Offham Chalk Pit Tramway (Top)
Introduction
The photograph on this page of Offham Chalk Pit Tramway (Top) by Simon Carey as part of the Geograph project.
The Geograph project started in 2005 with the aim of publishing, organising and preserving representative images for every square kilometre of Great Britain, Ireland and the Isle of Man.
There are currently over 7.5m images from over 14,400 individuals and you can help contribute to the project by visiting https://www.geograph.org.uk
Offham Chalk Pit Tramway (Top)
Image: © Simon Carey Taken: 29 Dec 2008
Remains of the first railway built in Sussex in the grounds of the Chalk Pit Inn which were once offices for Offham Pit. The steep slope down Offham Hill to the Ouse below gave the owners many problems in transporting their lime to barges for easy distribution. Consequently, in 1809 a funicular tramway was built with a 60% gradient and operated on the principle of the heavy wagons going down the slope would pull the empty wagons back up. The tramway went under the turnpike, now the A275, and at the bottom of the slope the lime was moved to a wharf on Chalkpit Cut to enable use on the nearby River Ouse particularly after the Ouse Navigation of 1790-1810 made it easier to transport bulky goods on barges up and down the river. The system remained in operation until it was closed and dismantled in 1870. All that remains are the original tunnels.
Images are licensed for reuse under creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0
Image Location
Latitude
50.887185
Longitude
-0.010009