The Invergarry and Fort Augustus Railway (I&FAR) was a branch-line railway built in Scotland, connecting the named places with the main line at Spean Bridge. It opened in 1903.
Serving exceptionally sparsely inhabited areas, it was never commercially successful, but it rekindled hostilities between larger railways over a planned railway connection along the Great Glen reaching Inverness; however this scheme never materialised.
Passenger train operation ceased in 1933 and the line closed completely in 1946.
Background The Great Glen is a fault-controlled glacial valley that runs in a straight line across the Highlands of Scotland from Fort William on Loch Linnhe in the south west to Inverness on the Moray Firth in the north east.
It forms an easy communication route. As well as roads, the Caledonian Canal was constructed along it by linking natural lochs with canal sections. It opened to sea-going vessels in 1822, but the limited size of the canal sections proved inadequate for general merchant shipping.A D Cameron, The Caledonian Canal, Birlinn Ltd, 2005,
In the railway age, Inverness was an important commercial centre, and from 1854 it was a focus of railway communication. From a company amalgamation in 1865 the Highland Railway was dominant in that area. Agriculture and industry were active in the eastern side of the country, and railway development there was more vigorous. By contrast the western side of the area was backward and depressed. The first railway to attempt to reach the west coast was the Dingwall and Skye Railway, authorised in 1865 to build from Dingwall, north of Inverness, to Kyle of Lochalsh, close to the Isle of Skye. In fact the line opened only as far as Stromeferry on Loch Carron, a more difficult anchorage than Kyle of Lochalsh, in 1870. (The Highland Railway later absorbed the Dingwall and Skye Railway, and in 1897 it extended the line to Kyle of Lochalsh.)H A Vallance, C R Clinker and Anthony J Lambert, The Highland Railway, David and Charles, Newton Abbot, 1985,
An approach to the west coast further south was attempted by the Callander and Oban Railway, by extending from an existing branch line from Dunblane at Callander. Oban was already an important hub of communication with the islands and coastal towns. The construction of this line was also difficult, passing through sparsely populated rocky landscapes. There were serious money problems, but with the considerable support of the Caledonian Railway Oban was at last connected to the railway system in 1880.John Thomas, The Callander and Oban Railway, David & Charles, Newton Abbot, 1966
Widespread attention was given to the depressed economic conditions in the West Highlands, and in the 1883 parliamentary session the Glasgow and North Western Railway was proposed. It was to leave the North British Railway at Maryhill (on the north west margin of Glasgow) and run by Loch Lomondside and Glencoe to Fort William and Inverness. This was an ambitious scheme, but the Highland Railway saw it as a threat to its supremacy in its area, and it opposed the scheme vigorously; the result was that the Glasgow and North Western Railway was rejected in Parliament.John McGregor, The West Highland Railway—Plans Politics and People, John Donald, Edinburgh, 2005,
It was a more modest proposal that actually provided the third link to the western coast: the West Highland Railway, which built a line from Craigendoran, opened in 1894 and extended to Banavie, on the Caledonian Canal, the following year. The West Highland Railway had intended to build their line to Roshven, on the Sound of Arisaig. Major difficulties had arisen with landowners' objections to the Roshven line, and the West Highland Railway contented itself with extending instead to Mallaig from Fort William; that section opened in 1901.
The West Highland Railway was sponsored by the North British Railway (NBR), and hostility flared up between the NBR and the Highland Railway. Both companies proposed lines along the Great Glen in 1893, before reviewing their intentions and withdrawing their schemes, and they agreed not to promote further similar schemes for a period of ten years, the so-called "ten year truce".
Planning The contractor and entrepreneur Charles Forman had been active in encouraging the various Great Glen schemes, and now he proposed the Invergarry and Fort Augustus Railway; it was to run to Fort Augustus from Spean Bridge on the West Highland Railway. In 1896 the board of the company comprised:
Sir Donald Matheson KCB (chairman) Captain Edward Charles Ellice (deputy chairman) James Scarlett, 1st Baron Abinger Michael Bass, 1st Baron Burton John Charles Cuninghame 17th Laird of Craigends and Upper Foyers John Neilson of Glasgow, George Malcolm of Invergarry
The scheme attracted considerable local support and it obtained its authorising act of Parliament, the (59 & 60 Vict. c. ccxl) on 14 August 1896.David Ross, The North British Railway—A History, Stenlake Publishing, Catrine, 2014, David Ross, The Highland Railway, Tempus Publishing Limited, Stroud, 2005, The population of Fort Augustus was less than 500, and it was widely assumed that the line was a speculative bid to reach Inverness.
Construction
Formans and McCall were appointed engineers of the railway, and James Young of Glasgow was the contractor. Construction started on 2 March 1897 when Mrs Margaret Ellice of Invergarry, wife of Captain Edward Ellice, deputy chairman of the company, cut the first turf. but the process was very slow, in part due to an exceptionally high standard of specification for the architectural and engineering assets. Elaborate stations with spacious goods yards were provided. Invergarry had four goods sidings and separate loading banks for cattle and goods.John Thomas, Forgotten Railways: Scotland, David and Charles (Publishers) Limited, Newton Abbot, 1976,
In April 1900 the directors paid a visit of inspection and travelled over the whole length of the line, which was reported as practically completed.
The line was in length to Fort Augustus station; the pier extension was . The first mile and last mile of the railway absorbed around one third of the capital expenditure. From the west end of Spean Bridge the line passed along the banks of the River Spean and through a gorge, which required four lattice spans at a maximum height above the river of , one of , two of and one of . After a stretch through wooded countryside, it crossed the river Gloy on a three-span lattice girder bridge of two spans and one span. The line then climbed to the summit of at Letterfinlay. The descent to the Great Glen included the Oich tunnel, and a four-span Calder Burn viaduct to reach Aberchalder. The final stretch followed the shoreline of Loch Uanagan to Fort Augustus town station. From there it crossed the Caledonian Canal on a swing bridge to the pier station on Loch Ness. The line had a ruling gradient of 1 in 66 and was single throughout, although land had been acquired for double track. There were passing loops at all the stations, which were: Spean Bridge (West Highland Railway station) Gairlochy Invergloy; opened June 1904 Letterfinlay: crossing place only; never brought into use and subsequently dismantled Invergarry Aberchalder Fort Augustus, with three platform faces Fort Augustus Pier; passenger service in summer only; closed 1 October 1906.M E Quick, Railway Passenger Stations in England Scotland and Wales—A Chronology, The Railway and Canal Historical Society, 2002
The line had cost £344,000 () to construct, or around £14,300 per mile. Michael Bass, 1st Baron Burton had provided £163,000 of the capital required for construction. The line was ready for opening in 1901, but the company had run out of money and had none to purchase locomotives, coaches and wagons. The company approached the North British Railway to operate the line for them. The Highland Railway objected to this and the matter was investigated by parliamentary authorities. This led to a lengthy delay in agreeing terms of operation. The North British Railway required 60% of the revenue with a minimum of £3,000 each year (). The Highland Railway agreed to operate it at £2,000 per half year. The Invergarry and Fort Augustus Railway company had to submit a private bill to Parliament to confirm the working arrangement, and this was passed as the (3 Edw. 7. c. cxii) on 30 June 1903.
Operations Opening On 14 July 1903 Colonel John Wallace Pringle inspected the railway on behalf of the Board of Trade and declared it open for traffic. The line opened to passengers on 22 July 1903."Brunel Redivivus", New Railway in the Highlands: Opening of the Invergarry and Fort Augustus Railway, in Railway Magazine, September 1903 The formal ceremony was performed at Spean Bridge by Mrs Eliza Stewart Ellice, of Invergarry, who had cut the first turf in 1897. She was presented with a gold whistle. A large party of invited guests travelled by train to Fort Augustus where they were entertained by William Whitelaw, chairman of the Highland Railway Company, to luncheon at the Lovat Arms Hotel.
The company appointed Hugh Fraser as stationmaster at Fort Augustus, James Morrison at Invergarry and Donald Macdonald to Gairlochy.
The building of the line was the signal for a resumption of the fight for a railway along the Great Glen: the itself as well as the Highland Railway and the North British Railway proposed lines linking to Inverness, but the Highland Railway gained the ascendency. However it was excluded in the Commons from running powers over the , and the Highland Railway Bill was subsequently thrown out in the Lords.
By section 32 of the Invergarry and Fort Augustus Railway Act 1896 (59 & 60 Vict. c. ccxl), the railway was, for the benefit of the owners of the Glengarry estate, required to construct a permanent station at within of the South-West end of Loch Oich, "to be called Invergarry Station, for passengers, animals and goods, with separate waiting-rooms for ladies and gentlemen and other usual and necessary accommodation therein" and to "stop all ordinary trains other than express or special or excursion trains at such station daily for the purpose of taking up and setting down traffic of any kind."
Highland Railway A 4-4-0 tank engine, no 52 was generally used as the motive power during the Highland Railway period. There were four trains each way daily. In September 1905, King Edward VII travelled over the line from Spean Bridge to Invergarry with George Cadogan, 5th Earl Cadogan and Countess Cadogan.
The Fort Augustus Pier station was on Loch Ness and tourist traffic was contemplated. However the dominant steamer operator on the loch, David MacBrayne, declined to use the railway pier and it saw very little use. The extension to the pier involved a hand-operated swing bridge over the Caledonian Canal and a viaduct over the River Oich. Passenger traffic on the pier extension was suspended from 1 October 1906,In Forgotten Railways page 202 Thomas says "On 30th September 1907 the closed its pier and station at Fort Augustus, and abandoned the expensive and little-used approach. In the following year the Highland withdrew its trains and the NB moved in to work the line..." The date 30 September 1906 is used by other authorities (Vallance, Clinker and Lambert; Quick) and in any case the NBR took over in 1907, not 1908. It was of course the Pier station, not Fort Augustus station that was closed to passengers. The approach line and Pier station remained in use for goods purposes for some years. although occasional goods trains ran until July 1924 when the extension was finally closed permanently.