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For 47 years it has lain dormant but now ambitious plans are being drawn up to reopen Wales’ longest tunnel as a tourist attraction.

Opened in 1890, the 3,443 yards (3,148m) Rhondda and Swansea Bay Railway Tunnel connected the coalfields of the Rhondda with Swansea Bay.

It was closed in 1968 as part of the Beeching cutbacks that decimated the railway network in the 1960s and led to the closure of thousands of train stations.

Both ends of the tunnel - at Blaencwm, in the Rhondda and Blaengwynfi in the Afan Valley - were filled in around 1979.

The Rhondda Tunnel Society group has now formed with the long term ambition of re-opening the tunnel, the seventh longest in the UK.

Volunteers are hoping to receive funding to excavate the tunnel to attract tourists and create a cycle trail.

Their short term aim, however, is to re-erect the original coverstone which was sited above the Blaencwm entrance to the tunnel, which stood at the foot of the Blaencwm Mountain, to commemorate the feat of engineering that lays buried beneath.

And signs so far are that the Rhondda Tunnel Society are on track with their grand ambition, according to chairman Stephen Mackey, from Treorchy.

“Since we’ve started the ball rolling by setting up the Rhondda Tunnel Society Facebook group everybody has become tunnellers,” he said.

“I’ve had people from America in touch, it’s gone through the roof.”

Two public meetings in Blaencwm were a great success and will now be followed by a gathering in Blaengwynfi on Tuesday evening to gauge the reaction from those living at the Afan Valley end of the tunnel, with a further meeting in the Rhondda planned for January 13.

The group also received a breakthrough when they were contacted by the Highways Agency Historic Railways Estate, who said they wanted to inspect the site.

Stephen, 59, said: “We were told they were going to go in but as the tunnel has not been inspected internally for many years, they were discussing undertaking a structural examination in conjunction with the Mines Rescue Service.

“They said that because of the hazardous environment of the tunnel it meant only people who are properly qualified in underground rescue techniques would be allowed to enter the tunnel.”

He added that no date had been set for the inspection but he and the group were to be kept informed when the inspection was undertaken.

“This will take years of hard work and hard negotiation with lots of people as we look for funding via things such as lottery grants and the like,” he said.

“That is in the future. We’ve got to keep our feet on the ground, have the tunnel inspected to see the integrity of the inside structure. It would be pointless digging out the tunnel and going in to find that it has seismic faults that can’t be fixed.”

However, the group’s chairman is convinced the dream of seeing the tunnel reopen can be realised – as there are already precedents in other areas.

“In the long term I do believe in my heart that it can reopen, because there’s a project that just happened in Bath called the Two Tunnels. It (a former railway tunnel) opened as a cycle path and thousands of people head through it every week.

“In addition, RCT council is planning a cycle path from Pontypridd to Blaencwm – and there are excellent cycle trails in the Afan Valley, so in the future cyclists could peddle from Pontypridd to Port Talbot without hitting any traffic. Imagine that.

“It could be a wonderful tourist attraction. So much has been taken from the Rhondda valley over the years – coal, jobs, factories they’ve all gone, it’s about time we had something back.”

In the meantime, the group has made great progress in their short term aim of re-erecting the original coverstone, which featured the name of the tunnel and the tunnel length.

“When the tunnel was being covered over, the contractors who were contracted to fill in the cuttings decided to take the stone out rather than bury it,” said Stephen.

“It got lost for a couple of years and then someone found it cemented into the wall of Glyncornel Archery Club in the Rhondda. It was very bizarre. We don’t know how it ended up there.

“It was removed and placed in an old disused car park and there it remained for years and years.

“When we found the stone, we transported it to Dewi Reynolds, a stonemason in Treorchy, who offered to do all the renovation free of charge.

“When the stone is restored it will be displayed at Treherbert station where it will stay until we have a chance of reopening the tunnel, then the stone will be placed back above it where it belongs.”

A public meeting will be held at The Tunnel Hotel in Blaengwynfi on Tuesday night at 6pm. A further meeting will be held at the Hendrewen Hotel, Treorchy, on Tuesday, January 13, at 7pm.

To find out more, contact Stephen Mackey on 01443 777200 or see the Rhondda Tunnel Society on Facebook.