Caernarfon: Train smoke is making us sick, say residents

The railway used to be able to buy good coal from Russia, but that had stopped because of of the war in Ukraine.

Now a mix of imported coal and smokeless fuel was burned, Mr Lewin said, but combining them was challenging.

He said: “Sometimes we get things wrong. We don’t want the smoke either, nor do our customers, so we try to deal with that carefully.”

The railway sympathised with its neighbours, Mr Lewin said, adding that closing was not an option as the business was responsible for jobs.

Welsh Highland Railway was trying to find the best fuel, he said, but sourcing it was an industry wide problem.