The Potteries, Shrewsbury and North Wales Railway, (known informally as the 'Potts'), was a railway built between Shrewsbury, England, and quarry locations at Nantmawr and Criggion in Wales. It was initially opened in 1866; despite the extensive title it never reached further than those extremities. It had cost about £1.5 million to construct, but its financial performance was extremely poor, and economies resulted in near-suspension of maintenance, leading to dangerous conditions. The line rapidly became very run down as a result of low revenues and poor maintenance, and was closed at the instigation of the Board of Trade for safety reasons in June 1880. It lay derelict for 30 years but was revived when the Shropshire and Montgomeryshire Railway re-opened it as a light railway in 1911.
Background
By the early 1860s Shrewsbury had become an important railway centre, dominated together by the Great Western Railway and the London and North Western Railway, and the main station was approached by trunk lines controlled by those companies, separately and jointly.
Shrewsbury itself was an important county town, but its hinterland was rural, agricultural and sparsely populated. Nevertheless, it had a strategic importance, in being the gateway to a large tract of land in mid-Wales. Earlier aspirations to form a direct railway route from London through Shrewsbury to a North Wales harbour, enabling a direct packet boat route to Dublin, had been superseded by the Chester and Holyhead Railway, and the development of Holyhead as a ferry port.
West Shropshire Railway
Richard Samuel France was the owner of extensive limestone quarries; limestone is a heavy mineral and conveying it to market was expensive and difficult. France proposed a railway linking his quarries at Llanymynech through Kinnerley to Westbury (Salop), a place on the Shrewsbury and Welshpool Railway about 11 miles west of Shrewsbury. France succeeded in getting the West Shropshire Mineral Railway authorised, by Act of Parliament of 29 July 1862.
France's objective was to get the limestone to a main line railway station for onward consignment, and he was the prime mover in promoting the railway. The old idea of reaching a Welsh ferryport for Dublin remained, and a route involving a two-mile tunnel had been thought about. There was evidently some difficulty about the choice of Westbury, for the following year he obtained a modifying Act of Parliament, on 13 July 1863; now his line would run from Llanymynech to Red Hill, much nearer Shrewsbury.
No doubt reflecting on the impossibility of raising subscription capital for a railway with only one potential customer, France now extended the vision, and the scope of his proposed railway network, to include limekilns at Nantmawr and granite quarries at Criggion, and a branch to Great Ness. Moreover, the line would now carry passengers, and the company would be reincorporated as the Shrewsbury and North Wales Railway. An application was made for running powers into the main Shrewsbury station, but the running powers were opposed during the Parliamentary process, so that the S&NWR would have to build its own line alongside the Welshpool line, and construct its own station at Shrewsbury. This third Act was passed on 30 June 1864.
Potteries, Shrewsbury and North Wales Railway
The North Staffordshire Railway observed these developments and encouraged the projection of a subsidiary, the Shrewsbury and Potteries Junction Railway; this line got its authorising Act of 5 July 1865. The Potteries district around Stoke-on-Trent was the NSR's home, and a long line westward through Shrewsbury into north west Wales appeared attractive. The Shrewsbury and North Wales Railway would, it seemed, make an ideal partner in this venture that might stretch from Market Drayton.
The alliance was agreed and progressed through Parliament, gaining authorisation on 16 July 1866, and the result was the Potteries, Shrewsbury and North Wales Railway, commonly abbreviated to "the Potts". The new company now contemplated extending to Porthmadog.