yeah original platform's still there
it's falling apart but it's easy isn't it there because somebody's planted that load
some hedge on top of it oh yeah but the station buildings you know still very much in existence
and it's been a gorgeous day today so we appreciate your guidance as always
absolutely it is the law that if you come to sussex kent direction at least that you have to
um get chris's directions at least there is in our case come say hello yeah now chris one more word
to say about your dvds you've got a plan in the pipeline okay so my little uh publicity slot um
last year i did a cracking job on the sidmouth and exmouth branch lines in devon
which is quite possibly the best one i've ever done you should buy it
uh later this year i'm hoping to do some work in hampshire not so far from where you guys live in
the long parish branch line um for lunch as well by the way pleasure it was very tasty wasn't it it
was very good we're all but we're still walking with the platform still here just coming to an
end now it's a long powerful isn't it it really is so william is is a nice little drawing we've been
a couple of joys along here isn't it well we're gonna say we're gonna say goodbye to chris thanks
for guidance as always pleasure absolutely great to see you guys yeah see you again definitely
shattered yeah do you know what i feel it's march and i feel sunburned yeah
my face feels really tight yeah and like it's just lovely though that's a good thing
yeah so that right so if you're ever in the area uh crawly kind heathrow, three bridges
to Tonbridge wales a lot of it is cyclable walkable it's lovely we didn't do it just
today but we're only just sort of a fleeting visit so yeah hopefully um you'll do more
justice by cycling a lot of it big thanks to chris to joining us today yes thank you chris
nice to see you again yeah very cool and uh we will see you next sunday 5 p.m british summer
time that's fine but as ever that we won't see them they'll see us yeah true goodbye
you