Talk:South Wales Main Line

Scope of Great Western Main Line

The scope of the Great Western Main Line article is under discussion. It currently covers Paddington to Bristol; Reading to Taunton; and the Cornish Main Line. The South Wales Main Line, and some other less obvious routes that the SRA deem to be part of the GWML, already have their own articles.

The question is: should the South Wales Main Line be merged with the GWML (which would bring it in line with the ECML/WCML articles), or should the West of England routes be separated out for clarity, although this could give rise to a naming conflict with the SWT West of England Main Line - a topic discussed a couple of years ago with no action taken. Geof Sheppard 14:49, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

Railway line diagram

It's a bit complicated, can't we simplify it with just the stations on it. No need for tunnels etc. to be shown really [Unsigned comment by 82.0.120.146]

I believe that, as this is an article about a route, then the diagram should show not just the stations but also the other features that make the route distinctive and notable. There is a disussion about this at UK Railways - please join in. Geof Sheppard 07:15, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Welsh Name

I've changed the Welsh name from 'Reilffordd Brif De Cymru' to 'Prif Rheilffordd De Cymru', as it was gramattically incorrect (was equivalent to 'South Wales Line Main' in English). I don't feel that this is a particularly "good" term, though. Does anyone have any input? Ansbaradigeidfran (talk) 21:14, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

Removed. google:"Prif Rheilffordd De Cymru" has one and only one result - this article. 81.110.106.169 (talk) 19:16, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

It's the translation. Welshleprechaun (talk) 23:58, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

Which nobody else uses. 81.110.106.169 (talk) 11:39, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

The Word 'Rheilffordd' would mutate to 'Reilffordd'. Googling this brings up a report by the Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Wales and a PDF map by Cardiff Council, so to claim 'nobody' uses it is incorrect. It is also used in news items on radio and on television, but I can't provide links to these sorry. --Rhyswynne (talk) 07:27, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

I notice you neglect to mention that the two results you have provided come from a search giving three results.. It seems that neither the BBC, the Assembly nor Arriva use it. AFAIK, Network Rail tends not to use Welsh full stop, but still. Worth noting you'll find the same number of results in these searches if you mutate the P to B, MH or PH. The whole matter is complicated by Rheilffordd De Cymru, of which the first few pages were referring exclusively to the pre-grouping South Wales Railway. 81.110.106.169 (talk) 18:46, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

2015 Wootton Bassett SPAD?

re [1]

What relevance does this one incident have to the entire history of the SWML, such that this, and only this incident, is mentioned - and with a whole section to itself. In contrast, the Severn Tunnel accident (185 injuries) doesn't even get a See also. Andy Dingley (talk) 22:10, 14 April 2015 (UTC)

Scope of South Wales Main Line

There seems to be some confusion and disagreement about where the South Wales Main Line starts and ends. This article from Network Rail states the line starts from the Severn Tunnel and ends in Swansea. [2] Does this article really need to be separate to the Great Western main line article. Nowadays it is effectively just a branch of the Great Western? Argoed (talk) 16:09, 25 September 2017 (UTC)

There are three routes that were of varying significance by age.

• The 1850 line from Gloucester.
• Post-1886, the line through the tunnel and North of Bristol. This now makes the Gloucester line through Chepstow and Lydney very secondary. It even affects some of the importance for the Golden Valley line.
• The Bristol and South Wales Union Railway and its notion of a "railway to America" via Neyland (or Abermawr), which would involve major traffic beyond Swansea. However this part never happened.

So the "modern" SWML is the tunnel to Swansea. But it has had other aspects too. Even today, it's wrong to say the line "terminates" at Swansea. Andy Dingley (talk) 16:34, 25 September 2017 (UTC)

External links modified

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Gauge history

I don't have the information to do so, but I think it would be useful if someone could add into the History section something about the fact that (as I understand it) this line was originally broad gauge. This fact is mentioned elsewhere (eg Taff Vale Railway#Taff_Vale_Extension_Railway and Rhymney Railway#London_and_North_Western_Railway), and it appears to have been one of the factors in the development of competing lines providing direct standard gauge links from some of the South Wales valleys to Cardiff, London and elsewhere. It therefore seems to be significant enough to warrant inclusion here - perhaps at least a mention of the original gauge and when it was converted to standard? JA 1961 (talk) 14:08, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

True, and the gauge conversion of the South Wales main line was a bigger project than the gauge conversion of the West of England main line, but got less publicity because it occurred twenty years earlier, during a period when the GWR were gradually converting the gauge area by area, line by line. The specific lines involved and dates are found in MacDermot, Volume II (Chapter II and Appendix I) - but generally speaking, the lines west of Gloucester were converted in early May 1872, the lines between Swindon, Gloucester and Cheltenham later the same month. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 23:12, 10 January 2024 (UTC)