This law passed in June 1871 and the St Aubin & La Moye Railway commenced construction to the narrow gauge of 3 ft 6 in (1,067 mm) on Monday 11 August 1873[2] at a point near General Don’s Farm.

However, the construction did not proceed to plan and in 1874 the states refused to allow an extension of time with the company, and the works were suspended.

[4] In 1894 the London Evening Standard reported that an attempt to wreck a train running round St Aubin’s Bay was made by placing heavy stones on the rails.

The railway was improved, with an extension to La Corbière Pavilion opening in 1899 and was successful up to the outbreak of the First World War.

The States of Jersey purchased the route of the line from St Helier to La Corbière on 1 April 1937 for the sum of £25,000.

The Jersey railway, in its final form, was a single track route with passing places at the termini, Millbrook, St Aubin and Don Bridge.

The main station at the Weighbridge (now Liberation Square) in St Helier was the operating headquarters of the line and featured an impressive building, glass roof and two platforms.

The workshops were capable of very heavy repair work and the manufacture of carriages – the distance from the mainland made the railway very self-sufficient.

After St Aubin, the railway turned sharply inland through a rock-lined tunnel and climbed steeply away from the sea, rising over 200 feet (61 m) in 1+1⁄2 miles (2.4 km) with gradients as steep as 1 in 30.

On 1 July 1940, German forces occupied Jersey, Hitler declaring that the Channel Islands would become an impregnable fortress.

To support this work, the occupying German army (Organisation Todt) re-opened almost the entire St. Helier to La Corbière line to 1,000 mm (3 ft 3+3⁄8 in) gauge.

A branch line was built to serve the large granite quarries at Ronez in the north of the island.

In St Helier, the 1901 headquarters and terminus building at the Weighbridge housed Jersey Tourism until 2007, although the trainshed has been demolished.

Beyond St Aubin, the tunnel built in 1899 to avoid some tight curves is still there, although much enlarged during the Second World War as a munitions store.

The Old Station House at La Corbière, registered as a Building of Local Interest, was sold by the States of Jersey to the private sector in 2004.

[citation needed] (Photo at St Aubin Station [3][permanent dead link‍]) Scrapped in Jersey.