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DMU depot / stabling sidings / Edgar Street Sidings at Hereford.


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Hi, 

 

after the former steam shed closed, I thought the diesels stabled in the sidings near the station? but the Quail shows Edgar Street Sidings at Hereford? just wondered where these were and they were used for? Locos? DMUs? 

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Hi, 

 

seems that 

201001

 

Pic by 40011 MAURETANIA

 

are these the Hereford "Edgar Street Sidings", but appear OOU? where they ever used by diesels? DMUs? from when to when? 

 

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Never known as Edgar Street sidings in my day. Nowhere near Edgar Street. Known to railwaymen as Aylestone Hill sidings, Corporation siding, or simply "The Diesel Depot" or "The Depot". The last two giving the game away for their use after the steam shed closed. Used to be very busy at one time, with all roads filled with DMUs, and least one of the London trains, stabled there overnight, and fuelling locos. This all gradually tailed off in the early 90's, and now it is only used as a turn-back siding for the HST's/800's and the occasional Birmingham service, when not turning back from Platform 1. Below is a link to one of my photos, taken on a Sunday 4th November 1985, whilst preparing  50043 for that afternoons London train, showing the DMU's also stabled there.

50043 [DBR1-125]

 

 

Paul J.

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There’s a few photos of diesels stabled by the station in the Rex Kennedy book “ diesels on shed, western region “, some 47s IIRC,.

 

so it seems there were two locations to catch stuff stabled ? I’m sure swindon 123 could tell us .

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Sorry can't help with lineside locations to take photos of the depot area Rob. Most of my photos of the depot area where taken from lineside when down there getting something "off shed" or putting something to bed. I took surprisingly few photos down there, and one of my friend who's photos I have on my Flickr pages, also took very few down there.

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Never heard it referred to as anything other than Aylestone Hill Sidings in the 70s.  There was nurses' accommodation behind it, which was nice when they were topping up their tans on the grass in hot weather.

 

The loco for the morning London stabled coupled to the stock overnight, a Hymek in those days followed by the 50s.

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22 hours ago, The Johnster said:

Never heard it referred to as anything other than Aylestone Hill Sidings in the 70s.  There was nurses' accommodation behind it, which was nice when they were topping up their tans on the grass in hot weather.

 

The loco for the morning London stabled coupled to the stock overnight, a Hymek in those days followed by the 50s.

 

Johnster, you've omitted (maybe deliberately ?!) the short and inglorious interregnum when BR thought Class 31s were suitable to replace Hymeks on the Paddington-Oxford-Worcester-Hereford services - Did they stable at Hereford as well ?

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i'd forgotten them, because they were pretty forgettable, but yes they did.  At Canton some idiot though 25s were suitable Hymek replacements, and the 31s, which were a little better than these pointless things at least, took a few more years to appear.  

 

52s occasionally worked this job as well, especially in the Hymeks' latter days when reliability was not what it should have been.  

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Finally a topic I can contribute more than a 'Like' to!

 

I'm in the early stages of planning a layout / large diorama based on these very sidings. I think I have amassed pretty much all of the photos on Flickr, Facebook, this wonderful site and others, as well as various maps and other bits of trivia about the place and its surroundings.

 

Over the last few months, I have created a reasonably detailed 3D Sketchup model of the place as it would have been in late 1980s/early 1990s, mostly for taking modelling measurements in due course, and generally getting the feel for whether a model would fit in the space available in my garage. That was a fun research project - particularly working out the floor plans and layouts of the various trackside buildings.

 

I don't think I would feel right uploading the various pictures I have culled from other sites (they were taken for my own use) but if you have any requests or questions, I can probably point you in the right direction. 

 

The Edgar Street sidings are at the other end of the station and were the more substantive sidings back when Hereford was a more significant freight terminal. Now all that remains in active use is the Network Rail depot.

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Do not know if it is strictly stabling but the 08 shunter used to spend the night in the siding behind the island platform known as 'under the wall'. A freight on the down would arrive in the early hours of the morning with traffic for Hereford on the front. It would pull off the Hereford traffic and set it back on top of the pilot. Later in the morning the 08 would propel the wagons out and then haul them back through the station. I was only at Hereford for a year and that would have been around 1990. 

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Yes Eggesford box, stabling the "Noddy" under the wall was the usual thing. Either 09001 or 09015, late 80's, early 90's. Last move of the day for the afternoon shunt driver was to put it there, and try and get 27MPH out of the 09 between the Brecon Curve GF Xover and the box. Great fun, and caused a few hard stares from the Traffic supervisors if they were out on the platform.

 

Paul J.

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On 18/04/2019 at 20:53, The Johnster said:

i'd forgotten them, because they were pretty forgettable, but yes they did.  At Canton some idiot though 25s were suitable Hymek replacements, and the 31s, which were a little better than these pointless things at least, took a few more years to appear. 

Not down to "an idiot at Canton".

More likely to be someone at 222 Marylebone Road , seeking retribution on the (Great) Western Region for having the audacity to "go it alone".

Canton staff had to make do with what they were given.....or cascaded.

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We had our full share of idiots at Canton, though!  Nicknames were brilliant; we had Harpic, who'd drive you clean around the bend, and Thrombosis, a bloody clot wandering around clogging up the system.  Also Tojo, because he looked a bit like the Japanese General, who derailed the Ferry Road tanks by returning the ground frame at Grangetown while the train was still half way across it, which is idiocy of a fairly advanced degree...

 

You are dead right of course, nobody at Canton or even on the Western could have thought that a 1,250hp loco could replicate the performance of one rated 350hp more, but once Marylebone Rd had decided to prohibit maintenance of the Hymeks because of their hydraulic transmission and, more importantly IMHO, the inability to find room in that cramped bodyshell for train air brake equipment, they were doomed.  One suspects that someone at 'The Kremlin' looked at photos for something of a similar general size to a Hymek, 'we want an engine about that big', and that was it!  I doubt the Western was happy to accept 25s for Hymek work, but that seems to have been all that was on offer, and a poor loco is arguably better than none.  Nobody asked my opinion, shared by the drivers, which was that the Hymeks should have been kept going for another few years as there was still a good bit of vacuum work about.  The WR had some experience with them double headed on the Newport Docks-Llanwern iron ore trains, heavy slow unfitted drags where 8 driving axles were no bad thing, but in South Wales only Ebbw Jc men traction signed them IIRC until the Hymek replacements arrived.

 

The only point of similarity between Class 25s and Hymeks was the all-up weight, 75tons, on 4 axles.  A refurbished 31 or more 37s would have been a better bet, and there were 37s in storage at Margam at the time.  I have often wondered about the WR's reluctance to use 37s on passenger work and they were proven performers on freight, but the WR seems to have considered them as exclusively freight locos for a very long time, despite them already having proved themselves on Eastern and North Eastern Regions passenger work before being allocated to the Western in 1963.  The Scottish Region later used them successfully on passenger work as well, and they had routes were poor reliability was potentially life threatening!  Maybe it was a mindset with roots in their being replacements for the 100 lower geared 60mph 'freight' Hymeks to replace 56xx on Valleys work which fell through when Beyer, Peacock went under.  

 

One might argue that a Hymek is superior to a 37 in terms of power/weight ratio, as a 37 is 30 tons heavier, about the weight of a coach, but in practice there seemed little to choose between them for main line work.  There was nothing better than a 37 for Valleys work.  There was a period in 1964 when they were used in pairs for high speed running trials between Bristol and Paddington, including some timetable service runs, with borrowed Deltic-geared bogies, but it was not followed up.  Even on their standard bogies, they were good for 105mph, over the Hymeks' 90.  

 

A few years later, when the futility of attempting to run the Cardiff-Crewe service to time with 120 dmus even when they were strengthened with bubble cars was realised, 25s were drafted in to work this service, initially with 6 mk1s.  This of course proved equally futile, but the passengers had better seats to be more comfortably late in; the load was eventually reduced to 4 before the locos could reliably time the trains.  I always thought a Hymek would have been ideal for this job, and in later years 33s, a bit more in that power range and another 75ton pocket rocket, were successful with it.  37s took over eventually when air conditioned stock was introduced on the route, but it really needed 47s.  I had a run from Crewe to Cardiff in the early 90s with Fire Fly, which fairly flew up the banks!

 

We passed Aylestone Hill sidings, so this screed is not off topic...

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Interesting insight. Although off topic , I’ll continue down that route. Surprised the 31 was rated over the 25, most driver stuff I’ve read was the other way round for some reason.

 

Didnt WR use 37s on the Tenby route and Milford haven ? I seem to recall one going through Tenby when I wa staying there in 81/2....I thought it was great as our TV branches got nothing more exciting than a 3 coach 117

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2 hours ago, rob D2 said:

Interesting insight. Although off topic , I’ll continue down that route. Surprised the 31 was rated over the 25, most driver stuff I’ve read was the other way round for some reason.

 

Didnt WR use 37s on the Tenby route and Milford haven ? I seem to recall one going through Tenby when I wa staying there in 81/2....I thought it was great as our TV branches got nothing more exciting than a 3 coach 117

37s were used on passenger services in West Wales, but generally after the Hymeks bit the dust.......in 1969 there were seven daily Hymek diagrams West of Swansea, on freight, passenger and milk services.

one stable d overnight at Fishguard.

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12 hours ago, br2975 said:

37s were used on passenger services in West Wales, but generally after the Hymeks bit the dust.......in 1969 there were seven daily Hymek diagrams West of Swansea, on freight, passenger and milk services.

one stable d overnight at Fishguard.

In the very late 1960s/ early 1970s, the Up postal/sleeper was a steam-heat EE Type 3 duty; Landore had a pool of half-a-dozen or so, fitted with Central Wales Line lamp brackets.

There used to be an odd Up working, which seemed to run on most days, just before lunch, comprising a EE Type 3, a Swindon Cross-Country and a parcels van. It seemed to pass often enough for it to be a timetabled working.

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Reviving an old thread on a subject dear to my modelling heart, on the off chance anyone has any memories, photos, thoughts or guidance as to what this little building may have contained? It was part of the Hereford DMU sidings so presumably contained offices, a bathroom, 'waiting around' area for the fuelling point workers to rest between jobs. The building still exists but is abandoned now and largely overgrown.

 

The NRM has a couple of track plans for this area, both of which I have obtained from their research service, but no details about the building.

 

The attached image is a screenshot of my Sketchup model, which has been drawn from every photo I can find of this building, which are very few indeed as the vast majority of photos taken in this part of the railway understandably concentrate on the stabled locos / DMUs.

 

It is of course a fairly simple brick building with some doors and windows, so modelling it is not particularly difficult. I'm just curious about its history and anything else anyone knows or remembers about it, just to complete my understanding of the scene.

Screenshot 2019-07-08 at 10.05.44 PM.png

 

Edit: the best photo I have is the one below, which is from Hydey44 on Flickr.

1923978255_19904.jpg.b063cfa407448bf4cb906493176e158f.jpg

Edited by ed1234
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On 15/04/2019 at 09:33, 18B said:

Hi, 

 

seems that 

201001

 

Pic by 40011 MAURETANIA

 

are these the Hereford "Edgar Street Sidings", but appear OOU? where they ever used by diesels? DMUs? from when to when? 

 

 

Given thats Hereford Hospital in the background these are what now appear on Realtime trains as Hereford Diesel Sidings.

 

On 18/04/2019 at 20:53, The Johnster said:

i'd forgotten them, because they were pretty forgettable, but yes they did.  At Canton some idiot though 25s were suitable Hymek replacements, and the 31s, which were a little better than these pointless things at least, took a few more years to appear.  

 

52s occasionally worked this job as well, especially in the Hymeks' latter days when reliability was not what it should have been.  

 

As for 52s on this job ..... hmmm ..... Worcester men were not trained on them - or the Swindon Warships - so unless a driver had traction knowledge from another depot they would not make it to Hereford on these turns. Theres only 2 photos I know of of a Wizzo on a Padd - Worcester - 1054 on top of a 47 at Norton Junction. - loco failure or positioning move perhaps, and an earlier publicity shot from the mid 60s.

 

The traction heirachy on the Hereford/Worcester Padds once the Castles finished - supposedly in Sept 63 but often returned thereafter - was Hymeks with occasional 47s until Spring 68 when most workings went over to Class 43 warships - still occasional Hymeks and 47s - until the 43s finished in Sept 71 by which time 31s were starting to appear.  Very occasional Swindon warships appeared for a few months at Worcester but probably on 81A out and back turns  and the Hymeks slowly died until 1975 to be replaced by 47s and then 50s.

 

See the year by year on http://www.miac.org.uk/

 

That the 31s were underpowered for these duties is indisputable - when they were introduced 40 min late arrivals were commonplace and the up Cathedrals had to be piloted from Worcester to Moreton in Marsh - by wwhatever was available on 85A, 25 and 37 reported as doing the honours on at least 1 occasion each.

 

Going back to Hereford most photos of stabled locos are in the sidings by the station - including the two class 14s used on PW trains as late as 1970 IIRC

 

Cheers

 

Phil

 

 

 

 

 

 

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5 hours ago, ed1234 said:

Reviving an old thread on a subject dear to my modelling heart, on the off chance anyone has any memories, photos, thoughts or guidance as to what this little building may have contained? It was part of the Hereford DMU sidings so presumably contained offices, a bathroom, 'waiting around' area for the fuelling point workers to rest between jobs. The building still exists but is abandoned now and largely overgrown.

 

The NRM has a couple of track plans for this area, both of which I have obtained from their research service, but no details about the building.

 

The attached image is a screenshot of my Sketchup model, which has been drawn from every photo I can find of this building, which are very few indeed as the vast majority of photos taken in this part of the railway understandably concentrate on the stabled locos / DMUs.

 

It is of course a fairly simple brick building with some doors and windows, so modelling it is not particularly difficult. I'm just curious about its history and anything else anyone knows or remembers about it, just to complete my understanding of the scene.

Screenshot 2019-07-08 at 10.05.44 PM.png

 

Edit: the best photo I have is the one below, which is from Hydey44 on Flickr.

1923978255_19904.jpg.b063cfa407448bf4cb906493176e158f.jpg

Fairly standard WR arrangement for DMU fuel and inspection site.  An office (small); mess room;  probably a drying room (for wet clothing) but they didn't all have them I believe; toilet and wash room; and a stores for consumable items and commonly needed small spares.  They were not wonderful places at which to work although that did vary a bit depending on how exposed the site was  but I doubt if any of them were much liked during any sort of bad weather - at some of the worst (such as Triangle Sidings at Reading) you could even get wet from rain when you were working in a pit underneath a unit:o

 

The canopy is not quite to the usual WR design and that is - in my view - one of the most neglected and under researched things of the WR dieselisation period as they existed all over the Region at DMU F&I locations with the majority of them on former carriage sidings sites (such as this one).  It would be really interesting to at long last see a fully researched model of one of these once ubiquitous locations.

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Edgar Street Sidings were, at least in my day (including my trainspotting career in the 60s), primarily a dmu fuelling/inspection facility and had the infrastructure standard to these as Mike Stationmaster says.  They were used to stable the stock for the Hereford-Paddington loco hauled trains, and the morning train was often stabled overnight with the loco coupled, presumably for heating purposes.  The loco stabling point was the north end of the station.  

 

I assume, but don't actually know, that they were carriage sidings in pre dmu days, but you'd have to go back before the late 50s for this.  The hospital behind had nurses' quarters backing on to the railway just beyond them, and their sunbathing in warm weather was very popular with us!

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3 hours ago, The Stationmaster said:

Fairly standard WR arrangement for DMU fuel and inspection site.  An office (small); mess room;  probably a drying room (for wet clothing) but they didn't all have them I believe; toilet and wash room; and a stores for consumable items and commonly needed small spares.  They were not wonderful places at which to work although that did vary a bit depending on how exposed the site was  but I doubt if any of them were much liked during any sort of bad weather - at some of the worst (such as Triangle Sidings at Reading) you could even get wet from rain when you were working in a pit underneath a unit:o

 

The canopy is not quite to the usual WR design and that is - in my view - one of the most neglected and under researched things of the WR dieselisation period as they existed all over the Region at DMU F&I locations with the majority of them on former carriage sidings sites (such as this one).  It would be really interesting to at long last see a fully researched model of one of these once ubiquitous locations.

 

Thanks for your input Mike. The Hereford site would have been pretty barren in the winter, I imagine. Although it's overgrown now with trees, the older pictures suggest they were kept under control but would have meant no real windbreak. The Hereford site was also lined by a stream, albeit in a deep ditch, so I imagine the whole place had a general dampness to it (an apt description of Hereford more generally, some might say!).

 

There was a similar canopy at Marsh Junction in Bristol, at least judging from this picture from another thread (linked below), and a much bigger one but of broadly similar construction at the Godfrey Road depot in Newport. I assume at some point all of these various trackside structures would have had some form of engineer's drawings or similar, and that those must exist somewhere in an old BR Archive - even a simple modular/ largely pre-fab structure would have needed some form of instruction book for those putting it together (I would assume). Being nearly 5,000 miles remote from the NRM at York, I doubt it's a question I'll get to research any time soon, at least beyond what is available online and in the memories of those contributing here.

 

I have pieced together a 3D model of the structure based on all the photos I can find, which I'm happy is sufficiently accurate for assembling a model in a much reduced scale and with my limited modelling skills. Screenshot below, in case it is of service to anyone contemplating anything similar (happy to share the model too, if useful).

 

post-7081-0-58523900-1493673449.jpg

 

532148430_Screenshot2019-07-09at8_35_20AM.png.23221a604fb88d56b8e39074d6148410.png

 

 

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I suspect that if there is a drawing anywhere it is as likely to be in the Wiltshire County archives at Chippenham as anywhere else because that seems to be where most of the Swindon M&EE plant and equipment drawings have gone.  There used to be a list of them online but as it was by drawing number the only way you could find anything specific was to begin at the beginning and carry on from there - not an encouraging exercise!  I can only find a distant view of the Treherbert one but it looks to be the same in detail as your drawing.  Some had a slightly different end arrangement but I can't find a photo of one online thus far.

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