St Ives to Ely freight & passenger steam train simulation

St Ives to Ely

This video simulates a steam train from the 1940s leaving St Ives station and travelling to Ely. Peter Swinson created the simulation. Below the video is a history of the St Ives to Ely railway line.

The St Ives to Ely railway was a single track line opened in 1878. It was never profitable, part of the problem being that stations were remotely sited from the villages they meant to serve. Residents of Bluntisham, Earith, Sutton and Haddenham had some distance to walk to catch a train. The development of road transport in the 1920s, particularly a local bus service, accelerated a decline in use. The line closed to passenger transport in the 1930s, although there were occasional passenger excursions to London and two annual excursions until 1958 from St Ives to Hunstanton and Great Yarmouth via Ely. Transportation of goods, primarily fruit production, continued until the line closed in 1964.