Bath Central Railway Station. LMS/GWR and BR proposals

[JZ]

Years ago I remember and article in the Railway magazine about proposals for a Joint Central Station in Bath. I've spent ages lookin on the internet and can find nothing. Please tell me that it wasn't an April Fools joke.

[Joseph_Pestell]

I seem to recall having heard mention of this before.

 

Difficult to see where any joint station could have been built without either massive demolition of properties or the station being rather remote from the city centre. Interesting "might-have-been" for a layout though.

[Joseph_Pestell]

Going for the second option - a bit remote from the City Centre - I reckon that it could be possible to have built a station about 500 yards west of the current Bath Spa GW station and from there a very tight radius chord across the A36 to access the Midland and the SDJR.

 

That part of Bath is quite run down with various warehouses etc along the A36. The site would still be rather constrained but that is generally a bonus to us modellers. The warehouses could help to provide scenic breaks.

[Edwin_m]

I remember that article too, but I was too young to appreciate the details and didn't know Bath at the time.  Probably mid-70s sometime. 

 

[speculation]

 

If the tunnels on the S&D were closed then it would presumably have had new curves at Midford and Monkton Combe and running powers over the GWR, or a dedicated alignment doing something similar.   In which case the GWR station would have done the job (but might have needed more platforms - not easy but could be possible?) with a connection in open country where the GWR and Midland are parallel a couple of hundred yards apart. 

[JZ]

From memory the connection would have been at Newton Meadows, just west of Twerton tunnel. The line from Limpley Stoke would have followed the Camerton Branch to a junction with the S&D near Midford and a new tunnel through to Widcombe and joining the main line immediately west of Bath Spa station. The new station would be on the site of the GWR goods shed. Not as central as the existing station or Green Park.

[RobR]

This article , and some additional new material, was reprinted in the Somerset And Dorset Railway Heritage Trust magazine, 'The S & D Telegraph', issue 31, December 2007.  It states that it was originally published in the March 1982 Railway Magazine.

The proposed site of Bath Central was Bath West goods yard. A new line was to diverge to the east of the new station to join the Bathampton to Bradford on Avon line to the north of Limpley Stoke. The new line would cross the Camerton branch just to the east of Monkton Combe, where there would be a triangular junction to a line heading south west to join the S & D to the south of MIdford viaduct. On the way there would be a new connection to the Camerton branch, which would be closed to the east of there. The GW line would be closed between Holmes siding at Bathampton and the new connection at Limpley Stoke, and the S & D would be closed between Twerton Co-op siding and the new connection to the south of Midford. To the west of Twerton tunnel  connections would be put in to join the former Midland line, both from the Bath Central direction and, presumably for freight traffic, from the Bristol direction. A new marshalling and transfer yard was proposed at Newton Meadows, between these two junctions.

HTH

Rob

[buffalo]

The date of the Railway Magazine article is perhaps a bit misleading. After all, the Camerton branch had closed in 1951 and the track was lifted in 1958. The actual proposal appears to have been part of a 1943 plan for post-war reconstruction in and around Bath (Maggs & Beale The Camerton Branch say it was the Abercrombie Plan, but I've not seen independent confirmation of this). Apparently, a similar plan was put forward jointly by the GWR and LMS in 1947 but, needless to say, nothing came of either.

 

Does the the 1982 article say anything about the origins of the plan?

 

Nick

[RobR]

According to the 1982 article this plan originated  in February 1947 with the GWR, and following nationalisation, and I quote '' was retained 'on the books'  as warranting further examination by the newly formed railway executive. Here it remained 'under consideration' as a long term scheme. Indeed the final decision to abandon the proposals was not made until the early part of 1958, following a detailed appraisal of the Modernisation Plan for the south west by the Transport Commission.'' 

The article says the idea of a joint station was first raised in 1943 by a 'replanning appraisal team' headed, as you say, by Professor Patrick Abercrombie,  but both the GWR and LMS  saw no justification for a joint station.

The author of the 1982 article, Mike Arlett worked for Bath City Council , and was shown a planning department file on the matter, from notes of which he prepared the article.

Rob