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Kings Cross York Road & Suburban Platforms


Pete 75C
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A question, if I may... The platform on the gradient leading up from hotel curve was Platform 16? If you take a look at the image in the link below, these are presumably Platforms 15 and 14, existing just outside of the supporting wall for the main station roof? In the later years of operation, would these two platforms have been used exclusively for parcels traffic (as per the images I've seen) or would they have been served by timetabled passenger DMUs as well?

Still trying to get my head around the station as it was in the late 60s-mid 70s - it seems to be a very complicated place.

 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/loose_grip_99/353965417/

 

The numbering was strange! I don't think the missing numbers ever existed and back then there was one track fewer under the suburban trainshed. My best guess is that there was an intention to extend the suburban station that never happened.

 

My recollection was that the Hotel Curve platform was 15 and the further platform was 17 but it was a long time ago!

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When I was a young lad, say from 1958-64, I used to travel into KX most weekends.  That platform was 16 and the majority of the platform surface was timber.  Even now I can recall the heavy smell of the mix of creosote and oil in the hot summer sun.  Access to the platform was over a covered walkway and then down to the platform.

 

In the KX to Potters Bar book from Charlie and Jim Connor there is a picture of platform 16 looking up the gradient in the early 70's, so it must have been in use for many years.

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A question, if I may... The platform on the gradient leading up from hotel curve was Platform 16? If you take a look at the image in the link below, these are presumably Platforms 15 and 14, existing just outside of the supporting wall for the main station roof? In the later years of operation, would these two platforms have been used exclusively for parcels traffic (as per the images I've seen) or would they have been served by timetabled passenger DMUs as well?

Still trying to get my head around the station as it was in the late 60s-mid 70s - it seems to be a very complicated place.

 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/loose_grip_99/353965417/

Hi Pete

 

Parcels were dealt with in Milk Yard, to the west of platform 16. Platforms 14 and 15 were passenger platforms for suburban trains. These were added in the 1920s when the loco yard was moved towards the tunnels.

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A question, if I may... The platform on the gradient leading up from hotel curve was Platform 16? If you take a look at the image in the link below, these are presumably Platforms 15 and 14, existing just outside of the supporting wall for the main station roof? In the later years of operation, would these two platforms have been used exclusively for parcels traffic (as per the images I've seen) or would they have been served by timetabled passenger DMUs as well?

Still trying to get my head around the station as it was in the late 60s-mid 70s - it seems to be a very complicated place.

 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/loose_grip_99/353965417/

 

 

Here's a link to a map of KX in the 40's-60's (Date of the OS map)

 

http://maps.nls.uk/geo/explore/#zoom=19&lat=51.5331&lon=-0.1246&layers=173&b=1

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Are these photos taken in 1980s any use and these from another thread.

 

Many thanks Clive. It took me a moment or two to realise what the concrete ramp leading up from the gated arch was - the Hotel Curve trackbed! Fascinating images.

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Here's a link to a map of KX in the 40's-60's (Date of the OS map)

 

http://maps.nls.uk/geo/explore/#zoom=19&lat=51.5331&lon=-0.1246&layers=173&b=1

 

Thanks Gordon. Although I have searched the NLS website, that's the most detailed view I've seen showing the suburban platforms... I must have completely missed that one. The really detailed OS maps I have seen feature the loco yard and turntable in that location.

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When looking for large scale maps of London on nls maps, it's always worth making sure that you select "OS England and Wales", and look at both the late C19th 1:1056 and the later 25" series, because there is a discontinuity in series that doesn't seem to apply elsewhere.

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Many thanks Clive. It took me a moment or two to realise what the concrete ramp leading up from the gated arch was - the Hotel Curve trackbed! Fascinating images.

post-16423-0-46237500-1511974488.jpg

 

thing is it looks like a steep enough access road, never mind that trains used to come up there! looks a LOT steeper without any trains/platforms etc to disguise it

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thanks for that clive, the subsequent changes didn't register - I was thinking the concrete was just laid on top of the trackbed. but comparing the 'arches' on the LHS shows that the road was built up /steepened until it was, as dave says, about level with the platform.

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Interesting signalling going into the hole at York road, there were four signal heads (two on each side). Presumably this was to cater for locos driven from both sides, and, as the heads appear to be angled differently, to cope with stoppers and non-stoppers.

 

Again another detail that if you modelled it, no-one would believe....

 

This is a fascinating thread...

 

Andy G

 

No, the starter signal at York Road was an LT controlled signal and was on the right side for visibility purposes. It is a stop signal which shows red or green and a distant below which can show yellow or green. All trains had to stop at York road to make sure the tripcock was lowered and was cut in, and there was a blue light which was extinguished if the trip cock was down. Trip isolating cocks were under the secondman's side on the 31s in a cut out quadrant, and in a similar place on the DMUs but on the solebar. From memory there were no signals on the left side of the tunnel portal.

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Are these photos taken in 1980s any use...

 

A huge thanks Clive, I've shamelessly nicked these...

 

I have an entire folder on my hard drive named "Clive"... (personal use for reference only, I can assure you). You do have a knack of capturing some slightly obscure detail shots that the rest of us wish we could go back in time and photograph for ourselves.

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No, the starter signal at York Road was an LT controlled signal and was on the right side for visibility purposes. It is a stop signal which shows red or green and a distant below which can show yellow or green. All trains had to stop at York road to make sure the tripcock was lowered and was cut in, and there was a blue light which was extinguished if the trip cock was down. Trip isolating cocks were under the secondman's side on the 31s in a cut out quadrant, and in a similar place on the DMUs but on the solebar. From memory there were no signals on the left side of the tunnel portal.

 

The picture I saw the heads in is on here: http://www.disused-stations.org.uk/k/kings_cross_york_road/index1.shtml

 

Andy G

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The picture I saw the heads in is on here: http://www.disused-stations.org.uk/k/kings_cross_york_road/index1.shtml

 

Andy G

 

Ye, you're right, the photo doesn't lie but the memory fades with time.

 

The 2 lots of signals duplicate each other, OJ1 being the stop signal and ROJ2 being the repeater or distant for OJ2 which protected the junction if my memory is correct. A look at the Harsig signal diagram will confirm that.

 

Edited to add Harsig's diagram is for 926-1956 and shows signal C1 and RC2 at York Road, with C2 protecting the Widened Lines platform. This would suggest the signals were re-numbered some time after that as other signals on the widened lines platforms are shown as 2 signals protecting diverging routes as old semaphore practice. In the 1970s the signal on the down line at KX WL platform was a 2 aspect with route indicator. C1 and RC1 are shown as co-acting signals which would explain why there are 2 at York Way.

 

Link here to Harsig:http://www.harsig.org/PDF/CircleWidened.pdf

Edited by roythebus
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That photo must be mid-70s at the latest, but on the extreme right a woman appears to be talking into a mobile phone.... Maybe time travel is possible after all??

 Between using the once extremely widely employed powder compact, adjusting one's barnet, and the Sony Walkman's advent, photographs with women captured incidentally in frame from the 1950s on, will to modern eyes sometimes appear to be in characteristic 'on my mobile' poses. Saw one earlier this week - very definitely from the 1950s - which looked like taking a selfie. (She would actually be inspecting the overall impression in the miror of her powder compact.)

 

...Occurs to me that JK Rowling did not need to invent Platform 9 3/4. Hogwart's Express could have departed from that platform (17?) beyond the Hotel Curve and no-one would know.

 So the one time resiting of the 'disappearing luggage cart' to the West side of the suburban platforms heading in that direction was a most insightful commentary...

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Yes... doing an image search on Google for "Kings Cross Suburban" occasionally turns up something useful, but not before wading through a heap of these...!

 

post-17811-0-82473700-1512034437.jpg

 

 

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Just picked up on this thread. I was lodging near Finsbury Park station in 1971. We took great delight in making diversions to and from work in Camden by travelling via Kings Cross Widened Lines station.

Later when I was Resident Engineer I was involved with signalling improvements on Thameslink and often used the spiral staircase to the site of St Pancras Tunnel Signal box. I was interested to see signal C2 in the six-foot. We put a new signal on the tunnel wall at about that position but it was only visible from a very short distance so we had to cast a concrete block between the track slabs and put a ground mounted co-acting signal. It was so tight that it was only 10mm outside the kinematic envelope. The local story was that clearance was so tight down there that the profile of the units was determined by making a dummy body with expanded polystyrene corners and towing it through. The final design of the tapered corners was supposed to have been based on the shape remaining after the run and taking 100mm off it.

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