Occupied Arches.

[Roger.s]

I am looking for information on occupied arches under urban railways.  Particularly when they became common and what sort of wall (if any ) was used to enclose the arch. Searching the internet seems only to give modern views and I am interested in the pre grouping era.

 

Regards Roger

[phil_sutters]

I am not sure how typical these arches are. Given that they are in a similar style to the station, I guess that they were designed when the railway was built.

https://alondoninheritance.com/tag/london-greenwich-railway/

[Nearholmer]

The first railway of any length built on arches was the London and Greenwich, and the arches were either specifically designed to be used as houses, or quickly adapted to form houses, I forget which. The housing idea didn’t work out due to vibration and water ingress, and they were reused as workshops etc, so the answer to your question seems to be ‘right from the very start’.

 

 

Edited January 10, 2021 by Nearholmer

[Nearholmer]

The thing to remember about the walls at the ends of occupied arches is that they are not structural, they don’t hold the arch up, in nearly all cases, so they can be of fairly feeble construction, brick or timber. Old photos tend to show the same range of semi-bodged walls as exist now. I think most such walls were/are the responsibility of the tenant, not the railway, unless the latter has invested in walls to improve the value of the arches before letting them.

 

What sort of tenants are you looking to put in yours? Shops, or workshops and stores?

 

Spa Road again, with an SER property department sign on display.

 

 

Edited January 10, 2021 by Nearholmer

[phil_sutters]

These are probably more typical arches and could have looked like this any time in the last 100 years. http://www.leodis.net/display.aspx?resourceIdentifier=200257_48157901

Edited January 10, 2021 by phil_sutters
too many probablys

[Kris]

Some of the arches just to the north of Bath station on wood road don't appear to have changed much in the past 40 odd years. Those that have not changed might give an idea as to how they could have looked further back in time. 

[Roger.s]

Thank you for your replies.

 

17 hours ago, phil_sutters said:

I am not sure how typical these arches are. Given that they are in a similar style to the station, I guess that they were designed when the railway was built.

https://alondoninheritance.com/tag/london-greenwich-railway/

The London and Blackwall also had houses under the arches, still in use in the 1930s.   Virtually all of the arches were let by about 1846. A lot were used for stabling which gave over to motor garages in the 1920s. Looking at Google Maps I see that groups of arches have had a makeover in the last 20 - 30 years and all I can see is their modern appearance  which does not help me much. 

16 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

The thing to remember about the walls at the ends of occupied arches is that they are not structural, they don’t hold the arch up, in nearly all cases, so they can be of fairly feeble construction, brick or timber. Old photos tend to show the same range of semi-bodged walls as exist now. I think most such walls were/are the responsibility of the tenant, not the railway, unless the latter has invested in walls to improve the value of the arches before letting them.

 

What sort of tenants are you looking to put in yours? Shops, or workshops and stores?

 

I'm not worried at the present about who the tenants are just how many.  I am building the elevated section of track and I need to know how much space I have in which to put supports. 2mm scale means that the width between typical arches is barely sufficient to provide a rigid support. I like the openness of empty arches but walling them up would hide lots of things, supports, point motors and uncoupler mechanisms so I am trying to find enough early photos to form an idea of what was typical in 1910 -1923. 

 

Regards Roger

[Compound2632]

Trawling the Midland Railway Study Centre catalogue on the search term "arches" or "arch" turns up a number of letting agreements. Most are for the London area though there is also a batch from Ilkley. The earliest are dated 1911, apart from the 1870 agreement with Thomas Salt & Co, brewers of Burton, for the use of part of the St Pancras station undercroft. These are chance survivals, so one can't make any systematic deductions other that the practice of letting arches was around by the second decade of the 20th century. They also give a glimpse of the type of businesses using these spaces. 

[Nick Holliday]

Not actually an arch under the railway line, but occupied arches under a railway built bridge approach road at Lewes, dating from around 1880.

[Nick Holliday]

This photo of Spa Road, SECR is interesting.

From here, but I can't get the link to work!

alondoninheritance.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/Spa-Road-10-1024x777.jpg  

Although a modern photo, the presence of the SECR lettering suggests that the infill, which is quite elaborate, dates from the turn of the last century, if not earlier, and echoes @Nearholmer b&w posting from SER days.

 

 

 

[Nearholmer]

That is a brilliant photo for illustrating the classic "arch problem" too. notice the severe water-marking on the righthand pillar, with weep-holes having been bored to release the water pressure. That viaduct is rife with that problem, and the section of it that is used as a traction substation had/has a heavy-gauge corrugated liner/roof below the arch, and quite a comprehensive run-off system. Many arches are like that, so if the tenant wants a shop, a dry-store, cafe/restaurant, or an office, it often ends-up as almost a free-standing structure, sheltering within the arch.

 

As regards wall, brick or block-work according to typical building practice of the time, so pre-grouping, and probably up to the 1950s, a 9" wall, something like English or Flemish bond, possibly with piers either side of a large door in the centre.

 

If it was used as stables, which many were, a big louvred vent over the centre door.

 

Often the brickwork only went up to the spring of the arch, above which studding covered with shiplap or feather-edged boards, and I've even seen close-set iron bars, rather than studding, above the wall on what I think had been fruit&veg, coal, or bonded stores, where theft was a risk.

 

Sometimes, the whole wall in stud and boards, but that must have been a fire risk.

Edited January 11, 2021 by Nearholmer

[Nearholmer]

2 hours ago, Roger.s said:

2mm scale means that the width between typical arches is barely sufficient to provide a rigid support.

 

I find that hard to understand - surely something like 6mm or 9mm ply could be accommodated.

[Roger.s]

6 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

 

I find that hard to understand - surely something like 6mm or 9mm ply could be accommodated.

I am thinking of GER arches similar to those at London Fields and these have pillars which are 3ft wide. Allowing 1.5mm for the 3D printed walls this leaves space for only 3mm ply which needs to be rigidly fixed on end.

 

Regards Roger

[Nearholmer]

3mm birch ply, fixed to the underside of the road-bed, also ply, by gluing, with fillets of 6mm or even 3mm square beading to strengthen the joint? It would make a strong joint if you used good quality PVA or aliphatic resin glue. If you were worried about the strength of a glued joint, which I don't think I would be, you could probably even pin the fillets to the road-bed using the finest dill (veneer) pins. You could even add triangular ply fillets, of a fair size, which would be concealed within the arch.

 

Have you got a shop that specialises in flying model aircraft nearby? Those places stock high quality thin ply, small section timber, and good glues, because those guys build structures like this that have to survive minor crashes!

 

 

 

 

Edited January 11, 2021 by Nearholmer

[PatB]

I would have thought that 3mm ply, on edge, would be more than enough to support a 2mm scale roadbed, especially as you could, if you wished, put in one per arch.

 

Not really useful for pre-grouping purposes, but nearly 40 years ago I visited the Burlington Motor Company, one of the many kit car companies that proliferated in the early 1980s, in Leamington Spa. They (actually, a singular "he") were based in a couple of railway arches in a space enclosed by arches, seemingly on all sides. The whole area had become an enclave entirely composed of enthusiastic people doing odd things with motor vehicles, every arch containing a different one man band business, specialising in something. Along at one end, where the encroaching walls made access for cars difficult,  motorcycles took over instead. The whole thing was this wonderful, enclosed little secret world, fragrant with oil and hot metal and paint, and seemingly very happy in the warm Easter sunshine. 

 

I had a look on Street view a while ago, and it is, of course, all gone. It's a very sterile, formal, light industrial park now, with uniformly tidy units and a proper tarmac surface. I'm sure it delights the local council, but I doubt if any 2021 sixteen year old will look back in 40 years and think that it felt like the most wonderful place on earth. 

[Roger.s]

2 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

3mm birch ply, fixed to the underside of the road-bed, also ply, by gluing, with fillets of 6mm or even 3mm square beading to strengthen the joint? It would make a strong joint if you used good quality PVA or aliphatic resin glue. If you were worried about the strength of a glued joint, which I don't think I would be, you could probably even pin the fillets to the road-bed using the finest dill (veneer) pins. You could even add triangular ply fillets, of a fair size, which would be concealed within the arch.

 

I'm with you at the top of the support but I am concerned that where the pillar joins to the ground level baseboard there is no spare space for fillets to go. I also have point motors and uncoupling magnets to hide,

 

Regards Roger

[phil_sutters]

In terms of the bottom joints, could you raise the floor of the archway, making a separate floor for each archway and sandwich the feet of the pillars between the floors?

[Bernard Lamb]

18 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

Trawling the Midland Railway Study Centre catalogue on the search term "arches" or "arch" turns up a number of letting agreements. Most are for the London area though there is also a batch from Ilkley. The earliest are dated 1911, apart from the 1870 agreement with Thomas Salt & Co, brewers of Burton, for the use of part of the St Pancras station undercroft. These are chance survivals, so one can't make any systematic deductions other that the practice of letting arches was around by the second decade of the 20th century. They also give a glimpse of the type of businesses using these spaces. 

St Pancras lower level was actually designed and built for the storage of beer barrels. I did have it all explained to me once about how the spacing of the columns was worked out to suit a number of barrels per bay. A very different structure from the typical arches.

 

I would suggest to the OP that he has a look in the catalogue of The Bishopsgate Institute as they have a heck of a lot of material  on old railway structures. Just one photo I happen to have from them of the old B'gate goods station. Not typical, as the span is much wider and shallow than most, but it does give an idea of the internal construction. 

Bernard

 

[Nearholmer]

Can we have a sketch of what you are trying to achieve?

 

My experience is that 3mm ply, if used carefully, can achieve all sorts of strong structures, so I might be able to make suggestions.

 

I get the issue of hiding point motors etc, but it might look more interesting to have a mix of fully-enclosed and open arches.

[Compound2632]

The trouble with open arches is that they need some view blocker at some depth - we don't know what the OP plans for a backscene behind the viaduct.

[Siberian Snooper]

My favourite occupied arch is just outside Waterloo Station.

 

 

From Google Street View.

[Nearholmer]

Running with ‘roaches that arch is. Waterloo supports enough cockroaches and rats to carry the station aloft on their backs.

[phil_sutters]

I wonder how Lucky a motor is to end up in an accident repair shop. Perhaps it is lucky to be repaired. Anyway that is no longer a question that needs answering as since my 2008 photo, the repair shop is no longer, according Google Street View in 2020. It was the arch next door that may be relevant to this thread. Apart from the roller shutter, I would think that the rest of that frontage was erected in the first half of the 20th century. It is a bit complicated to reproduce in 2mm scale, but gives an idea of something more interesting than plain boarding.

Edited January 12, 2021 by phil_sutters
Missed word

[Nearholmer]

In 2mm, a paper print, pasted-on, might well be sufficient.

[jcm@gwr]

56 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

In 2mm, a paper print, pasted-on, might well be sufficient.

 

Why not use laser cut walls, they will be strong enough to support a 2mm

railway infrastructue on top, unless you were thinking of standing on it!