Southern single-line block-posts

[RailWest]

 

As an example to illustrate my query, I’ve attached a diagram for Lympstone (albeit of a late date after the siding had been taken out-of-use and the shunt discs removed). Basically it was one platform, the main running line, and a siding connected at both ends. Crucially it was a tablet block post, but not a passing-loop.

 

Now, although the GWR seemed quite happy to have some very simple non-passing loop locations that were also staff/token posts (eg Lodge Hill, Wookey, Washford etc) , such things appear to have been very rare on the L&SWR. The only other examples which come to mind were Barnstaple Town and Calstock, otherwise they tended just to have GFs (as at Daggons Road).

 

I’m interested in finding any other single-line staff/tablet/token block posts on the Southern which were similar to Lympstone, in order to see how they were signalled, most of which probably will be in former LB&SCR or SE&CR areas. But before I start looking for actual signal-box diagrams,  first I need to actually identify such places if they existed! 

 

Can anyone suggest any appropriate SR locations please?

[KeithHC]

Try Rowfant in Sussex ex LBSCR.

 

Keith

[Michael Hodgson]

As long as it is a token/tablet post, I don't see why that layout shouldn't have been used as a passing loop, but only with freights using the loop - passenger trains would only take the platform road.  Highley Station on the Severn Valley comes to mind.

 

Of course with both ends of the loop clipped and padlocked, and no exit signals from the loop, it can't be used as shown even as a siding.    I'm not sure why 2 signal has two arms with the loop secured out of use - maybe co-acting arms because of a bridge ?

[The Stationmaster]

I do wonder if the Lympstone example - being from a late date - might be reflecting the SR ractice of clipping and padlocking points (usually trailing crossovers) instead of keeping them connected to a lever frame.  With padlocked. crossovers it seemed relatively clear that they would only be used in connection with a possession (although maybe it was perhaps also doned for certain little used sidings as well?).

 

It's always struck me asa strange arrangement but clearly the SR had some perfectly valid reasons for doing it and obvioulsy at Lympstone it would prevent the loop being used to cross trains and therefore signalled accordingly.

[Michael Hodgson]

Looking at George Pryer's Signal Box Diagrams, I see the starters are only 175 yards apart, which would limit the the length of any train you might want to shut in.  If there wasn't a traffic requirement to pass trains, there's no point to expenditure on signalling you're not going to use.

[RailWest]

I think there has been a misunderstanding here...the siding points were clipped OOU in BR days (probably not long before the SB was abolished), but previous to that had been worked from the frame and provided with shunt discs at the exits.

 

The station was not a passing loop for the simple reason (probably) that the Clearing Points for Up and Down trains would have overlapped. The electrical interlocking prevented tablets being drawn at Topsham and Exmouth at the same time (much as occurred also at Barnstaple Town).

 

>>>I'm not sure why 2 signal has two arms with the loop secured out of use - maybe co-acting arms because of a bridge....

Yes :-)

 

[RailWest]

58 minutes ago, KeithHC said:

Try Rowfant in Sussex ex LBSCR.

 

Keith

But that was an ordinary passing-loop with two platforms :-)

 

[KeithHC]

Ok second try Beddington Lane.

 

Keith

[RailWest]

2 minutes ago, KeithHC said:

Ok second try Beddington Lane.

 

Keith

...unfortunately I can't find a diagram for that box other than as just a plain single line :-(

[Nearholmer]

One that has long intrigued me: Miskin's Siding (at Beluncle Halt).

 

No loop, not even a "siding loop", just two sidings, but I believe it was signalled, and can't work out why, unless it was a block post, with a goods train being put in the siding while a passenger train passed. It didn't have a level crossing, and the 1897 25" OS shows two SPs, one on each side, barely clear of the siding turnout.

 

Daggons Road might be worth a further  look too, if only for the cuteness of the signalbox - I think that might have had signals at some point too.

 

"The signal box opposite the north end of the platform alongside the down loop was a non-standard ground level box with a pagoda-style roof and was located alongside the down loop, opposite the main station building. It was reduced to a ground frame in August 1903 and all signals, apart from shunt signals, were removed."

 

 

Edited February 20, 2021 by Nearholmer

[Mike Storey]

I think Rye was operated like this from 1860 until the 1890's when a box was constructed at Rye.

[Nearholmer]

Having checked Daggons Road, it has three SPs shown on the 25" map, in an arrangement that I also found at the SA&MJR's one-minute-wonder station at Salcey Forest, which had a loop that I think can only have been used by a goods train.

 

I wonder if these "three signal" stations may have had a home signal at the outer end of the complex, defining 'station limits', and a single post, situated at one end of the platform, with two arms acting as starters for passenger trains, with goods trains being hand-signalled out of the siding/loop.

 

 

Edited February 20, 2021 by Nearholmer

[bécasse]

1 hour ago, Nearholmer said:

One that has long intrigued me: Miskin's Siding (at Beluncle Halt).

 

No loop, not even a "siding loop", just two sidings, but I believe it was signalled, and can't work out why, unless it was a block post, with a goods train being put in the siding while a passenger train passed. It didn't have a level crossing, and the 1897 25" OS shows two SPs, one on each side, barely clear of the siding turnout.

 

It definitely had both box and signals up to passenger closure (although the signals may well have been oou by then) - the box retained its SE&CR name board (blue condensed lettered on white enamel) right up to the end, it wasn't the only example but they were very rare.

 

Colyton, on the Seaton branch, was another example but only during the summer months and I have a sneaking suspicion that it was set up in such a way that two identical tablets could be out for the long Seaton Junction - Seaton section with trains carrying the same tablet right through rather than giving up a tablet and receiving a new one at Colyton.

Edited February 20, 2021 by bécasse

[Nearholmer]

The early years of Compbyne might be worth a delve too, because I'm not convinced it was ever  signaled as the normal station with passing loop that it appears to have been designed as.

[RailWest]

We do seem to be digressing, but....

 

Do not forget please that in the early days of TS&T working it was common to have a 'signal box' and signals at intermediate stations, simply in order to protect the points. AFAIK it was not until the introduction of electric staff/tablet working that it became common to lock/unlock the lever-frame with the staff/tablet, at which time the running signals became superfluous and were abolished.

 

Daggons Road lost its running signals as described above, but for some reason kept the shunt signals.

 

According to the L&SWR WTT Appendices extra tablet instruments were brought into use when Colyton was brought into use as a block post for the summer and then taken out of use again for the winter.

 

Combpyne appears to have been built with the later Up loop simply as a goods line originally, with the points and FPLs at both ends worked by a 4 (?) lever GF at the south end, later replaced by a signal-box (at the same time as Lyme Regis) when the line was upgraded from OES to ETT.

[Nearholmer]

20 minutes ago, RailWest said:

Do not forget please that in the early days of TS&T working it was common to have a 'signal box' and signals at intermediate stations, simply in order to protect the points.

 

I know its a digression, and that I'm probably being thick (or at least being neither a signal engineer nor a signalman), but I don't quite understand how that arrangement would operate.

 

Under what circumstance could a train approach and find the signal "on"? Was it permissible to reverse the points for shunting (with a horse, presumably) while not in possession of the staff, having first set both home signals "on"?

 

It still, BTW, doesn't explain Miskin's Siding to me, because there wasn't room between the signals to shunt using the single line, and there was initially only one siding, so nowhere to shunt to or from.

Edited February 20, 2021 by Nearholmer

[Michael Hodgson]

1 hour ago, Nearholmer said:

 

Under what circumstance could a train approach and find the signal "on"? Was it permissible to reverse the points for shunting (with a horse, presumably) while not in possession of the staff, having first set both home signals "on"?

 

 

You probably wouldn't need to use a horse.  If there is a simple siding you approach the point in the trailing direction with the daily pick-up goods, leave through wagons on the main line while you use the train engine to shunt as necessary before resuming the journey.  You don't try to shunt from the opposite direction.  If you just need to move a wagon along the siding to a better place to unload it you use pinch bars

 

If there are worked signals, you are supposed to know where they are and be prepared to stop if they are on; you would usually have a distant to warn you.  This might equally apply at a public level crossing

[Nearholmer]

7 hours ago, Michael Hodgson said:

You probably wouldn't need to use a horse

You probably would if there wasn’t a locomotive present.

 

And, if there was a locomotive present, the driver would be in possession of the staff.

 

My question is about whether signals could be set against trains, and points reversed, at a station that wasn’t a block post, in the absence of the train staff.

 

 

Edited February 21, 2021 by Nearholmer

[Nearholmer]

Having continued to dredge my mind for stations in Kent and Sussex with a non-passenger loop, so far, I can only come up with Horsmonden on the Hawkhurst branch, which was a lot like what you are asking for in the other thread: loop opposite platform; a couple of other sidings. Whether it was a block-post or not, I don't know, but it had a SB. [Edited to remove reference to LC, which was at Goudhust, not Horsmonden]

 

It was a Colonel Stephens station, but pre-1896 LR Act and I don't think the line was built under earlier LR provisions.

 

Will keep thinking - plenty of examples with signals and sidings but no loop; its the loop that's challenging me.

 

Hold on though ......... Cranbrook, on the same line, also had a non-passenger loop opposite the platform, although no LC, and that I think was the subject of a model, because the station building was rather OTT and looks impressive.

 

 

Edited February 21, 2021 by Nearholmer

[RailWest]

2 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

 

 

My question is about whether signals could be set against trains, and points reversed, at a station that wasn’t a block post, in the absence of the train staff.

 

 

Quite simply, yes.

 

In the days before it was common to lock a GF with a key on the staff, essentially the points at an intermediate location were often 'free' to be operated at any time. Hence the provision of signals which would be normally 'off', but would have to be put back to 'on' before the points could be worked. That ensured protection for any train which might be approaching while the points were set incorrectly.

[RailWest]

3 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

Having continued to dredge my mind for stations in Kent and Sussex with a non-passenger loop, so far, I can only come up with Horsmonden on the Hawkhurst branch, which was a lot like what you are asking for in the other thread: level crossing; loop opposite platform; a couple of other sidings. Whether it was a block-post or not, I don't know, but it had a SB and more signals than I think it would have needed simply as a "gate box".

 

It was a Colonel Stephens station, but pre-1896 LR Act and I don't think the line was built under earlier LR provisions.

 

Will keep thinking - plenty of examples with signals and sidings but no loop; its the loop that's challenging me.

Yes Horsmonden is a good example, but an even better one turns out to have been Cranbrook further along the line :-)

[Nearholmer]

All is now sort-of clear on the points and signals at non-block post stations, so thanks for that, but .......... 

 

Having got into this, I've been looking at the positioning of the signals indicating ('protecting' seems too strong a word), at numerous places they seem so close to the points that it would have been impossible in practice to get even a single wagon out of the siding/s so as to use the single line for shuffling wagons about.

 

This picture of Grange Road makes the point(!) very clearly 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grange_Road_railway_station#/media/File:Grange_Road_Railway_Station_1.jpg  It also poses questions about the position of the signal WRT the level crossing, but I think the LC was somehow not a highway, and that the gates were normally closed against road traffic.

 

I'm conncluding that in many cases these signals at non-block-posts were merely very tall points indicators to provide reassurance to drivers in the absence of a lock between the staff and the points, rather than being there to facilitate shunting onto the single line between trains.

 

 

[Nearholmer]

18 minutes ago, RailWest said:

an even better one turns out to have been Cranbrook

 Which I remembered and added, before seeing that you are also onto it!

 

And, if you like signals, Cranbrook as shown on the SRS diagram, which must surely be a "modern" re-signalling, has plenty of 'em!

Edited February 21, 2021 by Nearholmer

[RailWest]

14 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

All is now sort-of clear on the points and signals at non-block post stations, so thanks for that, but .......... 

 

Having got into this, I've been looking at the positioning of the signals indicating ('protecting' seems too strong a word), at numerous places they seem so close to the points that it would have been impossible in practice to get even a single wagon out of the siding/s so as to use the single line for shuffling wagons about.

 

This picture of Grange Road makes the point(!) very clearly 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grange_Road_railway_station#/media/File:Grange_Road_Railway_Station_1.jpg  It also poses questions about the position of the signal WRT the level crossing, but I think the LC was somehow not a highway, and that the gates were normally closed against road traffic.

 

I'm conncluding that in many cases these signals at non-block-posts were merely very tall points indicators to provide reassurance to drivers in the absence of a lock between the staff and the points, rather than being there to facilitate shunting onto the single line between trains.

 

 

If a station on a single-line is not a block-post, then any train shunting there must - by definition - be in possession of the relevant authority to access the block section in which that station lies. Therefore, as it can be the only train in the block section while shunting takes place, occupying the single-line for that purpose is not a problem.

[Nearholmer]

Which takes us back to my previous question, which I thought you'd answered in the affirmative.

 

Was it, or wasn't it, allowable to set the signals on, and reverse the points to allow shunting onto the single-line, for example using a horse, when not is possession of the train staff (location of protecting signals permitting - for example, at Daggons Road, it looks to me as if you could, to move wagons between the up-side and down-side sidings).

 

Cranbrook - on Disused Stations, there is a photo showing the original signals, a beautiful ringed, half-size arm on the same post as the home, to give entry to the loop.