For quite a few years I had been collecting kits, stock and materials, but it has not been until I researched Finchley Road for a club layout that I got drawn into the North London Line – the scale and variety of traffic is astonishing and I kick myself for having missed the opportunity to trainspot on the route in my youth.   I managed to travel between Broad Street and Willesden only twice in about 1979/1980.    

I like the run-down element of the east end of London in the fifties & sixties, and whilst I want something that reflects the character of the area I didn’t want to slavishly model a location.

The National Library of Scotland is a fantastic on-line resource of OS mapping going back to the 19th century, and I followed the North London route around on those old maps looking for a section with natural over-bridge breaks.  I settled on Hackney Graham Road, the location of an ex-Great Eastern goods and mineral yard between Dalston and Hackney Central.    I can model, representatively but at a scale distance, the actual bridges of Greenwood Road and Navarino Road at the west end, and the Cambridge to Liverpool Street railway line bridge at the east end.

The entire concept of the layout is to ‘borrow’ the location and adapt it for my own purposes.    For instance, I will include a number of houses and The Navarino Arms from Navarino Road, the rear of all 9 terraced houses from Navarino Grove, and a handful of buildings from besides the railway overbridge.    There was an allotment garden between Navarino Grove and the goods yard which I shall represent. Furthermore there are a selection of buildings from Cottrill Road and Spurstowe Terrace to be included, though long-demolished.

So much for the real place; I am making significant changes for my model.   I have used an original 1911 proposal for an additional line between Feltham and Barking as justification to have a junction by Navarino Road which links with the Midland route, and have also created a tube line extension from the Moorgate area to Ilford with a station based on the famous Arnos Grove tube station.   This helps to disguise the tracks leaving the scenic section.      The original Graham Road goods yard is rebuilt to have some raised coal drops and 4 reception sidings which disappear under the Liverpool Street line.     These sidings are used to service the coal yard and to handle trip freights to & from Wenlock Basin on the Regents Canal near to Farringdon; potentially there is a link to the Snow Hill line there.  On the layout these use a dedicated single line which is presumed to follow the tube line beyond the station.

The layout in summary

• 16’ by 8’ with access along one side, operation from a central well.

• Fiddle yard is 13 through loops, an access loop and 7 stub sidings. There are also 4 reception sidings and a passing loop which are two thirds in the fiddle area capable of holding trains.    The longest train could be up to 10 coaches or 30 wagons.

• There are up and down main lines, with a double junction at the west end.   There is the single line to Wenlock Basin and up and down tube lines, and the reception sidings and passing loop mentioned above.   The coal drop facility should hold around 30 wagons under cover.

• Uses Peco code 75 track in the non-scenic area, C&L track in the scenic area.

Operation

I shall be able to operate a range of trains in a similar fashion to Hackney, but again it’s a bit of fun playing with history.   Before the war there were regular services between St Pancras and Tilbury, between Broad Street and Southend and between Broad Street and Poplar.   I shall make some representation of these.       There was also a plan put forward to join up Alexandra Palace with Palace Gates via a tunnel, so I have suggested there could have been a circular service between Woolwich, Broad Street and Ally Pally.  

All these variations make for a stupidly busy scene.    I reckon on having controls for up and down trains, shunting and the fiddle yard, and whilst there is only one of me I should be able to set freight trains running slowly around whilst I shunt as required

Ongoing Construction

Baseboards are 6mm ply, with side frames of a ply + 25mm pine block + ply sandwich, then criss-crossed with diagonal ply strip bracing as required for each board considering where points are positioned.   The scenic boards are 3’6” deep (as I can access from both sides) and being this wide I have used 3 bolts to join them and keep them in line.

Supports are 4 sets of frames about 8’ long and 30” wide with angle bracing, adjustable feet as used on kitchen cupboards, and with the lower bracing used to support old doors used as shelves.

I’ve worked out magnet positions for uncouplers and started to fit them, and have been systematically working through each track to ensure the isolation gaps are correct – in the fiddle yard I’m using Peco plastic fishplates for this purpose.  The track ends at baseboard joins are largely on copperclad sleepers, where I’ve had some repairs and cleaning to do.   I’ve also started drilling pilot holes for the Seep motors.  And I’ve worked out the principles of the point rodding