Bristol and North Somerset Railway

v t e Bristol and North Somerset Railway
Legend
MR Bristol & Gloucester Railway to Gloucester Bristol Harbour GWR Great Western Main Line to London Bristol Temple Meads St Philip's Marsh TMD River Avon GWR Bristol and Exeter Railway to Exeter Brislington Whitchurch Halt Pensford Pensford Viaduct over River Chew Clutton Camerton branch Hallatrow Farrington Gurney Halt Paulton Halt Radford and Timsbury Halt Camerton Dunkerton Colliery Halt Dunkerton Combe Hay Halt Midsomer Norton and Welton Somerset & Dorset Joint Rly Radstock West Midford Halt Monkton Combe Halt Wessex Main Line to Bath Spa Limpley Stoke Mells Road Westbury Wessex Main Line to Southampton Whatley Quarry Heart of Wessex Line to Westbury Frome Heart of Wessex Line to Weymouth

The Bristol and North Somerset Railway was a railway line in the West of England that connected Bristol with Radstock, through Pensford and further into northern Somerset, to allow access to the Somerset Coalfield. The line ran almost due south from Bristol and was 16 miles (26 km) long.

Opened in 1873, it joined with an existing branch from Frome to Radstock, and was later worked with it as a single entity. In 1882 the Camerton Branch was opened by the Great Western Railway to serve collieries at Camerton; it was later extended to Limpley Stoke, on the Bath to Trowbridge line. It closed to passenger traffic in 1925.

The line's primary traffic was coal, and travel to work commuting into Bristol. Both of these traffic sources substantially declined in the 1950s, with the Camerton Branch fully closed in 1951. Passenger traffic ceased on the rest of the entire line complex before the Beeching Axe in 1959, with complete closure of the line in 1973 following the closure of the last colliery in the Somerset Coalfield at Kilmersdon.