Out & About …

… on the North York Moors, or wherever I happen to be.

A single-track railway line of the East Cleveland Rail Line curves precariously along the rugged clifftop of Huntcliff, passing within 15 metres of the edge. To the left, the dark, sheer cliff face drops toward a choppy sea and a narrow rocky beach. Situated at the foot of these cliffs is a wide, lower vegetated platform known as Green Turf, a site identified as a historic landslide feature. To the right of the track, a steep cutting slope covered in tall, dry grass and patches of green scrub rises sharply upward. The scene is captured under a grey, overcast sky, emphasising the isolation and severe geotechnical risks of this coastal rail section.

Is the East Cleveland Rail Link Worth the Risk?

Restoring passenger rail to East Cleveland is a dream that has flickered in and out of local politics since the last carriage left in 1960. Connecting isolated coastal villages, boosting tourism, “levelling up” a corner of the world that feels forgotten. Lovely stuff, on paper.

Geology does not care about lovely stuff.

The Tees Valley Combined Authority recently spent £1 million finding this out. I kid you not, that is not a misprint. After moving past “desktop exercises” and actually looking at the cliffs, the results turned out to be a proper white elephant in the making.

A view looking northwest along the East Cleveland Rail Line as it contours the steep, grassy slopes of Warsett Hill above Huntcliff. The single-track railway curves along the upper edge of the dark, rugged cliffs, which drop sharply to a narrow pebble beach and the choppy, white-capped waters of the North Sea below. To the right of the track, the steep hillside is covered in thick, dry grass and patches of green shrubs. The scene is captured under a heavy, overcast sky, emphasising the dramatic and precarious path of the railway as it traverses within 15 metres of the cliff edge.
A view looking northwest.

The worst stretch runs around Warsett Hill above Huntcliff, where the track sits a mere 15 metres from the edge. Fifteen metres is nothing. You could put a shot further than that; or at least I think I could once—probably, memory tends to be biased.

The drop is not even the main worry. It is the ground underneath. Maps from 1856 mark a landslide feature at the foot of these cliffs called “Green Turf”, but, and I guess this is a positive, it has not gone anywhere in over a century and a half. Above the line, the consultants found active slope failure, with the topsoil of Warsett Hill creeping steadily downhill toward the track. To run trains here at any decent speed, engineers propose “discrete retention systems”—retaining walls by any other name—plus heavy geotechnical work to stop the ballast washing away with the next good rain.

Then there is the bill. Reopening the line could cost anywhere between £107 million and £329 million, depending on how far it stretches. A fair sum for a line that might slide down a cliff.

A heavy freight train, led by a blue and yellow locomotive hauling a long string of silver hopper wagons, rounds a sharp curve on the single-track East Cleveland Rail Line as it contours Warsett Hill above Huntcliff. The train travels on a bed of fresh grey ballast, passing a white "W" whistle board positioned at the side of the track. To the right, the steep hillside is covered in vibrant patches of purple heather and dry, wind-swept grass. To the left, a wire-and-post fence separates the line from a clifftop path that leads toward a large, circular metal sculpture visible on the horizon. The sculpture’s official name is Circle, but locals fondly know it as “the Charm bracelet”. The piece was created by Richard Farrington and is a familiar landmark on the Cleveland Way footpath. The scene is set under a flat, grey sky, capturing the train navigating the narrow corridor between the steep cutting of the hill and the nearby cliff edge.
Minutes after taking the featured image, a heavy freight train crawled past.

The Benefit-Cost Ratio—the government’s way of measuring if a project is worth the cash—sits at 0.03 to 0.05. Spend a pound, get back a few pence. That is not a rounding error. That is a project asking to be quietly forgotten.

Being technically possible and being sensible are two different things, and this study seems to have muddled them. It concludes trains could run here, given enough concrete and steel and money, while also admitting the deliverability risk is rated “High”. A cliffhanger indeed, and not the exciting kind.

Between the ancient landslide at Green Turf and a BCR that would make any accountant wince, the £1 million study starts to look less like due diligence and more like an expensive way of confirming what any local could have told them for free: it’s only a matter of time before the cliff crumbles away.

For now the heights above Huntcliff belong to the slow potash freight trains and the walkers on the Cleveland Way. Whether passengers ever join them depends on ground that, much like the whole scheme, is not exactly stable.

Sources:

Posted

in

, ,

by

Fhithich

Tags:

Comments

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *