Report - Tower Colliery, Glamorgan November 2016

[mookster]

Something else I never got around to posting up! This was a real good one so god only knows why.

Brief potted history from @Landie_Man 's post at the time we went....

Tower Colliery, once the oldest continuously working deep-coal mine in the UK and possibly even the world. It was the last mine of it's kind to exist in the valleys of South Wales. The Colliery got its name "Tower" after the nearby Crawshay's Tower folly began operations in 1864 and worked until British Coal closed the site in 1994 because it would be uneconomic to continue production. After the closure of Tower, 239 former workers pledged money from their redundancy packages to buy back the site and continue production in a community buy-out. The mining and production of coal ran for well over a decade, until the seams had been exhausted and Tower Colliery closed for the second time, for good, in January 2008.

In 2010, an open-cast mine was opened part of the former coal washery site located a short distance away. Although this one too is scheduled to close fairly soon. A possible case for future development of both sites would see part housing, part Industrial Estate and part Heritage Museum to provide employment in the area and keep some legacy of the former coal mines alive.

I had managed to comprehensively ruin my ankle the previous day looking around the outside of a sealed up college so it was a somewhat of a slow hobble around here for me dosed up on all sorts of painkillers. Even so, it was still a great place to visit and I loved it - although we both baulked at climbing the rickety headstock. Met a friendly security guard at the end of it too which was a bonus rather than being shouted at.

It's also the only colliery I've seen that had a sauna in it!

Thanks for looking ​

 

[dave]

Excellent report. Good you saw the need to post it well worth it. Is the place still standing btw.

 

[Seffy]

Excellent work sir - looked much better back then!

Excellent report. Good you saw the need to post it well worth it. Is the place still standing btw.

It is all still there aye, but the buildings are all boarded up now and the rest has a fence around it

 

[HughieD]

That's fantastic. Is this one still there or long gone?

 

[Bugsuperstar]

Yes mate! Looks a brilliant place. I bet it would still be worth a look around now.

 

[mookster]

That's fantastic. Is this one still there or long gone?

It's still there but much more secure than it was - all fenced off, a lot of the 'climable' things have been lopped off too and stuff welded shut according to some comments I saw on here from a couple of years ago, which is probably why it dropped off the radar sadly. Always worth having a look though in case anything has changed.

 

[alex17595]

I thought a lot of it had been levelled due to it becoming an open cast mine. I can't see any evidence of the headstocks either.


Maybe Im looking in the wrong place

 

[mookster]

I thought a lot of it had been levelled due to it becoming an open cast mine. I can't see any evidence of the headstocks either.


Maybe Im looking in the wrong place

You are, the open cast mine is down the road from here.

 

[alex17595]

You are, the open cast mine is down the road from here.

Cheers I have found it now.

Was looking at 'Tower colliery' on the 25 inch map and it was in a different place

 

[Lenston]

As already mentioned much of the site is welded shut these days.

 

[Five.Claws]

But where are all the brass band instruments? Can't be a colliery without those!

 

[tumbles]

Nicely done. Shame Big Pit was so close to this as think it could have made a great museum when they closed. Once they’ve finished open casting down road I think they’re relandscaping the lot

 

[Calamity Jane]

Great shots there. A sauna! wow lol. Love the old equipment and the atmospheric shots. Exploring with injuries now that`s dedication

 

[Symral]

I own shares for tower colliery from gaining half of
Someone’s estate can someone tell me how much they would be worth now please ?

 

[mookster]

I own shares for tower colliery from gaining half of
Someone’s estate can someone tell me how much they would be worth now please ?

Wrong forum for that, you'll need to find a specialist stocks and shares type forum or group to advise you as we'd just be pulling numbers out of our behinds.