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The fortunes of the railway, viaduct and quarry since 1960 have been closely linked. Twice, in the 1960s and 1990s, enormous changes to the rail industry have threatened the very survival of both the railway and quarry. Yet, probably more by luck than judgement, both have survived and today seem to face brighter futures than for some time.

The first period of threat came with the Beeching Report which recommended large scale closure and rationalisation of the rail network, a major element o which was the elimination of unnecessary duplication of routes and facilities The former Southern routes west of Exeter fitted this category and the likely out come was probably inevitable once control of these lines passed from Waterloo to the Western Region HQ at Paddington in 1963.

The condition of Meldon Viaduct had been giving the Southern regions civil en engineers concern for some time and by 1961 a major scheme had been prepared to permanently single the line over the Down side viaduct, including a new signal box to replace those at Meldon Quarry and Meldon Junction. The intention was to repair the Down side structure for longer term use, by single line working over the Up side in the interim to enable repairs to take place uninterrupted alongside. The overall timescale for the work was 3 years and this was quickly overtaken by the events as the whole future of the line came into question.

Following transfer of the line to the Western Region, by 1964 plans had clearly been drawn up for the withdrawal of all British Railways activities from the Meldon area. Not only were the single line routes to Torrington, Wadebridge and Bude threatened, as was the Southern main line to Plymouth via Okehampton \4aterial in the Meldon archives demonstrates that not only was the complete closure of the railway at Meldon anticipated, but also to achieve this the quarry was to be sold and all transportation of stone was to leave the railway before the end of 1965.

The year started badly, with the Quarry Manager, F.E.L. Weaver summoned to Waterloo to be told that the decision had been reached to sell Meldon Quarry, which would result in the loss of some 100 jobs. Mr Weaver then had the unpleasant task of relaying this information to the workforce at the quarry, which was at that time the largest single employer in the town.

However, the decision on the quarry's future was linked to the wider situation concerning the viaduct and the railway. The schemes proposed for the repair of the viaduct were expensive, and clearly could affect the financial viability the railway itself, which was in question anyway. Were the railway to be successfully closed to through traffic, it would obviously be something of an embrassment to have to retain a truncated line solely to access Meldon Quarry

We do not know exactly how far the sale of the quarry progressed, but it is believed that the buyer would have been English China Clays, ironically the company who eventually bought the quarry from BR in 1994. Due I loss of jobs and the likely impact on the area, there was considerable opposition to the plan.