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This is a representation of the famous Woodhead Route running between Manchester, Sheffield and Wath. Set in the 1960's, the route is still intact and passenger services between Manchester Piccadilly (London Road) and Sheffield Victoria via Guide Bridge and Penistone are still running.

The main traffic on the route was however the transportation of coal from Yorkshire to the North West, most originating at Wath On Dearne to be piloted by the famous EM1's as far Mottram before a loco swap for onwards travel into Lancashire and Merseyside.

Electrified at 1500VDC, the line featured its own unique traction, comprising of the EM1 Bo-Bo and EM2 Co-Co Locomotives and the 3 Car Suburban EMU's (the 506's).

Models of all the above built by Steve Sherratt may be downloaded from www.uktrainsim.com along with Ian Morgan's Mk1 Coaches and a fine selection of wagons both old and new by authors to numerous to mention

Although representing my best effort to recreate the route as was, this route suffers from a number of limitations and inconsistencies, the most serious being the lack of inclines in the Longdendale Valley and at Wentworth. Despite this, I hope that members of the Train Sim community find it an interesting and revealing ride along a route that in the real world, given hindsight and a reasonable sum of money, should never have been closed.

Route Map

• Manchester to Sheffield and Wath via Ardwick, Ashburys, Gorton, Fairfield, Guide Bridge, Flowery Field, Newton, Godley, Hatterlsey, Broadbottom, Dinting, Hadfield, Crowden, Woodhead, Dunford, Hazlehead, Penistone, Worsborough, Deepcar, Oughtibridge plus onto Darnall and Woodhouse Junction.
• Branches including Ashburys to Midland Junction, Gorton and Fairfield to Reddish Depot, Guide Bridge to Ashton Moss, Dinting to Glossop Worsborough Collieries, Stocksbridge Steelworks, Tinsley Marshalling Yard
• Other non-electrified non MSW lines included are Hyde North and Godley to Woodley, Woodley to Marple/Rose Hill via Romiley

Installation Instructions

1. You must have the six standard routes installed. Backup your MSTS Installation. I have to say this because even though I've tested the Route Riter generated files on my system, it just might not on yours!
2. Rename your old Routes\Woodhead folder as Routes\WoodheadV11 if you want to keep it, otherwise delete it - overwriting it with V2.0 will no doubt be a disaster!
3. Unzip the contents of each of the ZIP files into your Train Simulator\Routes folder with folder names on - this should create a new Woodhead folder.
4. Find and double click on the InstallMe.bat file. This will copy all the appropriate files required from the default routes.
5. And thats it - fire up MSTS, select Woodhead and run an EM1 with some MGR's from Wath or Tinsley to Mottram to see the bulk of the new stuff straight out!

Required Downloads

Woodhead Route V2.0 - Part 1of 4 [8119612 bytes] - WH20P1.zip File ID: 4573 Date: 30 Jan 2003 - 12086 Downloads

Woodhead Route V2.0 - Part 2 of 4 [8274717 bytes] - WH20P2.zip File ID: 4574 Date: 30 Jan 2003 - 10337 Downloads

Woodhead Route V2.0 - Part 3 of 4 [7485193 bytes] - WH20P3.zip File ID: 4575 Date: 30 Jan 2003 - 12396 Downloads

Woodhead Route V2.0 - Part 4 of 4 [8114021 bytes] - WH20P4.zip File ID: 4576 Date: 30 Jan 2003 - 10232 Downloads

Patches

Woodhead Route V2.2 Crossover Patch [700737 bytes] - WH22beta.zip File ID: 4717 Date: 06 Feb 2003 - 8351 Downloads

Piccadilly Canopy and Walls [652495 bytes] - PiccCanopyV3.zip File ID: 4814 Date: 12 Feb 2003 - 1744 Downloads

Motorway Textures [956378 bytes] - MotorwayTextures.zip File ID: 5432 Date: 17 Apr 2003 - 1701 Downloads

Suggested Rolling Stock

Class 506 1500V DC EMU in BR Blue and White [2274418 bytes] - BRClass506V11.zip File ID: 1483 Date: 16 Apr 2002 - 5988 Downloads

Class 506 Green EMU [1422755 bytes] - Green_506.zip File ID: 7826 Date: 16 Jan 2004 - 2001 Downloads

EM1 26035 in Green [1268522 bytes] - 26035.zip File ID: 10837 Date: 21 Nov 2004 - 1952 Downloads

Class 76 Preserved 26020 [1291201 bytes] - 26020black.exe File ID: 6210 Date: 23 Jul 2003 - 2816 Downloads

76001 Class 76 BR Blue [1843309 bytes] - 76001 Class 76 BR Blue.exe File ID: 6186 Date: 20 Jul 2003 - 4193 Downloads

EM1 EM2 cabview [3523336 bytes] - EM1_EM2 cabview.zip File ID: 4195 Date: 25 Dec 2002 - 8384 Downloads

EM1/EM2 Cab Upgrade [929502 bytes] - EM1- EM2 Cab Upgrade.zip File ID: 4641 Date: 02 Feb 2003 - 4520 Downloads

Fixes in this Release

• Full MSW route and layout
• Full signalling
• Much improved stations

Outstanding Bug/Feature List in Release 2.0

1. No gradients in Longdendale or Worsborough
2. Scenery incomplete on Romiley to Bredbury lines

Release History

Acknowledgements

Tim Court, Steve Sherratt, Tony Harrison, Graham Pitt, Ian Morgan, David Annable (www.thewoodheadsite.org.uk), Martin Sollieux-Cardwell, Matthew Peddleston, Mike Simpson, Gerald Morris, Freddie Ljundberg plus many others of the UKTrainsim (and Trainsimfiles) community too numerous to mention - you know who you are, thanks again!

And a final thanks go to my wife and kids for putting up with "Daddy playing trains on his computer" for the last eighteen months.

Legal Stuff

Steve Nicklin
30th January 2003