High Peak Junction & Cromford Canal

These are the original workshops of the Cromford and High Peak Railway - a unique railway which ran between Whaley Bridge and Cromford, via Buxton, mainly serving the local quarries. This unique railway was built in 1830 to link the High Peak Canal at Whaley Bridge with the Cromford Canal, and used static engines on a number steep inclines which were necessary to overcome the hilly countryside (the track achieved an altitude of 1250 feet near Buxton), plus normal railway engines on the stretches in between.

The railway finally closed in 1963, though the Whaley Bridge - Buxton section closed much earlier. The workshops are located at the bottom of an incline where the Cromford and High Peak Railway descended from Black Rocks to the Derwent Valley to join the Midland Railway below. The workshops contain early relics of the railway, plus a model and a video show. Nearby is Leawood Pump House, built to pump water for the Cromford Canal, which runs alongside the Midland Railway and the River Derwent. This was constructed in 1794 and linked Cromford with Langley Mill, where it joined the Erewash Canal. The canal was built to carry local limestone to the iron foundry at Butterley and goods to and from Richard Arkwright's Cromford Mills.