Tring Cutting
Tring Cutting is a large man-made trench on the southern part of the West Coast Main Line, near Tring in southern England. It was built for the London and Birmingham Railway to the plans of Robert Stephenson and opened in 1837. The cutting is about 2.5 miles long and around 40 feet deep on average, reaching 60 feet at its deepest points, making it one of the biggest engineering works on the line. Three bridges cross the cutting, and all were built at the same time as the line and are Grade II listed.
The cutting was dug entirely by manual labour from an army of navvies, with only occasional use of explosives. Materials were moved from the cutting floor using “barrow runs” or “horse runs”: a wheelbarrow was attached to a horse at the top by a pulley, and as the horse moved, the navvy guided the wheelbarrow up the slope on a narrow plank. This method was dangerous and the barrow often spilled, but only one fatal accident is recorded. The same technique was used elsewhere on the line, including at Boxmoor Embankment.
The cutting is shown in John Cooke Bourne’s lithographs made to mark the opening of the railway, with particular emphasis on the horse runs.
The line through the cutting opened in 1837. It was expanded to three tracks in 1859 and four tracks in 1876. The railway company did not buy more land around the cutting; instead, the sides were made steeper to fit the extra tracks. Stephenson wanted gentle gradients, so a lot of engineering was used to handle the hills. After Watford Tunnel, the line climbs on embankments through the Chilterns, following natural valleys and the route of the Grand Junction Canal.
Beyond Tring, terrain became tougher, so the cutting was dug to keep a smooth gradient of about 1:330. After the end of the cutting, the line descends toward the Vale of Aylesbury, having climbed for much of the journey from London. Much of the spoil from Tring Cutting was used to build embankments further north.
Tring Cutting is 2.5 miles long and was once the longest railway cutting in the world. It averages 40 feet in depth, with a maximum depth of 60 feet, and the sides slope at about 45 degrees. About 1.5 million cubic yards of material were removed. The three bridges — the southern accommodation bridge, Parkhill Bridge, and Folly Bridge (carrying the B489) — cross the cutting and are all Grade II listed. Each bridge has three arches; the central arches are 68 feet wide to cross the tracks in a single span. The bridges feature blue engineering brick arches with stone parapets, except Folly Bridge, which has a red-brick parapet. They were rebuilt to allow widening and electrification. The Hertfordshire–Buckinghamshire boundary lies in the middle of Folly Bridge.
This page was last edited on 2 February 2026, at 15:07 (CET).