What's your dream obscure railway restoration project?

The Northern line on the IoM
One of the Fell railways in NZ
Any one of the 2-2-2-0 etc unconnected driving wheel engines

 

Croxley Green branch from Watford, and then extend it to join the Metropolitan Line between Croxley and Watford. I realise that this is far too fanciful and will simply never happen but we can dream.

 

Unlike most other dreams, this one had some serious work started a few years ago, before all parties agreed that it was a great plan provided someone else paid for it.

 

Back when I was a teenager, my school sent a group of us on a week of "Arduous Training" (NOT a punishment!), trekking over the Rhinog mountains in Snowdonia.
Whilst poring over the map we'd been given, I noticed a "Tk of old rly" snaking north-south down the map, including some serious S-curves near a place called Beddgellert.
I remember thinking "whatever that was, it must have been spectacular!"
Just saying....

 

During the generally sunny summer of '73, when new FR Carriage 116 was like an oven, I came across an old cutting to explore, behind the Goat Hotel in Beddgelert and I remember thinking "Oh rats* .... that's not only very boggy, it's also rather deep".


*or words to that effect!

 

A local one to me The Parkland Walk is the longest linear nature reserve in London at 4km in length, and follows the former railway line connecting Finsbury Park to Alexandra Palace which opened in 1873.
The trackbed is still there.
Lots of graffiti but also incudes a statue of the ‘Spriggan’ a sculpture by Maryion Collins:

 

Know it well. The dream would be to connect from Finsbury Park to the Northern City Line so that tube trains could run from Moorgate to Ally Pally as per the Northern Heights plan.

 

Arthur Pain's light railways are high on my list.
The Southwold Railway was undoubtedly his magnum opus; but his first line, the Culm Valley, certainly came at a close second.
There's something about the early CVLR that, like the SR, just oozed charm. The meandering route along through beautiful surroundings, the petite 2-4-0 tanks, the ancient four wheeled carriages... I could wax lyrical about that railway!
The trackbed between Hemyock and Culmstock is almost entirely untouched, so I can't imagine it would be too difficult to reinstate the line there.

Another route that I think would make for an interesting heritage line is the industrial Barrington Light Railway in South Cambridgeshire. The track is in a pristine state as it is currently being used to take spoil to infill the old limestone quarry, so I can't imagine it would be particularly difficult to repurpose it for passenger use once the quarry infill project has finished.
For some reason, that part of the East Anglia hasn't got any heritage lines whatsoever, but it's always good to fill in the gaps imho .
I'd like to imagine it could be turned into a light railway paradise, rivaling the likes of Mangapps, the Middy, KESR and Foxfield: ancient Manning Wardle saddle tanks and four wheeled coaches, wooden station buildings with wriggly tin roofs; but maybe I'm getting a bit ahead of myself!

 

My dream railways to restore, though I wouldn’t call either obscure would be the Hawkhurst branch line, followed by the Cuckoo Line and rounded up by the Three Bridges to Tunbridge Wells. Perhaps not very exciting choices but there we go!

 

All those are on my dream list, particularly the Cuckoo, my own home line. Not forgetting Sheffield Park to Lewes (or Culver Junction, as necessary)

 

Sounds like my idea of heaven.

 

AS I've mentioned before (probably several times on various threads), my favourite bonkers WIBN would be the extension northbound of the Strathspey Railway over Dava Moor and as far as possible into Forres (now built over).
Grantown West is on the 750 ft contour, Dava Summit is documented as 1052 feet above sea level and Forres is at about 30 feet. Pretty awesome on a heritage railway.

 

Restore the section of NSWGR between Wallangarra and Tenterfield.

That would be the closest line to me that I could run my new-build 517 class…

 

1.Connecting the Llangollen Rly to Bala Rly. GBR can do the bit back to Ruabon
2.Connecting... Wa ...well you know that there is a whole other thread on that subject,apparently it HAS been done (six or seven years ago) but there is great difficulty on actually running services on it!!

 

1. Cleobury Mortimer and Ditton Priors Light Railway, with a possible link back along the old GWR line to Bewdley.
2. Coverdale Line from Much Wenlock to Craven Arms.

 

1. And Monsieur's choice of MW 0-6-0? Saddle tank, pannier rebuild or one of each?

2. Long a samping ground of curved frame Dean 4-4-0s. Care to name a Bulldog?

 

Mouth-watering….

 

Odd name for a loco...