'Melior' filling up with water at Kemsley Down station

Image: © Marathon Taken: 9 Sep 2018

This unique line was built in 1905 as an industrial railway by paper maker Frank Lloyd for the transport of the raw materials required for the manufacture of paper and the finished product. It ran between Ridham Dock on The Swale and the company's paper mill at Sittingbourne, and from the mid-1920s to a second mill at Kemsley. The line which is built to a gauge of 2′ 6″, continues to use the steam engines and rolling stock that were supplied to operate the railway in its working life prior to preservation in 1969. It now operates between Sittingbourne and the banks of The Swale at Kemsley Down. In the late 1960s, the railway faced closure by its then owners Bowater, but the Locomotive Club of Great Britain accepted an offer to operate the railway from 1970. However, the section of line from Kemsley Down to Ridham Dock was abandoned for redevelopment of the paper mills. In 2008-09, the line survived a threat of closure due to the owners of Sittingbourne Paper Mill closing the mill and selling the land. The lease then held by the railway expired in January 2009, but negotiations resulted in the railway being saved, although no public trains ran in 2009. The line was fully reopened in 2012 when trains ran from Kemsley Down station over the Sittingbourne Viaduct to Sittingbourne Viaduct station. Following vandalism at the Sittingbourne end all maintenance is carried out at Kemsley Down station which is the headquarters of the railway although almost all passengers travel from Sittingbourne Viaduct station. See http://www.sklr.net/ and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sittingbourne_and_Kemsley_Light_Railway for more information and a full history of the fight to save the line. This is locomotive Melior at Kemsley Down station. This is what the SKLR's website has to say about Melior: "‘MELIOR’ Kerr Stuart 4219 of 1924 Withdrawn shortly after the line was handed over for preservation, ‘Melior’ returned to service in 1993 after 23 years of work for which the SKLR won a Steam Heritage prize. Unusual in having modified Hackworth Valve Gear, her name (“made better”) may reflect this development in basic design. During the summer of 2012, ‘Melior’ underwent a scheduled ‘ten year’ overhaul and retube.

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