Scotland Street

[Astir648]

Scotland Street is my new 7mm scale shelf layout, set in 1970's urban Edinburgh. It depicts a partially disused good yard, which still receives occasional small freight workings and includes a coal yard clinging onto a failing existence and a rail service with a limited future. The main reason the yard has survived into the 1970's is the presence of a rail-served bonded whisky warehouse and the associated off-scene distillery, which also uses the bonded warehouse line as an exchange siding and maintains an industrial diesel shunter.

 

The layout is literally a shelf railway as it sits above my desk and modelling bench. It is just 8' x 1' with a fiddle yard 18 inches long. The fiddle yard has a nasty kink to avoid a shelf pillar but is just tolerable!

 

 

The layout is loosely based on Scotland Street yard, morphed with St Leonard's station. Both are early 1840's Edinburgh stations which closed in the 1860's, became goods yards and tottered on until closure in the late 1960's. Scotland Street has always fascinated me as it sits on a tiny site, sandwiched between two tunnels. Scotland Street tunnel closed in the 1860s when Canal Street station was replaced by Edinburgh Waverley. Rodney Street tunnel continued to link the coal yard there to Granton until closure and is now a cycleway. St Leonard's was larger and as well as coal sidings it served a brewery, a whisky distillery and bonded warehouse (There's a Youtube video of the last train to serve the yard in 1968 - search "Inncoent Railway").

 

The bonded warehouse as St Leonards (right), which I'm reproducing on the layout.

 

Scotland Street in the 1960;s, with the Rodney Street tunnel in the distance

 

Another view of Scotland Street, showing the bricked up Scotland Street tunnel and good platform. Both of these appear in my layout.

 

Hopefully the end result will be a good shunting layout with some operating potential and some real historical interest as well. Time will tell whether it end up like that!

Edited January 15, 2016 by Astir648

[Astir648]

Just to follow up, here are some pictures of progress so far. I've made a start on the bonded warehouse, including a really nice bridging building which will act as a scenic break. This is a cheat as it didn't appear at either site but comes from an Edinburgh brewery nearby, now the home of a salvage yard.

 

The original for the overbridge building.

 

The right-hand end of the layout, showing the buildings in progress, with the fiddle yard behind.

 

Here's the left-hand end, including the controls. The controller is rather elderly H&M, which is only temporary. Point control is by Cobalt levers, which are fantastic, but a horror to wire up!

 

Finally an aerial view from the left-hand end.

 

Track is mostly C&L flexi with Peco Y turnouts (to save space). In retrospect I wish I'd hand-made the track, but I've never done that before and wanted to make progress faster than would be possible that way. My work has a seasonal peak in the summer, so I want the layout to be well-progressed before April.

 

The buildings are based on foamboard carcases, using Highland Castings doors and windows and redutex for the masonry. I'm really impressed with redutex - amazingly realistic and very easy to work with and manipulate.

 

The ballast is woodland scenics fine cinders, attached with a 25% solution of copydex and the usual drop of washing up liquid. I've always used PVA before and this is a much better technique. It's easily removed and sets matt.

[Dava]

This looks fun. The film of Scotland St yard was amazingly atmospheric. Great point work in the original. Obviously has to serve distillery & brewery. Proximity to St Leonards means DI Rebus could be mooching aboot on a case?

 

Dava

[Astir648]

Thanks Dava.

 

The video was filmed (I presume on Super eight) by the son of one of the coal merchants based at St. Leonards. He has another on Youtube of winter coal deliveries, which is full of atmospheric details of how a 1960s coal yard operated. It reminds me of my childhood - we had coal delivered until I was about 9, when we converted to oil (just in time for it to get expensive!).

 

David

Edited January 15, 2016 by Astir648

[The Bigbee Line]

The buildings look good. Old railway infrastructure in freight only use has a charm of its own.

[Simond]

This does look hugely atmospheric. The grit in the photos has my fingers itching!!!

 

Following with interest!

Simon

[Simond]

Having watched the video, I can see your inspiration. By 'eck, you had to be quick with the shunter's pole!

 

You'll be able to get a Dapol's 08 at some point, fairly soon, hopefully. Having seen the pre-production sample, it's excellent.

 

By chance last Saturday, I looked at a 1:43 model of the exact same Bedford coal truck as the one on which the guy was watering the sacks. It's in a French series, (so you'd have to re-transfer it) looked very good, and the dealer wanted £30 - not sure about the make, but I'm sure you'd find it on the www. I he a quick look and found this: http://www.scalelink.co.uk/acatalog/O-scale-Diecast-Lorry-models--Retail-only-.html

 

HTH

Simon

[Astir648]

Bigbee - I agree totally. There's something wonderfully rough and ready about freight yards, especially near the ends of their lives, when decay and neglect were everywhere. Happily the lack of main line engines and long carriages means it can also be squeezed into a smaller space.

 

Simond - That lorry is tempting, but I'm planning on the yard having scraped into the 1970s. I'm sure lorries like that would have still been around, especially as a coal merchant at that stage would have struggled to find the money to replace it. I fancy one of the flat-fronted Leyland etc lorries I remember from my childhood, but so far I haven't managed to find one in 7mm. I'm planning to cut the lorry to reduce the space it takes up and have either the cab or load bed poking through the entrance to the yard, to make it lower profile. 

 

I have an MMP class 08 two-thirds completed, so that will probably end up as the primary locomotive for the layout. The Ixion Fowler was bought to act as the distillery industrial engine and gives me something to play with in the meantime. In one of the photos you can see a Heljan class 40 poking it's nose in from the fiddle yard but that's way too big and will be sold soon. All the sidings, runround etc have been spaced to ensure a class 20/26/27 can work the yard, so that's part of the plan.

 

David

Edited January 15, 2016 by Astir648

[peter220950]

I'm looking forward to this one, the scene ine the 1960's doesn't even need stock on it, as the atmosphere is so fantastic.

 

 not sure about the make, but I'm sure you'd find it on the www. I he a quick look and found this: http://www.scalelink.co.uk/acatalog/O-scale-Diecast-Lorry-models--Retail-only-.html

HTH
Simon

 

They are made by Ixo, and do come up on Ebay occassionally, but £30.00 is pretty good, particularly with the British transfers included, as they usually ship from abroad. You just need to keep an eye on listings every so often.

 

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/IXO-ALTAYA-CODE-3-BEDFORD-TJ-65-COAL-TRUCK-LORRY-HALL-CO-FULLY-LOADED-/291622385505?hash=item43e60c7761:g:ZBkAAOSwgyxWUetE

 

Good luck with the layout, another to be 'followed'.

 

Peter

[Astir648]

Thanks Peter!

 

Last night's task was to solve a problem with the bonded warehouse. At present it has a slightly "twee" look about it, with nice open-looking windows. This is partly because I'm using ready-made windows which are slightly wider than in the real building, but its mostly because the windows aren't grilled yet. This was a whisky warehouse in Edinburgh so it needed to be built like Fort Knox!

 

Getting 19 windows grilles with reasonably parallel bars is a challenge. I'm making them out of styrene and the solution was to make out the exact size of the cross-pieces on a piece of brass sheet and solder scrap pieces around to hold the cross-pieces in place. Six carefully-positioned holes in the brass act as a drilling guide and hey presto! Perfect and reproducable cross-bars. Three of them, threaded with 1mm styrene rod and with vertical sides added make quite a nice grille. I just have to make another 18 of them now!

 

 

Apart from the window sizes there are several other compromises in this building. It is only 2/3 the length of the original, so as to avoid dominating the layout and to place the two loading docks in the right place. In the pic below, taken in the 1970s, after the rails were lifted, you can see that the walls were actually harled (roughcast/render for the scottishly-challenged). I suspect this is over the original stonework so I've chosen to recreate that, mostly because i want the layout to have an Edinburgh feel and harled buildings are ubiquitous throughout Scotland.

 

 

Here's another pic, taken during a 1962 railtour. Sadly the building is now demolished. The only recognisable elements of the entire yard are the original 1840s station building (which looks like a warehouse) and the tunnel mouth leading towards Dalkeith.

 

 

David

Edited January 15, 2016 by Astir648

[railwayrod]

Nice work , David.

 

Rod

[Astir648]

Thanks Rod :-)

[bécasse]

Scotland Street yard was bigger than you might think. Someone, a club probably, made a nice 4mm model of it in its entirety some 20-25 years ago and it was on the exhibition circuit for a while and the model was surprisingly large. I seem to recollect seeing it at the Manchester show at New Century Hall.

[Astir648]

There's a picture of that layout (I assume?) on-line here: https://kgvsy.wordpress.com/history/. I would have liked to have seen it.

 

The interesting thing about the yard was the way it used tight curves to access the sidings (plus a tiny headshunt). Although the distance between the tunnels was remarkably small - basically the length of the original platform - the width of the yard was relatively broad. Sadly the very narrow space of my layout prevented me from replicating it properly so the layout aims to capture the atmosphere of the two yards and I'll try to overlook its practical shortcomings.

 

 

David

Edited January 15, 2016 by Astir648

[Mike Bellamy]

David - did you read to the end of that article where it said
 
 

https://kgvsy.wordpress.com/history/


A detailed scale model of the Scotland Street Goods Yard is held in the office of CEC Community Learning and Development at Broughton High School.

 

 

.

[Astir648]

David - did you read to the end of that article where it said

 

 

 

.

Well spotted Mike. I wonder if it's still there...

[The Bigbee Line]

Just watched the video on youtube.  Was looking for the pause button to give me time to write down some wagon numbers.  What a selection.....

 

Did you see the number of ground staff, plus members of the public, I particularly like the kid walking along the railhead next to the shunt.  As a kid I remember going to collect parcels with Dad from the Goods Shed at Brighton in pre-school days, the whole place was full of parcels and packets, an amazingly busy place.

 

Looking forward to see the model as it makes progress.

[Astir648]

Fantastic isn't it! Life before people looked for things to worry about.

 

The range of wagon types is interesting too. Not really something I know much about but there are some elderly wooden wagons in there, adding character.

[Simond]

I'm sure they had stuff to worry about, probably health, wealth, warmth & food. 

 

All the parcels and packets are now in a van on the M25...

 

best

Simon

[81A Oldoak]

Great start. I am thinking about an early 1970s freight/parcels layout for the space that will be liberated following the removal of my 4mm Abersoch layout later this year. 

 

Regards,

 

Chris

[Astir648]

Thanks Chris.

 

I have a hankering for a GUV or two, but probably too big for this layout. I'm really pleased with the Fowler by the way - it's nice to get a good quality RTR locomotive without needing to take out a mortgage on it. I don't suppose you could be tempted towards making a nice BR blue class 06????  :-)

[81A Oldoak]

Thanks Chris.

 

I have a hankering for a GUV or two, but probably too big for this layout. I'm really pleased with the Fowler by the way - it's nice to get a good quality RTR locomotive without needing to take out a mortgage on it. I don't suppose you could be tempted towards making a nice BR blue class 06????  :-)

Alas, no.

[Astir648]

The window grille factory is now in full production - nine made and ten to go.

 

 

I've also just heard from DCC Supplies, the UK importers of Redutex (the 3D textured sheet I'm using for the masonry and stone setts). The sheets of Redutex I need to finish the bonded warehouse walls are on their way to me, having been out of stock for a while. That will let me make more progress with that building as I can't put the windows and doors in until the Redutex is in place.

 

Now I just need to make the balsa mullions look less like balsa. Possibly a thin smear of fine crack filler will do the job. It might need a layer of PVA to help it stick.

 

My other task at present is the closed-off tunnel-mouth. I wanted to recreate the original tunnel-mouths at Scotland Street as they have distinctive "sun-ray" masonry, which is rather spectacular. It's probably a reflection of the site's higher status when it was originally built. Sir Walter Scott described emerging from this tunnel mouth after descending the tunnel from Canal Street (beside and at right angles to the modern Waverley station) at speed with two brakemen hauling on their brake levers to stop the train at Scotland Street. as this section was cable-hauled.

 

 

The Rodney Street Tunnel at the other end of the yard was the same:

 

 

Sadly I don't have the width to recreate the double-track tunnel and when I used a photo-editing program to compress it to single-track width it looked awful. So instead I'm using a Skytrex resin casting of a more standard tunnel mouth. The casting has a nice parapet above which fits with the original.

 

The casting had sides which curve inwards near the ground - I'm sure railway civil engineers have a name for this feature - I didn't think it looked right so I've cut out the lower stones with a razor saw, reshaped them and put them back to create straight sides, which somehow looks "right", at least to my addled brain!

 

 

 

Nowadays the tunnel has a bespoke grille fitted, but I'm going to brick it up, as it was in the 60's and 70's, with a small locked gate, hence the black paint on the plywood, to make it look dark inside.

 

David

Edited January 15, 2016 by Astir648

[John R Smith]

David

 

Those tunnel mouths at Scotland Street are really very special, and have two distinctive features. The "sun-ray" masonry is an unusual continuation of the voussoirs into the spandrels of the arch (that's the tech description!) and the arch itself is bordered by two Egyptian style pilasters (the two shallow columns on each side). This gives the tunnel mouths a semi-classical style very much of their period (I'm guessing 1840s?). It would be really nice if you could scratch build at least one of them because they have great atmosphere. The exact curve of the arch is very important too.

 

As for your balsa mullions, what I would do is make up a really thin wash of Polyfilla and brush it on. This should give them a nice stony texture.

 

I really do like the concept for this layout, please keep us informed of your progress!

 

John

Edited January 15, 2016 by John R Smith

[Astir648]

John that's fascinating - thank you. I'm on the look out for a similar single-track tunnel mouth I can recreate. I wonder if it would look better if I were to move the two pilasters further out. In the meantime the Skytrex moulding will fill that gap on the layout.

 

I'll try the polyfilla wash for the mullions.

 

David