thumb|right|Cholsey railway station from street level; the Cholsey and Wallingford branch platform is at upper level to right of building
The Cholsey and Wallingford Railway is a long standard gauge heritage railway in the English county of Oxfordshire. It operates along most of the length of the former Wallingford branch of the Great Western Railway (GWR), from Cholsey station, north of Reading on the Great Western Main Line, to a station on the outskirts of the nearby town of Wallingford.
History
thumb|right|Platform level at Cholsey station, with the terminus of the Cholsey and Wallingford line to the left
The first proposals for the Cholsey to Wallingford line date from 1861, and envisaged an independently owned route from Cholsey to Princes Risborough via Wallingford, Benson, Watlington and Chinnor. This line would have been a through route, with junctions with the Great Western Railway at Cholsey and the Wycombe Railway at Princes Risborough. In 1862, a Bill was presented to Parliament for a short branch from Cholsey to Wallingford, but this was withdrawn early in 1863, before it had come up for consideration. It was replaced by the Wallingford and Watlington Railway Bill which was passed by Parliament in July 1864.
The W&WR opened as far as Wallingford on 2 July 1866. Unfortunately, two months earlier, in May 1866, the Overend, Gurney & Co bank had crashed, causing the severest financial crisis of the nineteenth century. The Bank Rate was raised to 10%, making it impossible for the W&WR to raise the capital for its planned continuation to Watlington. In 1871, Parliament consented to the railway abandoning its plans for the line beyond Wallingford. The company was sold to the GWR in 1872.
The railway became popularly known as the Wallingford Bunk. The Curator of the Cholsey and Wallingford Railway Museum attributes the following story to the late Mrs Harold Gale. "Around the turn of the century, the loco did a 'bunk'. It left Cholsey station without its coaches. Harold and Len Gale, returning from football in Reading, had uncoupled the loco while it waited in the bay platform."
The line closed to passengers in 1959, and the last British Rail goods traffic into the old Wallingford Station ran in 1965.
Rolling stock
Locomotives
The line is the home to several diesel locomotives, including three of British Rail's ubiquitous Class 08 shunters, which are used on most trains. Steam also currently operates on the railway, by locomotive GWR No. 12.
Operational
- British Rail Class 08 08 022 Lion, ex-Guinness Brewery, Park Royal, London (Operational, August 2022) (DE = diesel-electric)
- British Rail Class 08 08 060 Unicorn, ex-Guinness Brewery, Park Royal, London (Operational, August 2022)
- British Rail Class 08 08 123 George Mason (Operational, August 2022)
- 12 Sentinel 4wVBT Sentinel Works No 6515/GWR No. 12, privately owned. (Operational, August 2022)
Not operational
- Hibberd Carpenter, ex-Guinness Brewery, Park Royal, London (under repair, July 2017) (DM = diesel mechanical)
Railcars
- One Wickham trolley
Carriage and wagon
The line has a varied collection of passenger carriages and freight wagons.
Gallery
<gallery>
Image:02I05I2015 CWR Steam Event C2.jpg|Peckett 0-4-0ST 'Northern Gas Board No. 1' at Cholsey
Image:Peckett Ivor Cholsey and Wallingford Railway 11-04-2009.jpg|Peckett 0-4-0ST Ivor the Engine at Cholsey
Image:A5 British Railways Class 14 D9523 Visits CWR 11-05-2013.jpg|British Railways 0-6-0DH Class 14 D9523 at Cholsey in May 2013
Image:02I05I2015 CWR Steam Event A2.jpg|Both Peckett 0-4-0ST steam locos 'Ivor' and 'Northern Gas Board No. 1' at Cholsey
Image:British Railways 0-6-0PT No 6430 Cholsey.jpg|British Railways 0-6-0PT 64xx Class No. 6430 at Cholsey in July 2016
File:British Oil and Cake Mill, dmu and GWR Society stock, Wallingford.jpg|British Oil & Cake Mill, dmu and GWR Society stock, Wallingford, 1969
</gallery>