Bolton and Preston Railway

Its authorising act of Parliament forbade its early completion to protect the North Union Railway (NUR) and imposed other restrictions that limited the success of the B&PR.

A change of route was authorised to bypass the delay making it dependent on the goodwill of the NUR to reach Preston.

The first chairman was Thomas Ridgway, a Horwich bleacher, and the chief engineer appointed to survey the line was John Urpeth Rastrick.

After following the route of the plateway for 1+1⁄2 miles (2.4 km), the new line would run into Preston, crossing the River Ribble and tunnelling under Fishergate, to terminate beside the Lancaster Canal basin, at a site occupied by Maxwell House.

[3][4] The Preston and Walton Plateway had been built in 1803 to link the two portions of the Lancaster Canal across the deep valley of the Ribble.

In Preston it ran down to the level of the Ribble, and then up to the canal terminating on an incline of 1 in 6, worked by a Boulton and Watt stationary engine and an endless chain.

[5][6] Reed observes that This was one of the most complicated and lengthy railway Acts framed up to that time, and had 263 clauses for the 20-mile [32 km] line.

It contained provisions which nullified each other yet left heavy financial commitments and sources of friction in the process; and it provided both the seeds of discord and the ground in which they could sprout and flourish.

"[8] The B&PR was to have a station in Preston adjacent to Maxwell House near the Victoria Hotel on the north side of Fishergate.

Thomas Swinburn was transferred from the Bolton and Leigh Railway to take charge of the tramroad, which remained in use until 1859.

In October 1840 agreement was concluded with the Manchester and Bolton Railway to supply engines and rolling stock and the line was extended to Chorley on 24 December 1841.

[note 4] Work on the cutting began in early June and within 13 months had been completed: it had a maximum depth of 80 feet (24 m), and involved the removal of 650,000 cubic yards (500,000 m3) of earth.

The NUR exacted a toll of one shilling per passenger for the 5+1⁄2 miles (8.9 km), and did what it could to hinder B&PR trains, even preventing their use of the Maxwell House station at Preston.

By these agreements passengers could be booked from Manchester and Bolton to Lancaster or Fleetwood and vice versa without change of carriage.

Both companies' fares were restored their original prices on 1 January 1844 and at a general meeting of proprietors of the B&PR on 10 April the draft of the bill for amalgamation was approved.

[24][22] The Waterhouse branch, serving several collieries to the south just over 8 miles (13 km) from Bolton, opened some time between 1849 and 1894.

[25] The Bolton to Euxton line, an important element in the trunk route from Manchester to the north, remained in use through several changes of ownership.