Was there is a connection between Swansea High Street and Swansea Victoria

[firstgreatwestern]

Evening All 

 

I'm having a discussion with someone and they are adamant that Swansea Victoria and Swansea High Street were not connected at all and the GWR High Level line did not ever make a connection with the LMS line. Obviously the connection wouldn't have normally been used, but the book "The Red Dragon and Other Old Friends" has a map of Swansea's railway lines and there is indeed a connection. The book in question also explains a train once reversed out of Victoria due to a blockage between Pontdardullais and Gorseinon and went via Danygraig, proving the connection did exist. 

 

Any more help would be greatly appreciated, so I can give this person "proof" as it were. 

 

FGW. 

[melmerby]

There was indeed a connection from Victoria to High Street and also across the Tawe to the network of lines there:

https://maps.nls.uk/view/102183114

[Richard_A]

There was a viaduct running from the wind street area of Swansea and connected at a junction just after the platforms at Swansea High Street, the truss Bridge which took the line over New cut Road down the back of the station is still there. 

[eastglosmog]

Just looked it up in Jowett's Railway Atlas and as Melmerby says, there was definitely a connection.

[Compound2632]

[Andy Kirkham]

I always thought Swansea Victoria was a terminus, and yet the RCH map seems to show it as a through station. Was that the case?

[melmerby]

I suppose, strickly speaking there wasn't a connection directly between the two stations but a connection between the lines that ran into the stations.

There were no passenger facilities at each end as the stations themselves were effectively by-passed.

The same with the Midland's St. Thomas station on the other bank of the Tawe.

 

Swansea High St. station with the connecting line running down bottom right:

 

Further south the line from Victoria coming in bottom left and winding up the LH side to High Street

with the line across the docks & Tawe curving across the middle:

 

Swansea Victoria Station middle right:

 

 

Edited December 24, 2020 by melmerby

[melmerby]

17 minutes ago, Andy Kirkham said:

I always thought Swansea Victoria was a terminus, and yet the RCH map seems to show it as a through station. Was that the case?

https://maps.nls.uk/geo/explore/#zoom=17&lat=51.61785&lon=-3.93794&layers=6&b=1

 

Anybody got a Glamorgan 1:2500 sheet XXIV 5 (24.05)?

That should show it clearer, the NLS don't have any copies.

Edited December 24, 2020 by melmerby

[Nick Holliday]

The old-maps website seems to have it, at least an 1879 version.

Assuming I'm looking at the right bit!

[Andy Kirkham]

I'm not clear whether the passenger train shed is the irregularly shaped building with "Victoria Station" directly over it, or the rectangular one into which the tracks enter from the north.

[melmerby]

1 hour ago, Andy Kirkham said:

I'm not clear whether the passenger train shed is the irregularly shaped building with "Victoria Station" directly over it, or the rectangular one into which the tracks enter from the north.

I would suggest the "irregular shaped building" is actually the forecourt, as the station had a long "frontage" on the side

Edited December 25, 2020 by melmerby

[melmerby]

You can see from this image that the station was at a lower level than the line to High St. & the docks:

[melmerby]

I found an aerial photo in a bock I have and the irregular shaped area, is indeed the cobbled forecourt. There is a brick building on the Northern edge of the space which looks lke it could be the  offices.

 

The station itself seems to be a very basic "shed" type construction with just two platform faces and a third track between them.

 

The connection out of the Northern end looks like it was just a connection to the dock tramway system and isn't apparent on any later maps & photos

Edited December 25, 2020 by melmerby

[Fat Controller]

In 1899, Cockett tunnel suffered a partial collapse. A chord was put in between the L&NWR and GWR lines at Gowerton, allowing trains from West Wales to run towards Swansea Victoria, and thence via existing links to the junction at the throat of High Street. This was before the Swansea District line had been built.

[The Johnster]

Everything connected to everything else at Swansea, though a reversal would have been needed to connect lines east of the river to/from High Street, and the through line (still there as a spur in the 70s when I worked on the railway) did not serve a platform.  But these were not main running lines that you would run passenger trains on, they were docks or goods line with permissive block at best.  The Cockett collapse diversion would have entailed much turnout clipping/spiking and handsignalling (a simiar situation arose when Newport High St was remodelled in the early 20s and Stars or Castles pulled restaurant car expresses through the streets of Newport along the MR&CC company's old route past what is now the main entrance of the Royal Gwent Hospital.  They were still talking about this 50 years later; they don't get out much in Newport...

 

There was never TTBOMK any booked through traffic between the Swansea passenger termini, it was more a matter of forwarding freight if was labelled that way, exchanging traffic between docks pilot duties and leaving traffic to be picked up later by another duty.  There was certainly a lot going on to watch from the car window when we went that way in the late 50s early 60s for Gower day trips, and I appreciated the traffic jams that gave me glimpses of it, but it had all gone by the time I was old enough to explore it for myself, story of my life.  Everywhere you looked in what is now the SA1 area and between the river and Victoria, and this was usually Saturday lunchtime when things could be expected to be calming down, 57xx and mysterious little 0-4-0s could be seen doing inexplicable moves with shunters' trucks but no brake vans on several levels at once; I was pre-teen, not mature enough for wet dreams, but this was the nearest thing I ever saw to a train spotter's and much better than Caswell or Oxwich.  Not much left now.

 

A run down Gower had plenty of railway interest, and traffic was slow and congested especially in Port Talbot and Swansea.  Firstly, there was main line and Porthcawl action at Pyle, then the R & SB level crossing in Port Talbot for about an hour until the traffic cleared, then the thrill of the new Briton Ferry bridge, then the whole run in from Danygraig (still interesting) through to Black Pill with the possibility of a Black or Standard 5MT from Vicoria along the sea front and of course the Mumbles Railway; trams even bigger than our trolleybuses and hunting in pairs!  In the evening, on the return run, Father would divert to Mumbles Pier for ice cream, and I rather enjoyed the trams and rock cuttings!  It'd be getting dark by now and there was less to see on the dock network, but there'd still be the odd pannier going about it's tidying up of wagons,  We often stopped in Pyle for chips on the way home, but parked by the chippy rather than where I wanted to, on the Porthcawl branch bridge, but I got my way on one occasion, to be rewarded with a Castle on a long parcels trying to blast a hole in the sky up Stormy, and a magnificent if polluted sunset courtesy of the Steel Company Of Wales at Port Talbot...

Edited December 25, 2020 by The Johnster

[Andy Kirkham]

Clearly Victoria was purely a terminus in its later years, but as seen here

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Swansea-Victoria-Railway-Station-Photo-London-North-Western-Railway-5-/263334434694

,  there were only ephemeral wooden structures beyond the buffer stops and the roof is as much open at that end as at the country end; so its not inconceivable that it was originally laid out as a through station.

 

I guess the lines that entered there were only ever goods lines, though

[Richard_A]

I think in the book, red dragon and other old friends, there is a mention of a swansea central station idea which obviously didn't come to anything even like a substantial proposal which would have been situated near the castle, this would have been a interesting idea. 

[melmerby]

2 hours ago, Andy Kirkham said:

 there were only ephemeral wooden structures beyond the buffer stops

I don't think from the photos I've managed to find that the station ever had any substantial (i.e.brick/stone) structures, it gives the appearance of a temporary arangement that lasted to the end.

The entrance from the forecourt is just clapboarded structures.

 

This is the signalbox diagram from later days:

 

View from the bufferstops:

 

The roof seems to be supported on columns and the buildings are incidental.

Edited December 25, 2020 by melmerby

[melmerby]

Found another map:

 

Looks like there was a connection from the sidings to the dock lines but not through the station.

[corneliuslundie]

Re the Cockett tunnel collapse, there has been an article in Welsh Railways Archive. The connection mentioned above was taken out again afterwards. It ran through some existing sidings.

There were also the tracks of the Oystermouth/Mumbles railway (trams) in the area of the station and there was at least one link to the railway network proper. And in early days there was a station on the viaduct discussed above. This has also been discussed in print. The station offices appear to have been in one of the arches of the viaduct.

I don't think when the line to Victoria from the west was built there would have been much thought of an extension. Certainly a link to the docks both sides of the river, as has been illustrated, as IU am sure it was the freight traffic the LNWR was more interested in.

A bit of the connecting viaduct still remains. I took a photo in the summer of 2019 (seems a long time ago now) of a digger attacking part of it opposite the Sainsbury car park.

Jonathan

[The Stationmaster]

22 hours ago, The Johnster said:

Everything connected to everything else at Swansea, though a reversal would have been needed to connect lines east of the river to/from High Street, and the through line (still there as a spur in the 70s when I worked on the railway) did not serve a platform.  But these were not main running lines that you would run passenger trains on, they were docks or goods line with permissive block at best.  The Cockett collapse diversion would have entailed much turnout clipping/spiking and handsignalling (a simiar situation arose when Newport High St was remodelled in the early 20s and Stars or Castles pulled restaurant car expresses through the streets of Newport along the MR&CC company's old route past what is now the main entrance of the Royal Gwent Hospital.  They were still talking about this 50 years later; they don't get out much in Newport...

 

I wouldn't be surprised if there were temporary signalling arrangements for the Cockett Tunnel collapse but i can't find any detail one way or another.

 

 As for trains from Paddington going round the Llanarth Branch (former MRCC line) in Newport that strikes me as involving considerable difficulties - starting with the fact that section between Courtybella Jcn and Dock St had been closed in December 1907 and the two level crossings between Salutation Jcn and Llanarth St Jcn were also closed then although the track remained on that section for some years - it had gone by 1927.  Both lines from Coutrybella Jcn towards Salutation Jcn, alongside the Cardiff Road and opposite the Royal Gwent, were retained as sidings connected at the Courtybella Jcn end but they were removed in the 1930s as was the substantial wall which separated them from the road.

 

Although the Eastern  Valleys was a Red route accessing it would have involved considerable diversion for London trains at the east end as it could only be accessed via Llantarnam Jcn and reversal at Cwmbran (which probably didn't have enough room between the crossovers), or reversal at Pontypool Road.  No reversal was needed to get back to the SWML at Ebbw Jcn but it was a long trek round via Pill Bank Jcn to get back to Courtybella Jcn.  I haven't got a clue what clearance restrictions there were on large engines round that way but there were considerable restrictions on large coaching stock vehicles (e.g. those over 9ft 6" wide) which barred them from the Eastern Valleys lines.  Going that way also meant that trains could not call at Newport which sounds fairly odd when one considers that it would not have been difficult for some through trains to serve the station while track and signalling work was underway. 

[The Johnster]

I believe some temporary track was laid to facilitate the diversions; it was quite an undertaking, which is why people remembered it.  For through services, it really would have been better to use a replacement bus service between Cardiff and STJ or PPRD, even in those days.  I believe the full diversion involving street running was restricted to one Sunday.  Trains from the North to West could have accessed Cardiff via Pontypool Road and Ystrad Mynach, thence over the Rhymney, and the sensible way to do this would be to change locos at PPRD.

 

I'm surprised you wern't told the story during your days at STJ.

[RailWest]

AIUI there were even connections - as can be seen in the map - to the end of the Mumbles Railway, allowing traffic from that to go eastwards beyond the Rutland Street terminus.

 

Also on the connecting line from High Street to Victoria was the erstwhile Wind Street station, a single platform affair on the Down line only just south of Wind Street junction. 

 

[Fat Controller]

1 hour ago, RailWest said:

AIUI there were even connections - as can be seen in the map - to the end of the Mumbles Railway, allowing traffic from that to go eastwards beyond the Rutland Street terminus.

 

Also on the connecting line from High Street to Victoria was the erstwhile Wind Street station, a single platform affair on the Down line only just south of Wind Street junction. 

 

IIRC, Swansea gasworks was served via the Mumbles Railway.

[melmerby]

2 hours ago, Fat Controller said:

IIRC, Swansea gasworks was served via the Mumbles Railway.

In earlier days the Oystermouth/Mumbles line was steam hauled with normal rolling stock, the giant D/D trams came later, before steam arrived in 1877 it was horsepower from 1807.

It made an end on connection to the Swansea Harbour Trust dock lines in the street.

It was this SHT tramway that the LNWR line also connected to at street level, in the road outside Victoria.