page_title: Llanidloes and Newtown Railway
section_title: Authorisation and construction
hierarchical_section_title: Llanidloes and Newtown Railway / Authorisation and construction
caption_attribution_description: English: David Davies Llandinam Born in Llandinam in 1818, Davies was the son of a tenant farmer. He left school at 11 and worked with his father both on the farm and as a sawyer. He made enough money to buy himself a farm and then another. Farms in the Severn valley are prone to flooding and Davies's flood prevention work impressed the then County Surveyor of Montgomeryshire Thomas Penson and he was asked to take on the work of building the foundations, road and embankment for a new iron bridge across the Severn. As his civil engineering skills developed he turned his attention to the building of railways and was responsible for the Llanidloes to Newtown line (now dismantled, the Llandinam station was at the western end of the nearby bridge) and later the Mid Wales Railway from Llanidloes to Llandovery and the Cambrian Railway. His interests then turned to coal and, with a group of investors, he started mining in the upper Rhondda Valley. Another of his lasting achievements was the building of Barry Docks which he needed to secure a stable overseas market for his Rhondda coal. This is the twin of the statue of Davies outside the Barry Dock Office https://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/270728 . He is shown holding the plans for Barry Docks.
context_page_description: The Llanidloes and Newtown Railway was a railway company in Montgomeryshire, Wales. It was promoted locally when plans for trunk railways passing through the locality were cancelled; local people saw that a railway connection was essential to the flannel industry in the district. The seventeen-mile line opened in 1859, and at first was isolated from any other railway, but from 1861 it became connected to Oswestry by an allied railway company, and other companies also connected to it. From 1864 the company was incorporated into the new Cambrian Railways company.
  Serving a thinly populated and remote area, the line was never commercially successful, and the long-distance through routes passing through did not succeed in bringing great traffic volumes to the line. When Llanidloes station was to be extended and improved, the Manchester and Milford Railway, then under construction, undertook to pay a one-third share of the cost of the works, and of future maintenance and operation of the station. The M&MR later decided to alter the course of its line and never reached Llanidloes, but continued to be liable for heavy charges for a station it did not connect with.
context_section_description: The Llanidloes and Newtown Railway received its authorising Act on 4 August 1853. Commercial prospects seemed excellent; Whalley was elected chairman. The authorisation led to a period of elation within the company, and immediately a long extension line to Shrewsbury was suggested. However the new company quickly found great difficulty in raising subscriptions to build its own line. It was not until September 1855 that the first construction contract was awarded; that went to David Davies of Llandinam. In time Davies became prominent in construction and mining in Wales. Soon Davies got the contract for the whole line; he took into partnership Thomas Savin of Llwyn-y-Maen. 
  The original plan was for a double line but this was amended to single, with bridges built for later doubling.
  Some progress was made with construction, but by the end of 1857 all available money had been expended and work stopped, and Davies and Savin were working elsewhere. Early in 1859, Davies and Savin offered to finish the line, in exchange for all unissued shares and debentures, on paper a 25 per cent rise on the original contract value, and to lease and work the line. The chairman was against acceptance, but a committee of shareholders considered that there was no realistic alternative, and voted in favour. The lease was incorporated into the 21 July 1859 Llanidloes and Newtown Railway (Canal Extension) Act. (The proposed canal extension was to be a short tramway to the Shropshire Union Canal basin at Newtown, but it was never built.)
  The railway construction was resumed with the excavation of Scafell cutting. The company engineer was now Benjamin Piercy of Trefeglwys, as Rice Hopkins had died.
caption: Statue of David Davies at Llandinam
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