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Tinsley Yard and Sheffield International Railfreight Termial


Arpleymodeller
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  • 3 weeks later...

Quick trip across Wood Lane today...

 

Not much new on the east (Catcliffe) side - still no lighting, and the concrete pad still doesn't extend the length of the train:

 1680071273_TinsleyEsideofWoodLane01jul21.jpg.410a848337dd8522197f37cd80af350d.jpg

 

But on the west side, more concrete going in, and a retaining wall has sprung up. Watch this space:

809491361_TinsleyWsideofWoodLane01jul21.jpg.af3b023815a5ec62cf77e3a81bd99ed6.jpg

 

The container trains are now up to 3 a day some days. Today's realtimetrains here:

https://www.realtimetrains.co.uk/search/detailed/gb-nr:SHPCTLJ/2021-07-02/0000-2359?stp=WVS&show=non-passenger&order=wtt

shows actual arrivals at 0214, 0708 and 1142, and departures at 0649, 1110 and due at 1615 (I'm posting this at 1607 - the train in the first photo was the one concerned).

Edited by eastwestdivide
3 trains in a day
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Thing is, those big hump yards were dead or dying on creation. Extinct dinosaurs from conception.

 

I’m pleased To see these intermodal pads popping up, deffo the future for railfreight 

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17 hours ago, rob D2 said:

Thing is, those big hump yards were dead or dying on creation. Extinct dinosaurs from conception.

 

I’m pleased To see these intermodal pads popping up, deffo the future for railfreight 

I'm in two minds about that - whilst we had a decent manufacturing sector there certainly remained a need for wagonload and sorting yards - perhaps the scale would have come down as handling improved but there are still yards in Europe.

 

It was successive government policies that saw the expansion of the road network with little encouragement given to railfrieght, distribution centres based around the motorway network and not the rail network and the general decline in manufacturing that destroyed the yards.  We even built a rail link under the sea and did a good job starving it of railfreight, instead building trains to haul lorries through the Tunnel to enter the motorway system in Kent and travel all over the UK from there.

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46 minutes ago, woodenhead said:

I'm in two minds about that - whilst we had a decent manufacturing sector there certainly remained a need for wagonload and sorting yards - perhaps the scale would have come down as handling improved but there are still yards in Europe.

 

It was successive government policies that saw the expansion of the road network with little encouragement given to railfrieght, distribution centres based around the motorway network and not the rail network and the general decline in manufacturing that destroyed the yards.  We even built a rail link under the sea and did a good job starving it of railfreight, instead building trains to haul lorries through the Tunnel to enter the motorway system in Kent and travel all over the UK from there.

The problem with various of the Modernisation Plan yards was that they were in the wrong place.  Tinsley was one that made sense because it was in the centre of an industrial area of originating and terminating traffic - as were Margam and Tees and to some extent Tyne.  But Kingmoor was a nonsesne as it was basically a junction yard with little originating traffic and work that could kargely have been done elsewhere - a rather old fashioned approach by the time it was built.

 

But all were overtaken by a mixture of industrial decline and, as in mportantly a move to get away from traffic spending its time in a succession of yards rather than being kept on the move.  The same can now be said of many similar yards in mainland Europe as traffic has moved to through trainload working and older industries have declined or vanished.

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1 hour ago, woodenhead said:

I'm in two minds about that - whilst we had a decent manufacturing sector there certainly remained a need for wagonload and sorting yards - perhaps the scale would have come down as handling improved but there are still yards in Europe.

 

It was successive government policies that saw the expansion of the road network with little encouragement given to railfrieght, distribution centres based around the motorway network and not the rail network and the general decline in manufacturing that destroyed the yards.  We even built a rail link under the sea and did a good job starving it of railfreight, instead building trains to haul lorries through the Tunnel to enter the motorway system in Kent and travel all over the UK from there.

Maybe there was some need, but the best thing beeching did was start the whole freight liner concept as wagonload, was proven never to be economic.

 

Transrail/ EWS tried to revive it but it was very dependant on a core traffic to make any return , and a lot of the stuff drifted away.

 

the only way wagonload would have remained would have been if the railway stayed nationalised and the tax payer picked up the bill for the uneconomic nature of it 

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I agree the liner concept as it is now is the most efficient method - compatible /  interchangeable with train, road, sea and storage.

 

When you look back at docks from the 1960s and 1970s when they were fighting modernisation in employment practices and jobs it was all about moving away from unloading goods and using containers - it was always going to be the future as it made such sense.

Edited by woodenhead
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1 hour ago, rob D2 said:

Maybe there was some need, but the best thing beeching did was start the whole freight liner concept as wagonload, was proven never to be economic.

 

Transrail/ EWS tried to revive it but it was very dependant on a core traffic to make any return , and a lot of the stuff drifted away.

 

the only way wagonload would have remained would have been if the railway stayed nationalised and the tax payer picked up the bill for the uneconomic nature of it 

Don't forget that RfD was in wagonload long before Transrail and EWS.  It also got out of it because it couldn't make it pay the necessary rate of return.  And a lot of the freight traffic which was shed by the BR freight businesses in the mid-late 1980s was entirely down to The Treasury re-locating the goal posts in respect of teh rate ot f return not just further along the pitch but to   somewhere a couple of fields away.

 

Transrail and EWS had the distinct advantage of not being held down by The Treasury's rules so went to recover a lot of the traffic which had actually been profitable in BR times to the extent that it covered its costs and made a small rate of return.  But seemingly they couldn't make it all pay to the extent they wanted.

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3 hours ago, The Stationmaster said:

Don't forget that RfD was in wagonload long before Transrail and EWS.  It also got out of it because it couldn't make it pay the necessary rate of return.  And a lot of the freight traffic which was shed by the BR freight businesses in the mid-late 1980s was entirely down to The Treasury re-locating the goal posts in respect of teh rate ot f return not just further along the pitch but to   somewhere a couple of fields away.

 

Transrail and EWS had the distinct advantage of not being held down by The Treasury's rules so went to recover a lot of the traffic which had actually been profitable in BR times to the extent that it covered its costs and made a small rate of return.  But seemingly they couldn't make it all pay to the extent they wanted.

Was that the “ less than trainload “ part ? I was always amazed to see gidea park portions behind a 47 of just a few cargowaggons or even some of the MOD stuff - I’m guessing the MOD paid well to keep the core network but the other stuff must have been loss making for a few wagons ?

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9 minutes ago, rob D2 said:

Was that the “ less than trainload “ part ? I was always amazed to see gidea park portions behind a 47 of just a few cargowaggons or even some of the MOD stuff - I’m guessing the MOD paid well to keep the core network but the other stuff must have been loss making for a few wagons ?

RfD was originally the less than trainload part of the Freight Business Sector but it was turned into a completely separate business unit at some stage in the late 1980s although it conveyed some TraInload sectors' traffic - especially oil - when it passed as wagonload traffic.  Most of that oil traffic was chopped as result of The Treasury changing the rate of return.  

 

And sorry to confuse things a bit but RfD also operated a lot of its traffic on a trainload basis.

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Surprised they have not rebuilt the other sid of th triangle at woodburn jn. Save having to send the freight trains through conisborough as the two track section is a bit full. If the line through Brigg is under the ROC control from York it no longer needs to be shut during the week. And even the aggregate trains could be routed this way to avoid Sheffield station and having to be looped at heeley.

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18 hours ago, The Stationmaster said:

 Tinsley was one that made sense because it was in the centre of an industrial area of originating and terminating traffic -

 

Tinsley yard's raison d'etre was to allow the closing of a myriad of small yards, reduction of trip workings and cutting down the time and mileage taken by the trip workings, the fact that hump yards were flavour of the month was somewhat coincidental I think.

 

Mike.

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2 hours ago, Enterprisingwestern said:

 

Tinsley yard's raison d'etre was to allow the closing of a myriad of small yards, reduction of trip workings and cutting down the time and mileage taken by the trip workings, the fact that hump yards were flavour of the month was somewhat coincidental I think.

 

Mike.

Exactly the same reason that Kingmoor yard was built, to save tripping from Carlisle's 7+ small yards

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4 hours ago, Enterprisingwestern said:

 

Tinsley yard's raison d'etre was to allow the closing of a myriad of small yards, reduction of trip workings and cutting down the time and mileage taken by the trip workings, the fact that hump yards were flavour of the month was somewhat coincidental I think.

 

Mike.

Yes but don't ofrget that Sheffield was a hub of considerable amounts of originating and terminating traffic a lot of which only moved a comparatively short distance  The idea of Tinsley was that instead of traffic being tripped to/from its local (i.e. effectively Pre-Group company yard) and then being tripped to another yard if it wasn't for a destination served by that yard it would instead have all the local tripping and m longer distance workings concentrated onto one yard.  Hence wagons would only be shunted at one yard instead of two (or sometimes even three) before leaving the Sheffield area or after arriving at it.  For example, the 1935 RCH Handbook of Stations has just over three whole pages of terminals and private sidings in Sheffield itself without including others  in nearby places served by Sheffield yards.

 

Kingmoor in contrast was not serving an area with such large and varied amounts of originating traffic - it barely filled one page in that 1935 Handbook.  Thus a lot of the tripping and marshalling work was for exchange purposes between what had originally been the even greater number of Pre-Group company yards than in Sheffield.  True the number of yards needed to be rationalised but by the time Kingmoor was developed trainload working was increasing so a lot of the work that yards had once carried out was ceasing to exist.

 

It's all too easy to forget that in the years of freight traffic growth on the railway existing marshalling yards and sorting sidings were sometimes overwhelmed so an additional yard was constructed to takeover some of the work or a  new yard was constructed elsewhere to take some of it.  WWII for instance saw not only yards being expanded (where possible) but completely new yards coming into use, in some cases on sites that were only used because they were readily available.  And a common, very logical, idea at that time was to build yards at junctions where traffic was exchanged between routes as well as ideally serving local needs.  A very different railway from one where wagonload freight traffic was going the other way and declining. 

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  • 1 month later...

Back over to Tinsley today to see a railtour....

 

The loading/unloading pad by Wood Lane (see post of  2 July) now seems complete:

1114806800_Tinsleyunloadingpad.jpg.eb62b497fb61e343b149211e09aee282.jpg

 

The word on the street (well, on Wood Lane) is that it's for unloading spoil from HS2 works to be transferred locally. There's what appears to be a portable weighbridge at the end with road access:

615811190_Tinsleyweighbridgeposs.jpg.e1cdb2c2f60e91a9ebbd27d4ca88b20a.jpg

 

Plenty of containers stacked up on the other (Catcliffe) side of Wood Lane, although they've still only got hard standing for half the length of the trains, so they have to draw forward for loading and unloading. Sheffield Parkway is the blue bridge:

1426149484_Tinsleycontainerdepot.jpg.30959b15c64fb860be00c3c675b44325.jpg

 

Gratuitous railtour shot. A 60 and a 66, smart blue/grey coaches (except one in Anglia turquoise), 2 catering cars, more 1st class coaches than 2nd, plus a generator car for the AC. It went most of the way up the left hand line in the photo above, alongside a container train that arrived shortly before the railtour.

1575580253_Tinsleyrailtour.jpg.f02c0923f5061e40f8385830638c073b.jpg

 

 

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13 hours ago, Ncarter2 said:

I would say that it’s a wheel was, not a weigh bridge. 

Agreed; we had similar devices at Eurotunnel during the Foot and Mouth outbreak, and I saw one in action at Beechbrook Farm when Lynne worked there. Quite why they need one at a container terminal is another matter.

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On 18/08/2021 at 13:22, Fat Controller said:

Quite why they need one at a container terminal is another matter.

That bit of hard standing is away from the container terminal - as I understand it, that area will be for unloading spoil trains from HS2 works for dumping locally, so a wheel wash would make a lot of sense.

 

Much later edit (1 Sep): don't think it's HS2 waste as it comes from Barking/Ripple Lane, entirely the wrong side of London for HS2.

Edited by eastwestdivide
typo; source of waste
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  • 2 weeks later...

First train into the new spoil terminal at Tinsley today, an 0205 Barking Eurohub to Tinsley, with 66142, arriving about 90 mins late. Photos from about 1100-1200.

 

First a departing container train passes the unloading grab:

1150931546_Tinsleydepartingcontainers01sep2021.jpg.d7dd1115128da66a6e03744372ba99b0.jpg

 

The incoming train:

2144133795_Tinsleyarrivingspoil01sep2021.jpg.af7e2ea902f6909aba43ea40136dac5c.jpg

 

1909863928_Tinsleyarrivingspoil01sep2021b.jpg.b35603240c4803ceb32d0b277a7a8b1e.jpg

 

Unloading:

1726627562_Tinsleyunloadingspoil01sep2021.jpg.fb85b9179ec503e484aadecbe7c914a2.jpg

 

Wagon close-up, VTG 3509 as far as I can see:

178203373_Tinsleyspoilwagon01sep2021.jpg.637c2813f84af1fac846c09f4c8d47d5.jpg

 

Also on site, a big shovel:

87273711_Tinsleyequipment01sep2021.jpg.0e4273c878c980bd3c915d559309676a.jpg

Edited by eastwestdivide
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So the first spoil train arrives, in Parliament the Transport Secretary jubiliantly announces that the first HS2 train arrives in Sheffield to prove to the naysayers that the Eastern leg isn't cancelled and already the North is feeling the benefit of HS2.  :jester:

Edited by woodenhead
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18 minutes ago, woodenhead said:

So the first spoil train arrives, in Parliament the Transport Secretary jubiliantly announces that the first HS2 train arrives in Sheffield to prove to the naysayers that the Eastern leg isn't cancelled and already the North is feeling the benefit of HS2.  :jester:

Unfortunately, I suspect it isn't HS2 spoil, as the train comes from Barking/Ripple Lane - surely you wouldn't cart muck from works to the west of London to the congested east just to put it on a train to the north?

 

14 minutes ago, Dr Gerbil-Fritters said:

Which Northern Hole are they chucking that waste into?

Avoiding all temptations, I don't know for sure yet, but there are plenty of candidates. But I'm not going to chase the trucks out of there on my pushbike to find out.

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16 hours ago, woodenhead said:

So the first spoil train arrives, in Parliament the Transport Secretary jubiliantly announces that the first HS2 train arrives in Sheffield to prove to the naysayers that the Eastern leg isn't cancelled and already the North is feeling the benefit of HS2.  :jester:

North should be grateful  for a big pile of London poop ;)

Edited by rob D2
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  • 4 weeks later...

More activity at Tinsley this morning:

 

66023 on the spoil train being unloaded, while 66729 comes in on another container train:

1574720966_Tinsley66s24sep2021a.jpg.1fe3a71f6fa5ed1c69524398933e6bed.jpg

 

 

Then as the container train waits to proceed into the unloading area, a third 66, 66094, creeps into the background with some steel wagons. Unfortunately I couldn't get all three locos in the same shot, as the loco on the container train had moved the other side of Wood Lane bridge where I'm standing.

The rear of the first part of the spoil train from the first picture is bottom left, then in three sidings to the right of the warehouse are (left) some red steel wagons (BBA type?), (centre) the second part half of the spoil train, which will get swapped over in the afternoon for unloading, and (right) 66094 on steel wagons (the cassette ones that go to Immingham I think):

1993197414_Tinsley66s24sep2021b.jpg.890da253f0cc9e0d1b80fc1c782e832d.jpg

 

It was all go at Wood Lane for 10 mins!

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