Highland Railway

This fantastic collection of photographs documents the engineering feats constructed to realise the aim of opening up Scotland's Highlands to rail travel. The Inverness and Perth railway was built to provide the quickest means possible of getting between Inverness, Central Scotland and further south into England. However, between Inverness and Perth lay mountain ranges and river valleys which would have to be traversed.

Until the 18th century, drove roads remained the main arterial routes for getting between towns and cities in the Central Highlands. However, after the Jacobite rebellion in 1715, the army started to build and maintain roads through the region. By the end of the 1700s the threat of Jacobite uprisings had passed and the army devolved responsibility for maintenance of the roads to civilian labourers. To further improve the transport infrastructure two commissions were established in 1803. One was the Commission for Roads and Bridges in the Highlands, and the other was the Caledonian Canal Commission and the engineer for both was Thomas Telford. Telford employed John Mitchell in 1810 as chief inspector of roads. When John died, his son Joseph Mitchell, a former student of Telford's, took over.

Joseph Mitchell and his partner Murdoch Paterson left an enduring and remarkable legacy. They were responsible for engineering the vast majority of the canal, road and railway infrastructure that took place in the Central and Northern Highlands in the 19th Century. Many of their bridges and viaducts are still in regular use by passenger trains today whilst others are still standing but with changed use. One notable exception is the Ness Viaduct at Inverness. It stood for over one hundred years, but was washed away in a heavy downpour and ensuing flood water in 1989.