IMAGES TAKEN NEAR TO
Queen Street, MEXBOROUGH, S64 8NG

Used to be just a dirt path.

This library has been replaced by a repulsive modern building behind the photographer. The one in the picture is (I think) converted to flats.

View southward from the path beside the canal, which was convenient for watching trains on the very busy ex-Midland main line between Sheffield and Leeds. The Swinton & Knottingley Joint main line turned off ahead at Wath Road Junction, surviving the closure due to mining subsidence of the direct line to Leeds via Normanton. The signal-box in the distance was for Swinton Junction, where the south-east loop line still connects with the ex-GCR at Mexborough West Junction. The Stanier 8F 2-8-0 is No. 48540, the first built at Darlington Works in 1944, one of several batches built at Railway Shops during the War. It was used on the LNER until 1947, then survived right on until 11/67. The train comprises many ex-NER high-capacity coke wagons.

This canal linked Barnsley with the River Don. Most of its length has been abandoned but a short section from the River Don to this point remains. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dearne_and_Dove_Canal

...or what remains of it at Swinton. The canal, linking Swinton with Barnsley opened in 1804 but by the middle of the twentieth century was in full decline.

The railway junction at Swinton. The tracks to the left go to Leeds, those to the right to Mexborough and Doncaster. The train is a First Transpennine Class 185 diesel multiple unit No 185127, crossing over to take the Mexborough route.

Class 47/4 diesel electric locomotive No 47445 at Swinton Junction with a freight train in the summer of 1990

The idea of creating a navigable waterway from the River Don to Barnsley along the course of the River Dearne was first proposed in 1773 by the Marquess of Rockingham. However, the idea was not pursued, until a meeting of the shareholders of the Don Navigation Company in 1792, where a canal from the River Don Navigation into Barnsley was proposed. It was fully opened in November 1804 at a cost of just under £100,000 and soon proved a vital and profitable transport artery - mostly for the haulage of coal.