IMAGES TAKEN NEAR TO
The Poplars, MOUNTAIN ASH, CF45 4LB

Viewed across the A4059 New Road.

This OS cut mark can be found on the wall of the old Labour Exchange building. It marks a point 110.130m above mean sea level.

The green board on the Jobcentre Plus http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/3830529 can be seen centre right.

Cardiff Road is on the left.

Viewed from Jeffrey Street where two-way traffic along Seymour Street behind the camera becomes one way.

Viewed from the A4059 New Road.

Circa 1880 steam driven Waddle fan for ventilating the pit. Standby until 1967. The 40' fan has been cut-up but the driving steam engine is at Big Pit Mining Museum. Colin Bowden writes as follows - The fan engine was installed at Nixon's Navigation Colliery (North Pit), but the two shafts of this were taken over and used for pumping and ventilation by Deep Duffryn Colliery, for which the Waddle fan was used as a standby ventilator until 1967, when it was condemned. I don't know when the change occurred - it seems that Nixon's Navigation was never operated by the NCB, so it was presumably before nationalisation. This site has also been called Abergorki colliery by various authors.

Also known as Nixon's Navigation Colliery and sometimes as Abergorki Colliery. This engine drove a large Waddle ventilating fan and was built in about 1880 by The Waddle Patent Fan & Engineering Co of Llanelly. This was a very simple piston valve machine with two simple cylinders arranged vis a vis. Only one was used at a time with the other acting as a standby that could be got in to use quite quickly by swapping over the connecting rods. The fan was very rusty and has been cut up. The engine is at Big Pit Mining Museum but I do not know whether or not it is on display yet.

Viewed from a riverside path near this http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/4092775 entrance to Mountain Ash railway station.

The Mountain Ash Railway was a colliery railway, latterly NCB serving a number of locations in the Cynon Valley, and centred on Mountain Ash, The two locomotives are making their way to the locomotive shed for a mid-day break. They are (left) No.8 and (right) Sir John. No.8 had a varied history, starting life as a War Department 'Austerity' locomotive in 1944, having been built in 1944 by Robert Stephenson and Hawthorns of Newcastle. It was sold to the Hunslet Engineering Co of Leeds in 1960 where it was rebuilt incorporating improvements to the designs of Argentinian steam engineer L D Porta. It was given their works number 3880 and sold to the NCB in 1961. After withdrawal it was sold into preservation and after several moves is currently (2020) at the Dean Forest Railway. 'Sir John' was built by Avonside Engineering of Bristol (no.1680) in 1914. It too has survived into preservation and is currently (2020) on long term loan to Pontypool and Blaenavon Railway at Big Pit, Blaenavon. The tall building behind Sir John is the Mountain Ash Workmen's Club, which still survives. The station platforms in the foreground are those of the closed Mountain Ash (Cardiff Road) station of the former Vale of Neath Railway.