The Isle of Wight Railway was a railway company on the Isle of Wight, United Kingdom; it operated of railway line between Ryde and Ventnor. It opened the first section of line from Ryde to Sandown in 1864, later extending to Ventnor in 1866. The Ryde station was at St Johns Road, some distance from the pier where the majority of travellers arrived. A tramway operated on the pier itself, and a street-running tramway later operated from the Pier to St Johns Road. It was not until 1880 that two mainland railways companies jointly extended the railway line to the Pier Head, and IoWR trains ran through, improving the journey arrangements. An independent company built a branch line from Brading to Bembridge, and the IoWR operated passenger trains on the line from 1882, and later absorbed the owning company. The IoWR was itself absorbed into the Southern Railway in the "grouping" of 1923. The Bembridge branch closed in 1953, and in 1966 the Ryde Pier Head to Ventnor line was truncated to terminate at Shanklin. This was electrified, and former London Underground tube train stock was brought into use on the line; this arrangement continues to the present day. First proposals In the first years of the nineteenth century, the Isle of Wight was established as a successful agricultural base, and there was some fishing. Cowes, on the River Medina, was the principal port, and Newport was the main industrial town. Ryde was an established town, but Shanklin had a population of 355 (in 1851) and Sandown was only a village. The idea of visiting the Isle of Wight for reasons now described as tourism began to take hold, but these activities were limited by the poor internal transport facilities on the island. The easy money of the middle years of the 1840s encouraged the promotion of railway schemes, and in May 1845 public support was sought for an Isle of Wight Railway, which was proposed to build from West Cowes and Ryde to Newport and Ventnor. Capital of £300,000 was said to be necessary, but notwithstanding local support, the landowners to be affected were hostile and the scheme failed to gain approval. Nevertheless, and in October of the same year a Direct Ryde and Ventnor Railway was proposed; requiring only £120,000 in capital it would follow much easier ground and claimed that landowners would not object to it; this