A reader asked for details of the history behind Ebury Way. David Hillas of Great Missenden, Bucks, wrote in: The Watford & Rickmansworth Railway (W&RR) was originally the brainchild of Lord Ebury, who saw it as a means to connect a newly opened GWR Uxbridge branch with the LNWR at Watford.

He obtained Parliamentary approval in 1860 but due to financial problems, the section between Rickmansworth and Uxbridge was never completed.

Instead, the W&RR comprised a four-and-a-half mile branch from Church Street, Rickmansworth to Watford Junction.

The first train arrived at Rickmansworth from Watford on October 1, 1862, with hundreds of people there to welcome it.

Initially the line was worked by push-pull two-coach trains hauled by 0-6-2 freight tank locomotives.

Electric trains came to the line on September 26, 1927 and in 1939 the Oerlikon saloon car sets were used until the line closed on March 2, 1952, having run for nearly 90 years.

The track lasted another 15 years with the occasional goods train working the spur down to Dickinson's Croxley Mills. Freight services on the Rickmansworth line lasted until January 2, 1967 and the following autumn the track was dismantled.

In recent years, the track has been designated as a public footpath known as Ebury Way, and is now also used as a cycle route as part of National Cycle Network Route 61.