Loading Dock "Sans Platform"?

[Ray Von]

 

I notice that in the US there are sheds and warehouses that have large doors for loading / unloading rail freight.  Do these exist on this side of the pond, and would they suit my late 1970's BR Blue layout?  

[Phil Traxson]

I worked in a cattle food mill in Burton on Trent in the late 1960's which had rail sidings which were close up to the building and loaded/unloaded directly through doors onto the floor inside with no outside platform. I'm pretty sure some of the breweries in Burton did too.

[The Johnster]

They certainly did exist in the UK, but not AFAIK at railway owned facilities; they were more a feature of private company sidings and perhaps military depots.  A few were certainly still in business in the 70s, but I doubt any survived long into the 80s (happy to be proved wrong on this); the railway had by then been moving away from from the sort of wagon/van load traffic that this sort of facility generated for some time. 

[Fat Controller]

The problem with doing this in the UK is that a majority of UK vans had hinged, rather than sliding doors, so that there has to be about 3' clearance between the wagon and the building. 'Cupboard doors' would have to be opened or closed away from the building. 

My father's company did quite a bit of work installing rail loading platforms for what was then the Steel Company of Wales. They had to modify the client's instructions, as, if they had used the platform heights specified, then half the van doors would not be able to be opened on arrival, or closed on departure.

[Robin Verth]

In Kingston Fyffes bananas had a sliding, the bananas were unloaded through sliding doors into the warehouse,  the banana Van's always arrived by special trains usually hauled by a BR Standard class 4 2-6-4T, I am not sure how the doors of the vans were opened, this was obscured by the vans, Southern meat vans were built with sliding doors, it is believed that one or more customers loading facilities could not deal with vans fitted with hinged doors.

[TomJ]

It’s how a majority of the clay works in Cornwall operated. Track right along sides the dries with dried clay loaded straight into wagons

 

Obviously more of a loading than unloading dock!!!

Edited November 17, 2020 by TomJ
Unfortunate typo of ‘dock’

[Fat Controller]

3 hours ago, TomJ said:

It’s how a majority of the clay works in Cornwall operated. Track right along sides the dries with dried clay loaded straight into wagons

 

Obviously more of a loading than unloading dock!!!

The clay wagons would be loaded over the top of the sides, so no reason for the doors to be opened or closed.

[Titanius Anglesmith]

At my local goods yard there was a brewery alongside one of the sidings. The brewery stores building had doors at wagon floor height just like the OP’s photo. As far as I can tell the siding wasn’t private as it was never fenced off from the rest of the yard.

 

Incidentally the stores building still exists, now a glaziers. The goods yard of course is long gone, now the station car park.