Branksome & Swanage Light Railway was a proposal to build a 13 miles line from
the County Gates through Branksome Park to Canford Cliffs. From there it would
travel to Sandbanks and then to the entrance to Poole Harbour. This would be crossed by
a transporter bridge so that the line could make its way onto Swanage.
Promoters of the Scheme argued that it would open up the
health giving opportunities of the Isle of Purbeck to Bournemouth & Poole residents as well as making Swanage less isolated. A representative of the promoters was
reported as saying that they wanted a pretty route because they ‘did not want to flood Branksome Park with
rif-raf!’
A suspended gondola would carry the tram cars across the
water at a height of 90 metres so as not to interfere with shipping. There are similar transporter bridges built in both Newport and Middlesbrough. The
intended drive system would have used electric motors under the gondola to draw
the platform across the harbour mouth by grabbing a tethered chain – in a way
not dissimilar to a chain link ferry.
The company planned to raise £266,000 to finance the project
to include £30,000 to build the transporter bridge. Annual revenue of £36,000
was projected to yield an £18,100 net profit. Electricity would be provided by
the Bournemouth Electricity Supply Company. The service would run for 18 hours
every day and cover 700,000 miles every year. Fares would be set at one old
penny per mile together with four old pennies (about 2p) to cross the bridge.
Unfortunately for the promoters, the Scheme met widespread
opposition to include Bournemouth & Poole Corporations, the Poole Harbour
Commissioners, Branksome Park Estate, London & South Western Railway, the
Bankes Estate and Wareham & Purbeck Rural District Council. Poole Council
had met in December 1905 and had concluded that the proposed Branksome &
Swanage Light Railway Scheme offered absolutely no benefit to the town. They
feared the potential interference with shipping into and out of Poole and did not want the developers to acquire land that could in future be used for better
purposes.
With such overwhelming local opposition, the Light Railway
Commissioners felt , whose role was to evaluate the proposal, they had to
reject it so the bridge was never built.
However, one can but speculate how different Sandbanks and
the Isle of Purbeck would be today if the Branksome & Swanage Light Railway
transporter bridge had been built.
(Sources: 1906 copies
of Western Gazette & Bournemouth Graphic.)
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