Alternative Histories

If there's one part of the Festiniog which really tantalises me it's the abandoned former track bed leading from Dduallt station to the Old Moelwyn Tunnel.I suppose I'm not unusual in that. I mean, why else would there be so many heritage railways which have been restored from dereliction if it wasn't that enthusiasts became fixated on the idea of seeing trains run again along those pathways that have been reclaimed by nature?I've often looked at the stub siding which continued straight on behind the signal box at Dduallt and wondered what might have happened if the FR had never been to surrender the old route through the Ystradau Valley in the 1950s. What's the alternate history, and how might it have come about?How about instead of the Ffestiniog Power Station being built as the UK's first pumped-storage hydroelectricity scheme the power-that-be decided it would be simpler to dust off the pre-war proposals to install the technology at the Loch Sloy station next to Loch Lomond.That…