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The Brandling Junction Railway was an early railway in County Durham, England. It took over the Tanfield Waggonway of 1725 that was built to bring coal from Tanfield to staiths on the River Tyne at Dunston. The Brandling Junction Railway itself opened in stages from 1839, running from Gateshead to Wearmouth and South Shields. Wearmouth was regarded at the time as the "Sunderland" terminal.
The Tanfield Waggonway was modernised and connected to the Newcastle and Carlisle Railway near Redheugh, and onward transit to the main line of the Brandling Junction Railway was by a rope-worked incline from Redheugh to a Gateshead station. The Brandling Junction Railway modernised the Tanfield Waggonway route, although it remained a difficult route, with numerous rope-worked inclines.
The Brandling Junction Railway was conceived as a mainly mineral railway, but passenger traffic was surprisingly buoyant. From 1841 until 1850 main line passenger trains from London to Gateshead ran over part of the line (from Brockley Whins) and after that date from Pelaw to Gateshead, until 1868.
Most of the network closed in the middle years of the twentieth century, although the route from Gateshead to Monkwearmouth is still in use; a heritage railway operates on a section of the former Tanfield Waggonway.