The company continued to develop its mining interests and in 1918 it purchased the Overton Estate at Fallgate with the aim of extracting minerals. An order under the Light Railways Act was obtained in 1918 to build a standard gauge railway between the Midland Railway station at Stretton and Ashover, with a gauge rope-worked mineral railway serving Alton colliery. This railway was not built because the cost estimates were too high. Instead in 1920 H. F. Stephens, the consulting engineer for the line, proposed building the entire railway to gauge. This considerably reduced the costs of construction and the plan was approved.