Life in a Northern Town

[Captain Kernow]

You're most perceptive, the light railway will have a Derwent Valley-esque feel to it, some structures will be copies and one location a direct-ish lift from the real thing. I also have in mind the Isle of Axholme, though that won't result in any physical representation. The light railway will be less of a feature than I'd originally intended when faced with the bare boards, but less is as ever more and I think that what's left will be better for it.

 

Earlier Ian (old dudders) suggested that I take a look again at the British Transport Film's 'This is York'. I'd last seen it about forty years ago as a teenager. Viewed again I found it more charming than I remembered and more interesting. One thing that struck me is that it appears not to use stock footage but has everything shot specifically for it; it becomes far more valuable for that. Anyway, take a look for yourselves.

 

I've always liked the bit where the Stationmaster says that the meeting with the union reps end up 'breathing agreement over each other'.

[Neil]

Last month Alex asked if I had a layout plan; I replied that I hadn't but hinted one might appear once I had a firmer idea of how the layout would look. Well that time has arrived, so here's the plan.

 

 

 

You should see that it incorporates the repositioning of the glassworks and gives some sense of the light railway heading towards a more rural setting. The light railway is still a rather rough concept in this area and may be subject to alteration. The other side of the layout shows the freight depot behind the Stonebow and opening out to the top end of Fossgate. The plan is very obviously not to scale but does give a reasonable idea of the track layout and how it fits with the landscape and major structures.

 

I've also found a dozen photos of the Castle Mills Bridge area in the York Press archives.  This should give a good idea of what I'd like the road crossings to the left of the glassworks to look like.

 

 

 

 

Edited November 14, 2022 by Neil

[PMP]

I like the overall look of the plan but the diamond in front of the light railway shed looks odd, I’m trying to think of a UK location where that occurred and can’t recall one. It almost seems too extravagant for a light railway. Is it worth considering the shed being the aisle side of the track, same location with the kickback, but full foreground?

[Oldddudders]

Do I not recall that a railway nursery (plants, not bambini) near York had a narrow gauge railway as part of the infrastructure? Was it called Popplewell?

[Worsdell forever]

Do I not recall that a railway nursery (plants, not bambini) near York had a narrow gauge railway as part of the infrastructure? Was it called Popplewell?

 

Don't know about a narrow gauge line but there was a railway nursery at Poppleton station and it's still there.

 

https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@53.9753947,-1.1511244,155m/data=!3m1!1e3?hl=en

[Oldddudders]

Don't know about a narrow gauge line but there was a railway nursery at Poppleton station and it's still there.

 

https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@53.9753947,-1.1511244,155m/data=!3m1!1e3?hl=en

That’s the one, thanks Paul.

[sir douglas]

it was a railway owned nursery that grew the flowers for most NER station platform plant pots, it had a 2ft system around it which is still there and part of it is now run by a group of volunteers

[Neil]

I like the overall look of the plan but the diamond in front of the light railway shed looks odd, I’m trying to think of a UK location where that occurred and can’t recall one. It almost seems too extravagant for a light railway. Is it worth considering the shed being the aisle side of the track, same location with the kickback, but full foreground?

 

That's an interesting suggestion Paul and many thanks for sharing it here. The main reason for not doing it this way has to do with the topography of York (the real one)  where at this place a railway line would best follow the river bank not leaving sufficient space for shed and any other ancillary stuff I might want to bless the fictional line with. Less logically I've always had a thing about diamond crossings when set up this way, variants of this have appeared on the last three layouts I've built so it's not surprising that I would be drawn to repeat it here. In some ways the constrained site both on the layout and in real life mitigate the improbability a touch so I'm minded to stick with what I've planned, though this in no way invalidates your insightful critique. In many ways it's sharpened up my own thinking around this zone of the layout which has to be a good thing.

Edited September 30, 2018 by Neil

[Neil]

Since my last post a couple of things have happened, I've had time to lay some more track for the light railway and I've made a visit back to York. First things first, so let's take a look at where the head of nickel has progressed to.

 

 

Though there are no images of the track at the glassworks complex I can report that it's been laid as per diagram and mock up and that the running line has reached the backscene at the Fulford Ings station.

 

 

As part of the proving process I've indulged in a bit of shuntery-pokery to see if it's a workable proposition. It'll get a further test once my mates descend to play with it in a few Friday's time.

 

 

 

You might feel that Fulford Ings is a bit minimal, a bit incomplete, especially if I tell you that the line will not be penetrating the backscene here and that the station will effectively be a terminus. I'll come back to this in a later post but for now I'd like to show a few photos from my York trip which should help to show what Piccadilly Yard looks like and how the route from there to Foss Basin and the glassworks fits into the real geography of the city. Starting with Piccadilly Yard I see it as sandwiched between the Foss and the rear of the buildings which line Piccadilly. I'll be juggling time to selectively backdate some of the structures and there's one from the banks of the Ouse, no longer standing, which I hope to include too. Here's the real rear of Piccadilly.

 

 

Piccadilly leads towards Castle Mills Bridge and the course of the railway alongside the Foss is indicated by the line A. I envisage a level crossing just to the right of the bridge B with the line continuing along a ledge above the path alongside the locks.

 

 

Turning away from Castle Mills Bridge and looking towards the site of the glassworks the route of the railway is again indicated by the light grey line.

 

 

As you can probably tell from the photos it was a lovely day so rather than take the bus out to Fulford to visit my parents I walked the half hour it takes by the riverside path following the imagined course of the light railway. Again I'll save this bit for later.

 

 

[sb67]

Nice photo's Neil, the fith one is very inspirational, love the backs of the buildings and the overgrown look of it all.

Steve.

Edited October 18, 2018 by sb67

[Alex TM]

Hi Neil,

 

Any updates to report on this?

 

Thanks.

 

Alex.

[Neil]

Hi Neil,

 

Any updates to report on this?

 

Thanks.

 

Alex.

 

Very little at the moment. I tidied up the temporary wiring and added a siding and then spent a few days In Bath. Since then it's been played with a couple of times and now waits some revisions in the light of both playing and recent thoughts. All this would be relatively simple to do but at the moment I have a knackered old sofa wedged in the garage waiting for the date when the council will pick it up. Also after tidying up the garden shed the lawnmower has taken up residence in the garage too. Once these two encumbrances are 'outta the parish' I can maybe get on with tweaking the design and testing some more. However I've not been idle, in my upstairs workshop a rake of 21T hoppers have been taking shape.

[Re6/6]

 I have a knackered old sofa wedged in the garage waiting for the date when the council will pick it up. 

 

Would this be the one that we all used to collapse into after a day's gricing? 

[Neil]

On 08/12/2018 at 09:57, Re6/6 said:

 

Would this be the one that we all used to collapse into after a day's gricing? 

 

Yes it was.

 

 

However time has moved on and the sofa is no more. In fact time has moved on so much that I've had time for a revision of the layout and a revision of the revision.  What's happened is that the focus of the layout has shifted from one bank of the Ouse to the other. This means that the names of the different zones of the layout have changed. Those who know York should be able to work out where the line is set, the rest will have to wait for a more detailed description, however enough has been done to take some photos.

 

Here's a view of a coal train entering the scene looking across the Skeldergate coal drops and showing the exchange between them and the line into Bishophill Yard.

 

 

Looking along the train it's possible to discern where its point of entry will be.

 

 

Meanwhile in Bishophill Yard a short mixed freight is ready to depart behind a K1.

 

 

As the K1 leaves our Q6 hauled coal train heads into the yard.

 

 

Meanwhile at the Clementhorpe Chemical works a tank wagon is propelled towards Bishophill Yard by the works shunter.

 

 

Not all is so fully worked out though, here 'work in progress' is a bit of an overstatement.

 

 

 

 

[31A]

How did the railway get to Bishophill??  I hope you're not sending a line up my street!!

[Neil]

It's ok Steve I won't need to issue a compulsory purchase order. I envisage the line as heading off from the approach to the old York station inside the Bar Walls tunnelling under Toft Green and Micklegate to emerge in the region of Fetter Lane; Bishophill Yard lies alongside Bishophill Senior and Cromwell Road. Whilst it involves some demolition of historic York it's nothing like that which would have been involved if the seventies scheme for the inner ring road had come to fruition. as a lad i was fascinated by the small scale architects model of the proposed ring road which was touted round public venues at the time. I think I saw it at the library, but may have been mistaken.

Edited February 5, 2019 by Neil

[south_tyne]

Great stuff Neil. I love the fact you have clearly given the real life history careful thought for you 'what if' scenario. I know York well so am really enjoying following this. I know from your previous projects that as this develops the modelling will be of the highest standard and that the end result will be stunning. I am eagerly awaiting your updates!

[31A]

9 hours ago, Neil said:

It's ok Steve I won't need to issue a compulsory purchase order. I envisage the line as heading off from the approach to the old York station inside the Bar Walls tunnelling under Toft Green and Micklegate to emerge in the region of Fetter Lane; Bishophill Yard lies alongside Bishophill Senior and Cromwell Road. Whilst it involves some demolition of historic York it's nothing like that which would have been involved if the seventies scheme for the inner ring road had come to fruition. as a lad i was fascinated by the small scale architects model of the proposed ring road which was touted round public venues at the time. I think I saw it at the library, but may have been mistaken.

Interesting idea, Neil!  I guess it might have been a bit like the Gallows Close tunnel in Scarborough?  Interesting that York at one time had quite a bit of industry connected with the Ouse, but there was never really any railway connection with any of them, perhaps with the exception of the short lived coal drops in what's now the Memorial Gardens area.

[Neil]

It was John Shaw who unwittingly set my train of thought off. I remember some remark about a proposed Clementhorpe layout, which as far as I know never materialised. Of course I wondered what route the rails might take to get there which brought me to the tunnelled link to Bishophill and beyond. The more I though about it the more it seemed to fit with the space I had and it allows me to build in some of my favourite bits of York, some of which still exist and some of which have been bulldozed and redeveloped in the period between my childhood and today. I have to admit to not thinking of Gallows Close until you mentioned it, but yes in my minds eye it has a very close resemblance; thank you that's dialled up the believability a notch or two.

Edited November 14, 2022 by Neil

[Neil]

Over the last few days I've been working on the light railway loco shed. You may have noticed it earlier on in the thread when it was just the four walls stuck together. The basis is a Miniart workshop kit which I'm tweaking to look more typically British. Though not yet finished it looks far more complete and the corrugated roof replaces the rather continental looking moulded tiles which come with the kit. This afternoon I took the part finished shed out to the layout in the garage to see how it looked in its intended location.

 

 

 

 

[rodshaw]

Interesting project and a timely one for me as I've just recently moved out of York after 41 years. So this will give me a few reminders.

[john new]

On 17/10/2018 at 20:01, Neil said:

 

You might feel that Fulford Ings is a bit minimal, a bit incomplete, especially if I tell you that the line will not be penetrating the backscene here and that the station will effectively be a terminus. I'll come back to this in a later post but for now I'd like to show a few photos from my York trip which should help to show what Piccadilly Yard looks like and how the route from there to Foss Basin and the glassworks fits into the real geography of the city. Starting with Piccadilly Yard I see it as sandwiched between the Foss and the rear of the buildings which line Piccadilly. I'll be juggling time to selectively backdate some of the structures and there's one from the banks of the Ouse, no longer standing, which I hope to include too. Here's the real rear of Piccadilly.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thanks for reminding me of that view across the Foss to the round topped buildings Neil. I was recently back up in York and took advantage of the lack of leaf cover on the trees to take some photos; still a lot of photoshopping needed though to turn my shots into a printable image.

Edited March 17, 2019 by john new

[Neil]

Last week we headed back to York to visit friends and family; the camera came too. I took the opportunity to point it at various things that I'd like to include on the layout the first up being Capaldi's ice cream factory now repurposed for other use.

 

 

 

It's a rather fab art deco structure with some lovely detailing round the doorway. Obviously it's been altered but I like the way the character of the building remains. Here's a shot of how it used to look when still fulfilling its role as a factory.

 

[Captain Kernow]

3 hours ago, Neil said:

Here's a shot of how it used to look when still fulfilling its role as a factory.

 

Neil - you must have a model of that ice cream van somewhere on the layout!

 

[Re6/6]

It would be a challenge but would look good Neil if you modelled it in the lovely dilapidated state above!

 

A touch of Emmanuel Nouailler about it!

 

Edited March 25, 2019 by Re6/6