Page:Rivers, Canals, Railways of Great Britain.djvu/697

 Railway, near Parkside Lane Bridge, about a mile and a half east of the town of Newton. The length is six miles, four furlongs and four chains; the first mile and two chains of which from Wigan rises 5 feet; in the next six furlongs and eight chains there is a descent of 11 feet; then a gradual rise of 18 feet in the next distance of two miles, five furlongs and four chains; thence to the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, a fall of 25 feet. A branch is to commence from the main line a mile east of Wigan, which proceeds in a north-easterly direction by Ince Green; thence along the north side of the Lancaster Canal to the road leading from Wigan to Aspull Moor, and near to New Springs or Bark Hill Bridge, where it terminates. Its length is two miles, four furlongs and eight chains, with a rise of 42 feet in the first length of one mile, one furlong and seven chains from the main line; thence to the road leading to Kirklees Engine, which is three quarters of a mile, there is a further rise of 132 feet; and to its termination a further ascent of 15 feet. The line in communicating with the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, opens something like the top of the letter Y, thereby enabling waggons or other Carriages the better to communicate with the line of the last-mentioned railway; the part towards Liverpool is forty-two chains in length, while the one towards Manchester is only thirty-three chains. The works designed by Mr. C. B. Vignoles, in 1829, were estimated at £70,000.

The act authorizing the execution of this railway received his late Majesty's assent on the 29th May, 1830, and is entitled,  'An Act for making and maintaining a Railway from the borough of Wigan to the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, in the borough of Newton, in the county palatine of Lancaster, and collateral Branches to communicate therewith.' The subscribers, consisting of nineteen persons only, amongst whom was Sir Robert Holt Leigh, Bart. were incorporated as" The Wigan Branch Railway Company," with power to raise amongst themselves the sum of £70,000, in seven hundred shares of £100 each, and if necessary, an additional sum of £17,500 on credit of the undertaking. The powers of the act are to cease in seven years, as to the parts then remaining unexecuted. The distance between the inside edges of the rails to be 4 feet 8 inches; the outside 5 feet 1 inch. The