 By 1830 railways using stone block sleepers and cast iron rails were well established technology, and Dixon commissioned Thomas Grainger and John Miller to design a conversion of his waggonway to a railway.Grainger and Miller had been responsible for several of the "coal railways" in central Scotland, notably the Monkland and Kirkintilloch Railway, opened in 1826.The track gauge was 4 ft 6in, which Grainger and Miller had adopted on most of the other lines.