The Dingwall and Skye Railway was authorised on 5 July 1865 with the aim of providing a route to Skye and the Hebrides. However, due to local objections, another Act of Parliament was required before work could commence. This was passed on 29 May 1868.
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With the exception of the Strathpeffer Branch, the line is still open, being the major section of the Kyle of Lochalsh Line.
History
The line to Stromeferry opened for passenger traffic on 19 August 1870. It was 53 miles (85 km) in length and cost £238,500 (equivalent to £20,580,000 in 2015) to build.
The line was worked by the Highland Railway, and was ultimately absorbed on 2 August 1880. On 29 June 1893 the Highland Railway obtained re-authorisation to build the section to Kyle of Lochalsh. The line was inspected by Sir Francis Marindin of the Board of Trade on 29 October 1897, and opened for traffic on 2 November. The construction of the 10.5 miles (16.9 km) line cost £200,000 (equivalent to £20,470,000 in 2015) and was built under the supervision of the engineer Murdoch Paterson. The pier at Kiyle of Lochalsh cost £85,000 to build.
The initial aim was to connect Skye to Inverness. Although Inverness was Skye's county town at the time, it was easier to get there via Glasgow. The line opened in 1870, but with its terminus at Stromeferry. Boats provided onward connection to Skye and the Outer Hebrides.
The line was extended to Kyle, through some unforgiving terrain; almost all of the extension is in rock cuttings or embankments. At the time it was the most expensive railway ever built in Britain per mile, and much money was provided by the Government.
The line never gained much traffic: connections with the ferries were often unreliable; much freight traffic was stolen by the West Highland Railway upon its opening. Original ideas, including such ideas as moving fishing boats by rail across Scotland to avoid navigating around, never came to fruition. The line avoided the Beeching Axe due to social necessity, but throughout the 1970s it was variously threatened with closure, but won a reprieve until the Caledonian MacBrayne service to Lewis was moved from Kyle to Ullapool. It was eventually saved in connection with supplying goods for oil platform fabrication at the nearby Kishorn Yard. The section of line along Loch Carron is particularly troublesome, and prone to landslides, often closing that section.
Strathpeffer Branch
The logical route for the original line would have taken it through Strathpeffer, a spa town, and one of the few centres of population, but disagreements with landowners - particularly Sir William Mackenzie of Coul House - meant that it bypassed the town, and the line was diverted through Raven Rock. This diversion consequently proved very costly for the Dingwall & Skye Railway company. The original Act had allowed the company to build the railway through to Kyle, but the severe costs of the Strathpeffer diversion in addition to loss of revenue from relevant shareholders meant that the money ran out, leading to the line being cut back to Stromeferry, 10 miles short of Kyle. It would be another 27 years before the line reached the originally planned terminus.
The short-sightedness of the landowner was to last for a generation, as his son gave permission for the branch line to be built to Strathpeffer by 1884, despite the fact the main line was now already in place. On 3 June 1885, the branch opened, operating for 66 years before it closed on 26 March 1951, with the track being lifted soon afterwards. A station was opened at Achterneed on the original line, being called Strathpeffer, but proved too far from the town to viably harness that revenue, and closed in 1965.