Transport

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Transport in Milton Keynes

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A brief look at the history of four types of transport in Milton Keynes

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The Canal

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The Grand Junction Canal

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Originally, canal barges travelled from London to Birmingham along the River Thames through Oxford. But the upper reaches of the river were difficult to navigate and so a more direct route through what is now Milton Keynes to Braunceston was proposed. It was approved in 1773 and fully open by 1805. In 1810 343,560 tons of goods were carried along the canal. It was a broad canal, allowing for boats 14 feet wide, but because it connected to narrow canals it was mostly used by narrow boats.

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For most of its life it operated as a turnpike trust. This means that its revenue was generated from tolls and rental income.

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The Grand Union Canal

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In 1929 the Grand Junction canal, the Regents canal and two Warwick canals merged to create the Grand Union Canal. This linked London, Birminghamd and the Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire coalfields with canals all under single ownership. It was the longest canal in the country at 137 miles. Improvement work was completed in 1937 to allow broad beamed boats to travel between London and Birmingham. But commercial cargo continued to decline and the last recorded commercial journey was in March of 1960.

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The Railway

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London and Birmingham Railway

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This was the first intercity railway from London. There were objections to the line from landowners and canal companies but it was finally approved in 1833 and opened in 1838. Initially the line was not complete and replacement coach services ran between Denbigh Hall (near Bletchley) and Rugby for five months. When the full line was open the journey took 2.5 hours, compared to the 4 days it took by Canal.

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The Iron Road

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Frances Coghlan wrote travel guides and he issued two for the London and Birmingham Railway. The first covered the five month period when the railway line was not fully open. The museum has a copy of this book on display in our Hall of Transport.

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The introduction covered statistics of the railway, how long it was, the number of cuttings and embankments etc. and tips for rail travel. Coghlan walked the route of the line and described the towns and villages the train would travel through or near.

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Local Towns

Denbigh Hall

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The Newport Nobby Line

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In 1866 a branch line to Newport Pagnell opened. There was one engine on the line, which was nicknamed the Newport Nobby. It carried freight and passengers between Wolverton and Newport Pagnell with stations at Bradwell and Great Linford. The line was closed in 1964 as part of the Beeching railway cuts. Part of the route is now a redway.

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Special trucks were designed which carried the vehicles from Salmons Coachmakers. All the coal used in Newport Pagnell and the surrounding villages was brought in by train. Flour mills were built along side the line and livestock pens were built so that farmers could transport their cattle.

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Wolverton Works

It was not safe to take a locomotive all the way from London to Birmingham without checking it. At the midway point a new town developed which was named Wolverton after the local village. A loccomotive works was opened in 1838 known as Wolverton Works. In 1865 the railway became the London and Northwestern Line and Wolverton Works stopped making loccomotives and concentrated on building and repairing carriages and wagons. It became the largest carriage works in the UK. Initially covering 2.27 acres by 1906 the site was 80 acres and employed 5,000 workers. It continues to operate today, managed by Gemini Rail Services.

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Car manufacturing

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Salmon & Sons Ltd

In 1830 Joseph Salmon started as a small coachbuilder in the grounds of Tickford Abbey in Newprt Pagnell. He became famous for producing coaches, dog-carts and ralli-carts, selling them internationally. In 1869 the company became Salmon & Sons Ltd when his two sons joined the company. With the advent of the internal combustion engine they started to build bespoke cars for all makes of chassis in the late 1890s. At the start of the 20th century they were leading exhibitors at the Olympia Motor Show and had an extensive premises in London with show rooms in the West End from the mid 1920s.

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They were well known for their hood developments, creating both spring assisted and winding hoods. In the late 1930s they employed 450 people and built 30 car bodies a week. The company was renamed Tickford Motor Bodies in the 1940s when the last member of the Salmons family retired from the company. After WW2 they continued to make quality coachwork for companies including Alvis, Daimler, Humber, Rover, Austin Healey and Lagonda.

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Aston Martin

In 1955 David Brown of Aston Martin purchased the Tickford Motor Building Company. The company had already been building bodies for the DB2 range. Within a few years the entire production had been moved to the site, with the global headquarters following in the 1960s. The DB5, the first Aston Martin to appear in a James Bond film, was launched in 1963.

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Hundreds of cars were produced a year, each one handbuilt by craftsmen. It would take a week to roll a flat sheet of aluminium into a bonnet. Each panel received 9 coats of paint, every one rubbed down by hand. Once assembled the car received a further 12 coats of colour and lacquer. In one week four craftsmen used 11 hides and 17 square yards of carpet on just one Lagonda. By 1984 10,000 cars had been produced on the site. The last car, the V12 Vanquish, came off the production line in 2007. Aston Martin continues to have a presence on the site with a new car dealership and service centre and a global Heritage sales, service and restoration facility.

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Boatmakers

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Edward Hayes

Edward Hayes (1818-1877) was apprenticed as a boat builder and agricultural engineer in Manchester. In the 1840s he moved to Wolverton to work at Wolverton Works as an engineer. In 1847 he founded Watling Works in Stony Stratford. Initially they made portable steam engines for agricultural use. He worked with William Smith, of Woolstone, the inventor of the steam cultivation system.

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Edward Hayes was keen to train men from all backgrounds and the company had many apprenticeships. A number of these went on to be well known engineers, including one who worked on the titanic.

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Boat Making

They began to specialise in marine engines and in the 1960s started to build steam boats, for coasting, canal and river work. They built launches and tugs for governments across the world as well as for private individuals. By 1900 they were building boats up to 80ft long.

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The business was continued by his son, Edward Hayes Jnr (d.1917), and grandson (d.1920). They built tugs, ocean-going vessels, steam boats and river launches. The company had a worldwide reputation. and won prizes in international yacht races, tug tests etc. ‘Engineering’ records a 51ft Hayes tug towing three Thames barges, totalling over 400 tons, loaded, against the tide.

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We hope you enjoyed our exhibition

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Visit our website www.miltonkeynesmuseum.org.uk for more exhibitions, details on our podcast and information on how to visit.

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