Lostwithiel and Fowey Railway

The company ran into financial difficulties and closed in 1880, but the line was purchased by the Cornwall Minerals Railway and reopened in 1895.

A passenger service operated, but it was withdrawn in 1965, and the line reverted to the conveyance of china clay; it remains open for that traffic at the present day.

[3] The principal traffic was expected to be china clay and other minerals from the area around St Austell, but the financial performance of the company was dependent on the buoyancy of the mining activity.

Difficult trading conditions were followed by the opening of a more direct route to Fowey by the Cornwall Minerals Railway on 1 June 1874, and the two companies engaged in a bitter price war.

The company's finances became increasingly strained and the necessity to reconstruct a number of timber bridges proved impossible to fund, leading to suspension of the line's activity from 1 January 1880.

The CMR reconstructed the line and converted it to the 4 ft 8+1⁄2 in (1,435 mm) standard gauge, rebuilding and extending the jetties at Carne Point also.

[6][note 1] The Second World War period also enabled reuse of sidings at Woodgate Pill near Fowey, which were used to service a munitions store.

[7][8] Never heavily used, the passenger service from Lostwithiel to Fowey was withdrawn on 4 January 1965, and the line now carries only mineral traffic to Carne Point.

[3] In February 1870 the directors reported that the temporary arrangement made with the Cornwall for carrying on the traffic did not leave to the company sufficient profit to pay the cost of maintaining the permanent way.

These trains typically had their origin or destination at one of the clay dries such as Burngullow or Goonbarrow, with booked motive power being an English, Welsh and Scottish Railway (EWS) Class 66.

[21] In 2020, the UK Government announced their £500 million Restoring Your Railway (RYR) Fund, with the aim of enabling the re-opening of existing lines and stations.