(Photos 1-5 © The New Mendoza, photo 6 © Richard Croft)

British Rail opened a four-mile single-track branch to the new Bevercotes Colliery in 1961, linking it to the network at Boughton Junction. It was closed temporarily between January 1962 and August 1965, and saw its last ever train on 18th June 1993.

The line featured a 350-yard bore known locally as Mummies Tunnel, but correctly titled Boughton Brake. The portals are brick-built whilst the interior features near-vertical brick side walls - incorporating regular refuges - and a segmental arch concrete roof.

Vegetation has recently been cleared from the tunnel's approach cuttings.

(Richard Croft's photo is used under this Creative Commons licence.)

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