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Elizabeth Way, BRISTOL, BS16 9LN

The old Midland Railway used to head on towards the Midlands from here, near Mangotsfield station. In the past it ran close to the Warmley Brook and old gasometers - hence some of the large block structures.

Rodway Hill crosses the former Bristol & Gloucester Railway, now a cyclepath.

Mangotsfield station closed in 1966, thanks to low traffic and Dr Beeching. Some of the original buildings remain as just walls, leaving parts of the windows as a sad reminder of the past. How many people would have gazed out of them, eager to see their train?

Mangotsfield station closed in 1966, leaving an empty shell of a few tall walls now. Where once passengers would have looked out of the windows, there are silhouettes.

What was once a large station with six platforms to the various lines is now an empty shell. The interiors are gone and left to grass.

Mangotsfield Station would have seen many such different locomotives. They are the only ones you will see nowadays.

Dismantled station buildings, and track removed

Mangotsfield station closed in the 1960s and has become converted into the very popular Bristo to Bath cycle path. The old station building is now just a shell and the empty windows are filled with metal silhouettes. Appropriately, they have bikes as well as trains.

The old Mangotsfield station closed in the 1960s; over the next two decades the tracks were converted into a cycle path by Sustrans. As homage to the station (which is now just a shell) the organisation planted trees where iron columns used to hold up an elaborate canopy. See Image] for a closer look at the window decorations. As an abandoned station, Mangotsfield has more of a ghostly look these days. Quite apropriate, considering the story that this place tells: Most people will remember the actor Arnold Ridley as the dozy Private Godfrey in the TV series Dad's Army. He had trained to be an actor but his career was ruined after being injured in WWI. In fact, Ridley became a successful playwright and he penned 'The Ghost Train' in 1923, which had a long run in London's theatres. While en route he stopped here one dark night and waited for his connection. Due to the close proximity of a number of lines here, trains often passed close by but were not always visible from certain platforms, creating an eerie sensation that Ridley used for the play.

Mangotsfield station started life as a horse-drawn coal line, then was part of the Midland Railway of old. Now it has been converted to the Bristol-Bath cycle route.