was something more important to bother about. Actions in
Chancery had begun to distract the attention of worried directors, and
these retarded progress with the construction of the line. So it was not
until June 1869 that the Cambrian continued beyond Penmaenpool, and, even
when Dolgelley was eventually approached, passengers had to alight at a
platform some little distance from the town. Only when the Great Western
Railway from Ruabon was completed did the trains from Barmouth Junction
run into Dolgelley station proper.

Many and difficult as were the engineering problems involved in the
construction of the coast line none aroused greater interest or put
scientific skill and courage to a severer test than that, to which we
have already briefly alluded, of carrying the railway over the sand and
river current into Barmouth. To the lay mind it appeared an almost
insuperable task, and there were those who did not hesitate to whisper
their doubts as to its practicability, one well-known local gentleman
being reported to have gone as far as publicly to undertake to eat the
first engine which ever crossed that formidable gulf. But engineers and
craftsmen set to work with a will, and before long what had appeared an
impossibility was rapidly taking shape as an actuality. Eight hundred
yards in length, the greater portion was constructed on timber piles,
over 500 in number, in 113 spans, driven into the sand. The navigable
channel, at the Barmouth end, was crossed by an iron-work construction,
of seven fixed and one opening span. The latter was of the drawbridge
type, and when lifted at one end by means of large screws was carried on
wheels and could be drawn back over the adjoining span.

It was a lengthy as well as a cumbersome operation, and when, in 1899,
the ironwork portion of the viaduct had become too weak for the
constantly increasing loads of developing traffic, it was completely
renewed with a modern steel structure of four spans, one of which was a
spring span, revolving on the centre pier and giving two clear openings.
The piers carrying the girders are formed of columns 8ft. in diameter
sunk through the sand down to solid rock, which was reached at a depth of
about 90 feet below high water mark. The columns are steel cylinders
filled with concrete, and were sunk into position by means of compressed
air on the diving bell principle, and owing to the depth below water at
high tide, the men excavating insid