1950s Highways Department vehicles

[65179]

I??™m currently researching Chorlton station in South Manchester. Alongside the goods yard is a yard described as a Corporation Yard which I??™m told was a Highways Department Yard.

 

Does anyone know what sort of vehicles would have been used by the Highways Department in the late 1940s or early 1950s and so might have been kept there?

 

Unsurprisingly the yard wasn't often photographed and the ???best??? shot available on the web is this poor and distant 1926

view from the Manchester Library Image Collection (the yard is at the top immediately to the left of the railway).

 

If the link doesn't work type M72049 in the search box at www.images.manchester.gov.uk

 

This shows a stable block and a number of carts (don??™t know the technical term for them!), but I am guessing these would have all been replaced by motor vehicles post-war. An equivalent yard would have a load of specialist equipment like gritters etc now adays, but am I right in assuming that low-sided lorries would have predominated in the 1950s?

 

It??™s a bit of a long shot I know, but not being a road transport man I don??™t really know where to look for this sort of info, if it still exists.

 

Thanks,

 

Simon

[petethemole]

I would suggest typical lorries might include normal and short wheelbase tippers and dropside 3 tonners, typically Bedford O series, both civilian and ex WW2 military pattern, but also other makes. Bedford QL 4x4 trucks may have been used by some councils. Other vehicles would include road rollers, either early diesels such as Aveling Barford or steam rollers, which some councils had into the '60s. Air compressors for pneumatic drills were much larger than today, as were cement mixers. A lot of minor roads were still being re-surfaced by spreading tar, then grit, and rolling, so tar boilers were still about, both towed and lorry mounted. Some late model Sentinel steam wagons were used to carry tar boilers. I would suggest a Google image search including 'council' as a keyword might produce some interesting results.

Pete

[Oldddudders]

I??™m currently researching Chorlton station in South Manchester. Alongside the goods yard is a yard described as a Corporation Yard which I??™m told was a Highways Department Yard.

 

Does anyone know what sort of vehicles would have been used by the Highways Department in the late 1940s or early 1950s and so might have been kept there?

 

This shows a stable block and a number of carts (don??™t know the technical term for them!), but I am guessing these would have all been replaced by motor vehicles post-war. An equivalent yard would have a load of specialist equipment like gritters etc now adays, but am I right in assuming that low-sided lorries would have predominated in the 1950s?

 

It??™s a bit of a long shot I know, but not being a road transport man I don??™t really know where to look for this sort of info, if it still exists.

One item that comes to mind is mechanical street sweepers. A firm in my home town of Dorking, Johnston Brothers, used to manufacture them for use all over the UK. We are talking about a lorry the size of a tipper, but with a semi-circular tank on the back and all sorts of brushes and scrubbers on the side and rear, used to sweep gutters etc. I certainly saw such vehicles on test around Dorking in the '60s, and big cities like Manchester would have been the first with the budget and need for such plant.

[Adam]

QLs strike me as pretty unlikely council fodder. The predominant civilain use seems to have been as limespreaders or any other application where 4WD was actually needed - pretty expensive to run, especially with petrol engines.

 

Some hints amongst Chris Hodge's archive photos.

 

http://www.chrishodgetrucks.co.uk/

 

Lot's of interesting vehicles - though admittedly, most from the cleasning departments. Rollers and tar boilers are possible (though there were planty of contracters for that sort of thing). The ubiquitous Bedford O tipper (in either the wartime utility cab version or the more familiar bonneted type) is very likely, rather than the more expensive Leylands and Atkinsons local though they were. In the late 40s we're talking pre-war types, by the mid-50s probably something new.

 

Adam

[Nick Holliday]

One name that hasn't come up yet is Shelvoke & Drewry - they made probably the majority of refuse lorries from around 1925 to the 1950's, the mantle then being taken up by Dennis. There is a fascinating "unofficial" website at http://www.shelvoke-drewry.co.uk with pictures and some good links, such as the Chris Hodge Archive pages - http://www.chrishodgephotos.co.uk/pagecma/truckphotos.htm and the Nick Baldwin Collection in the BMIHT website http://www.bmiht.com/baldwincollection Lovely stuff that, having found, I will be browsing myself when I can get the time.

[Fat Controller]

To which, add Karrier Bantams as soon as they became available. These were very popular in normal tipper/lowsided versions, three-way tipper and various dustcart/street-sweeper/gully emptiers. I recollect Matchbox doing a dustcart version in the early 1960s.

Brian

[shipbadger]

Hi all,

 

If it's a corporation/council depot you may have some rarer vehicles, especially bonneted Dennis chassis as tippers or dropsides. If the council already had a fleet of Dennis dust carts and gully emptiers it made sense to standardise on one make. Also consider any local manufacturer. Years ago council purchases still reflected local companies, Guys in Wolverhampton for example.

 

Tony Comber

[65179]

Many thanks for your replies everyone. They are much appreciated because, as noted before, this really isn't my area. Some of the links are very interesting and guarantee many hours spent not railway modelling!

 

The various mentions of street sweepers and gully emptiers etc is interesting and it's a shame I'm not modelling a Cleansing Department yard, because the Manchester Library Image Collection seems to have photos of pretty much everything used by them in 1950 right down to the last Cleansing Dept horse!

 

Now all I need to do is choose some suitable vehicles and work out how to model them in 2mm scale!

 

 

The yard had a weighbridge. Would that just be to avoid overloading the lorries etc or might raw materials have been brought in by road (there appears to be a siding at a lower level at the back of the yard)?

 

Simon

[Fat Controller]

Many thanks for your replies everyone. They are much appreciated because, as noted before, this really isn't my area. Some of the links are very interesting and guarantee many hours spent not railway modelling!

 

The various mentions of street sweepers and gully emptiers etc is interesting and it's a shame I'm not modelling a Cleansing Department yard, because the Manchester Library Image Collection seems to have photos of pretty much everything used by them in 1950 right down to the last Cleansing Dept horse!

 

Now all I need to do is choose some suitable vehicles and work out how to model them in 2mm scale!

 

 

The yard had a weighbridge. Would that just be to avoid overloading the lorries etc or might raw materials have been brought in by road (there appears to be a siding at a lower level at the back of the yard)?

 

Simon

The weighbridge was probably be used to weigh the Council's own lorries, but would also serve as a Public Weighbridge- these were quite common throughout the country. They were used both by hauliers, to check how much they were carrying, and also by the police/transport authorities to check vehicle which they suspected were overloaded.

Brian

[DVLR Dave]

Another use for the weighbridge was for the check weighing of lorries when unloaded, as the excise duty was calculated on unladen weight-the local authority was responsible for Road Tax in those days-the check was done every three years.

[Penlan]

Another web page to look at is

 

http://www.levyboy.com/index.html

 

and at the HOME page, click on Railway and (Oh, can't find it now), although you may find some of the other pages a distraction, like Hell is a City

 

I know these are street scenes in South Manchester, which seems to show there were hardly any trucks about, but as I now live in West Cornwall, Manchester's Manchester....... presunmably a United City.

 

T.I.C. As I was in London in the late 40's early 50's, part of our street scene was bomb sites. Presumably Manchester had a few, like the Council depot......

 

If your modelling a Council Depot, presumably in the day time, wouldn't most/all the vehicles be out working..... I'm tempted to say in those days the work ethic was a little bit stronger, by supervisors if not the lads.

 

I think you will find that even in the 50's there was the occasional horse and cart for the street cleaner/sweeper and lengthsmen. My recollection of Council vehicles from this era is the SWB tipper, certainly when I worked for Winchester, Worcester and Norwich City Councils, their Archive photo's of 'New Fleet' vehicles always seemed to be of SWB Tippers - I've always had an interest in Archive photos - and I run a couple of 1930's cars almost daily as well.

 

A lot of the dust carts for street cleaning in London in the 50's were of the pedestrian controlled type like a milk float but with the curved top. Films like 'The Lady Killers' are always an inspiration for vehicles - trouble is I can remember the places round there being like that, we lived off Paddington St, Marlybone at the time (about 100yds from Walkers & Holtzapffel's Shop) and it was easy to walk about as a youngster in those days down to Kings Cross.... that was my main 'spotting' station.

 

Penlan

[jcb 3c]

Two years later and the layout has probably been built and redone by now but this is a great picture of Sudbury council yard vehicles in 1959.

http://www.sudburysuffolk.co.uk/photoarchive/viewimage.asp?id=212

 

also way off topic but a nice pic of a very early BRS Leyland -

 

 

http://www.sudburysuffolk.co.uk/photoarchive/viewimage.asp?id=237

[Penlan]

The little 3 wheeler with an 'L' plate, wonder what that is, it's a local Reg No. 'CF', West Suffolk.

 

I was surprised to see the Refuse lorry with a 'CV' plate, that's Cornwall (Truro) registered.

 

As mentioned in one of my earlier replies SWB tipper lorry........

All typical Municipal fleet vehicles though... apart from the 3 wheeler.

 

That's an interesting web site, many thanks for posting the reference.

[PhilJ W]

The three wheeler might be a battery electric. At the time in question such a vehicle could be driven on a provisional licence. It could have been used by the street sweeping department. The other registration is GV a West Suffolk mark.

[Merfyn Jones]

The little 3 wheeler with an 'L' plate, wonder what that is, it's a local Reg No. 'CF', West Suffolk.

 

I was surprised to see the Refuse lorry with a 'CV' plate, that's Cornwall (Truro) registered.

 

As mentioned in one of my earlier replies SWB tipper lorry........

All typical Municipal fleet vehicles though... apart from the 3 wheeler.

 

That's an interesting web site, many thanks for posting the reference.

 

The 3 wheeler is a sweeper, narrow for doing pavements and hard to get at areas. I have seen a similar one with British Railways at Hither Green depot doing the warehouse.

The dustcart could be registered by the makers. Today most Dennis' are registered at the factory.

The tipper is a Bedford OS, the refuse wagons are old and new model of Karrier Gamecock. As you say, all typical of any part of the country them days.

 

Merf.

[PhilJ W]

I used to work for the London borough of Barking and Dagenham. In the storeroom in the basement of Dagenham Civic Centre I found a filing cabinet full of vehicle record cards from the old Dagenham Council and dating from the 1950's, regrettably someone decided that they needed the filing cabinet and binned the lot.

Naturally most of the general purpose vehicles were Fords, but things like dustcarts were Shevloke and Drewry. Also in the fleet were a couple of pre-war AEC single deck buses used for schools work. Another vehicle type that is no longer common in municiple fleets is the Gully Emptier/Street Washer, it was common practice to wash the streets at night up until the 1950's. This practice ceased with fewer horses being used and fewer droppings on the streets.

 

Prior to my employment with the council in 1970, I worked for the GPO telephones, one of my duty's was keeping similar record cards updated.

[jcb 3c]

The little streetsweeper thing looks incredibly modern ( specially compared to the archaic Chaseside rope operated shovel )and wouldn't look out of place in current day line up .

[Black Sheep]

would landrovers have been used in the late 50's?

 

or only in rural areas?

[PhilJ W]

would landrovers have been used in the late 50's?

 

or only in rural areas?

The GPO telephones used Landrovers equipped with compressors and similar machines would be used in an urban environment but each authority if they did have them would only have one or two at the most. The most common vehicles to be seen prior to the 'Transit era' would be light vans such as the Ford E93A as made by Classix.

[65179]

Blimey! I've only just spotted that this thread had been resurrected. Thanks to everyone for their contributions especially jcb 3c for the link to that excellent photo.

 

Sadly (or is it thankfully?) the layout hasn't even been started yet so all contributions are still very welcome.

 

From what I've been told the yard was specifically a Highways rather Refuse department yard and so things like tippers etc are likely to predominate. All these photos of refuse vehicles though is tempting me to have the odd interloper!

 

I'm still on the look out for decent photos of tar boilers particularly in the late 1940s/early 1950s as these would definitely have been used.

 

Does anyone know if handcarts would still have been used in the early 1950s?

 

Thanks,

 

Simon

 

 

 

 

[The Stationmaster]

Nobody appears to have mentioned steam rollers - which were still in use by some councils into the early 1960s and with considerable numbers in use in the 1950s although diesel replacements were appearing. Steam rollers often operated with their own water cart and a living van.

[petethemole]

May I politely refer you to post #2. Southampton CC retired theirs in the 60s; it's still preserved locally and rallied. In the days when council direct works departments did just about everything a Highways Depot would have almost all the plant required (that was available then). One I don't think has been mentioned that may have been kept at such a depot but operated by the street lighting dept would be a tower truck, the predecessor of the cherrypicker.

Pete

[The Stationmaster]

May I politely refer you to post #2. Southampton CC retired theirs in the 60s; it's still preserved locally and rallied. In the days when council direct works departments did just about everything a Highways Depot would have almost all the plant required (that was available then). One I don't think has been mentioned that may have been kept at such a depot but operated by the street lighting dept would be a tower truck, the predecessor of the cherrypicker.

Pete

 

Thank you Pete - I missed that sentence as I skimmed through Our local council got rid of their steam rollers gradually between 1958 and 1960 but at least two are preserved locally.

[PhilJ W]

If it is a highways department there would be such items as stone setts stored in the yard. There would also be drain pipes as often the highways department would be responsible for maintaining the surface water drains so gully emptiers would also be present.

[Oldddudders]

In my yoof I lived in Dorking, Surrey. There was a firm called Johnstone Brothers (I think) in Vincent Lane who made street sweepers. It was not unusual to see half a dozen of them all being road-tested together, already painted and lettered for a number of big cities across the UK. These were the size of a small tipper lorry, perhaps.