The original report has been lost in time with only a dated and signed map drawing surviving in Derbyshire Records Office.

The purpose of this 5-mile-long (8 km) plateway was to carry coal from Kilburn and Denby down to the canal at Little Eaton and general goods including stone, pottery and "clogs of wood".

Outram's original plan was for a conventional waggonway with wooden sleepers and oak rails reinforced with cast iron plates.

In this he may have been greatly influenced by William Jessop (1745 to 1814) and also by Joseph Butler of Wingerworth near Chesterfield, who had constructed a similar line in 1788.

From Smithy Houses, several private lines served the Denby Main colliery and other mines in the locality.

[3] The waggons, built at Outram's Butterley works consisted of containers mounted loosely on a chassis, or tram, with four cast iron wheels.

The container would be lifted off at Little Eaton and loaded complete into narrowboats or transferred to two-wheeled carts for carriage by road.