Southern route discs through Hove

[GreenGiraffe22]

Hello all, so I recently decided to change the location of my layout from being between Brighton - Eastbourne, to loosely based on Hove. My station is a similar layout albeit considerably  miniaturised. 

 

Now, I've been looking at the 1936 route code guide on Semgonline and I found it odd that all the services coming from London to West Sussex all seem to go via Horsham. But with the Cliftonville tunnel connecting Hove directly to the Brighton - London Line being built as early as 1879, I thought it seemed odd that none of the services listed seem to go via Hove as they do today?

 

Another service I found curious was that there seemed to be the Brighton - Hove shuttle as still runs today but going via Preston Park? So into Preston Park then back round to Hove? Sounds like a job for a P Class

 

If anyone can share any knowledge that'd be appreciated, I have re worked the route codes on some of my locos now for services from Brighton to Littlehampton, Bognor Regis and Portsmouth. 

 

Gonna do my Merchant Navy up on a Brighton - Salisbury service, I doubt they ever worked that route but Salisbury is at least an area they ended up in I think? Even if they started form a different location

[bécasse]

Although it was omitted from the official listings, through steam trains via the Cliftonville Spur displayed head code 1 - a single disc at the top of the smokebox. I imagine that it was changed at the next stop after traversing the Spur to a code appropriate to the train's actual destination.

 

Brighton-Hove direct shuttles would have displayed head code 5 despite not proceeding as far as the Dyke branch.

[GreenGiraffe22]

Although it was omitted from the official listings, through steam trains via the Cliftonville Spur displayed head code 1 - a single disc at the top of the smokebox. I imagine that it was changed at the next stop after traversing the Spur to a code appropriate to the train's actual destination.

 

Brighton-Hove direct shuttles would have displayed head code 5 despite not proceeding as far as the Dyke branch.

Cheers! According to Semgonline all the Brighton - Portsmouth trains also had that single disc above the smoke box so that's handy!

[Oldddudders]

Electrification. Trains had always run via the Cliftonville Spur, but from 1933 most of the passenger trains were electric. By 1938, the Mid-Sussex route via Dorking and Horsham, as well as via Crawley, was also electric, and electric trains ran from Brighton to Portsmouth, including Littlehampton and Bognor. So 1936 is an interim stage.

[phil_sutters]

Looking for something else - as per usual - I came across this thread. These two are from 20 years later, but show that there was still some steam about.

 

[GreenGiraffe22]

Yeah there seems to be loads of photos from the BR steam era, and even quite a few from the LBSCR era , but for whatever reason SR era photos are a little harder to find but there are a couple of photos about,the single disk in the bottom middle is by far the most photographed route disk arrangement which according to Semgonline is Brighton-Horsham.

 

There's also one disk at the top which is Brighton - Portsmouth, found a good photo of an H2 on that, and lots of photos of H2s on the Brighton - Bournemouth service in the 50s.

 

There are other route disc arrangements for Brighton - Littlehampton and Brighton - Bognor, but I don't think I've seen any photographic evidence of steam engines heading those routes, yet.

 

Searching "steam train Hove" brings up many fascinating photos, especially in the Mike Morant collection =)

[Oldddudders]

Electrification. Trains had always run via the Cliftonville Spur, but from 1933 most of the passenger trains were electric. By 1938, the Mid-Sussex route via Dorking and Horsham, as well as via Crawley, was also electric, and electric trains ran from Brighton to Portsmouth, including Littlehampton and Bognor. So 1936 is an interim stage.

What I should have added was that from 1938, when the West Coast was electrified throughout to Portsmouth, the service pattern for Littlehampton, Bognor and Portsmouth trains from Victoria was entirely via Horsham, thus replicating under electric traction the headcodes you have identified for steam. The only service to/from the Hove etc route was the hourly Littlehampton fast service, which initally was a portion working with the Ore via Eastbourne service, splitting at Haywards Heath. Furthermore, this service pattern continued for 40 years, and it was only in 1978 that a total recast sent more services via Cliftonville, serving Gatwick on the way.