Abandoned rails in the road.....(or elsewhere...)

[009 micro modeller]

5 hours ago, Ian Smeeton said:

A visit to Glasgow with a Quid Pro Quo for taking the wicked stepmother to the garden centre meant a visit to Fairfields at Govan.

 

The Shipyard is still in use by BAE Systems building ships for the Navy, but the offices have been turned into a rather good Museum, well worth a visit.

 

 

 

All that remains (on public view, there is probably more in the yard.

 

 

And what it used to be like (stolen from facebook)

 

Regards

 

Ian

Interesting. Were the wagons for the shipyard hauled over the tram network (as I think they did elsewhere in Glasgow) or are the two tracks in the old photo just coincidentally parallel at this point?

[Ian Smeeton]

Over the tram network AFAIK

 

https://maps.nls.uk/view/82891749

 

See here

 

Regards

 

Ian

[009 micro modeller]

45 minutes ago, Ian Smeeton said:

Over the tram network AFAIK

 

https://maps.nls.uk/view/82891749

 

See here

 

Regards

 

Ian

I had a look, apparently they did run over the tram network (and continued to do so on a retained section of track after the passenger trams stopped running, with the electric loco modified to run off the replacement trolleybus twin-wire overhead). Given that Glasgow trams were 4’ 7 3/4” gauge to accommodate standard gauge railway wagons (with their different, railway rather than tramway wheel profile) running in the flangeways, I can’t work out what gauge would have been used for the shipyard’s internal sidings or the loco itself. It would make an interesting and unusual prototype for a micro layout though.

[Fishplate]

This is all very interesting! There must have been some form of special wheel profile, or internal use only wagons. The S&C in the map of Fairfield works looks like short, sharp radii, suggesting tram type geometry, but the modern photos appear to show standard railway track flangeways, but with the only two visible crossing both have a very sharp angle.

 

Standard railway flanges don't fit in the flangeway of tram track and the wheel treads of a standard wheel would overlap onto the road surface. However, this might account for the apparent damage to the road surface in the old picture (?), just to the right of the tram.

 

Similarly, tram wheel treads won't interface with standard railway crossings as they are not wide enough to be supported by the wing rails at the flatter angle of a railway crossing nose. But this might support the sharp angle crossings in the modern photo.

 

The logical place for the wagons to go from the map extract is to Govan station. But that layout suggests standard railway S&C, as it is much longer. However I know OS maps can sometimes be a bit inaccurate when it comes to S&C. (You can see different S&C lengths on the approach to Govan station which illustrate this. There are short turnouts in the main line and long turnouts in the goods yard, which isnt prototypical).

 

It would be interesting to know if the Fairfield wagons were tripped to Govan station and then loads transferred between the Fairfield and main line wagons.

 

Presumably at least two lines at Govan station yard also had tramway electrification.

 

There is also a 90 degree flat crossing of the tramway tracks into the Govan shipyard buildings shown on the map. Was that connection electrified? Did Fairfield Engineering contract to Govan ?

 

 

[cctransuk]

2 minutes ago, Fishplate said:

This is all very interesting! There must have been some form of special wheel profile, or internal use only wagons. The S&C in the map of Fairfield works looks like short, sharp radii, suggesting tram type geometry, but the modern photos appear to show standard railway track flangeways, but with the only two visible crossing both have a very sharp angle.

 

Standard railway flanges don't fit in the flangeway of tram track and the wheel treads of a standard wheel would overlap onto the road surface. However, this might account for the apparent damage to the road surface in the old picture (?), just to the right of the tram.

 

Similarly, tram wheel treads won't interface with standard railway crossings as they are not wide enough to be supported by the wing rails at the flatter angle of a railway crossing nose. But this might support the sharp angle crossings in the modern photo.

 

The logical place for the wagons to go from the map extract is to Govan station. But that layout suggests standard railway S&C, as it is much longer. However I know OS maps can sometimes be a bit inaccurate when it comes to S&C. (You can see different S&C lengths on the approach to Govan station which illustrate this. There are short turnouts in the main line and long turnouts in the goods yard, which isnt prototypical).

 

It would be interesting to know if the Fairfield wagons were tripped to Govan station and then loads transferred between the Fairfield and main line wagons.

 

Presumably at least two lines at Govan station yard also had tramway electrification.

 

There is also a 90 degree flat crossing of the tramway tracks into the Govan shipyard buildings shown on the map. Was that connection electrified? Did Fairfield Engineering contract to Govan ?

 

We're over-thinking this!

 

Why did the tramway have a sub-standard gauge? Precisely so that STANDARD GAUGE railway wagons could run ON THE TIPS OF THEIR FLANGES in the tramway flangeways. On the tramway, the wagon wheel treads did not touch the tramway railheads.

 

Flanges taper, hence the need for the the tramway gauge to be less than the railway gauge.

 

Off the tramway, the dockyard tracks were perfectly normal, standard gauge dimensions.

 

The wagons used over the tramway were bog-standard, mainline railway ones.

 

CJI.

[pH]

There was another instance of wagons being worked over tram tracks into a shipyard not too far west of Fairfield’s along Govan Road/Renfrew Road. Alexander Stephen’s yard at Linthouse was served from Shieldhall Goods, using steam engines running on the tram tracks.
 

Smith and Anderson’s “An Illustrated History of Glasgow’s Railways” has a picture of a Barclay saddle tank passing a tram on this stretch of track. The caption confirms what “cctransuk” says above - railway vehicles travelled on their flanges in the shallow grooves in the tram track. It also says that the Vale of Clyde Tramways Act of 1871 specified that railway vehicles had to be able to travel on tram tracks. That led to the adoption of the 4ft 7 3/4in gauge for the trams to allow the arrangement described.

 

The section of track was retained to service the yard after the trams were withdrawn in 1958 till the yard itself closed in 1968.

 

Here’s a picture of a pug and a tram together on that stretch of road (not the one from the Smith and Anderson book):

 

https://transportsofdelight.smugmug.com/RAILWAYS/BRITISH-INDUSTRIAL-LOCOMOTIVES/SHIPYARDS-SHIPBUILDERS/i-gf4Mhgf

 

Edited May 4 by pH

[Fishplate]

3 hours ago, cctransuk said:

Why did the tramway have a sub-standard gauge?

 

@009 micro modeller and I posted at about the same time. 

I didn't know that the tramway had a narrower gauge until I read:

 

3 hours ago, 009 micro modeller said:

Given that Glasgow trams were 4’ 7 3/4” gauge to accommodate standard gauge railway wagons

 

I was coming from an (incorrect) assumption that track gauge was 4ft 8 1/2 inches on the tramway, so wheel profiles/ back to backs wouldn't match and would need to be modified. The tighter gauge would make the wheel back to backs the same. 

 

Whilst railway flanges are thicker than trams/light rail today, who knows what they may have been like in 1871, or machined to locally for passage along these lines in later years. 

 

Presumably the non-standard bogies for tram vehicles was a nominal expense.

 

Hats off to the Victorians for that bit of forward thinking. An integrated transport system. What were they thinking of??? 

 

Every day is a school day. Thanks for the information 👍 

[009 micro modeller]

18 hours ago, pH said:

There was another instance of wagons being worked over tram tracks into a shipyard not too far west of Fairfield’s along Govan Road/Renfrew Road. Alexander Stephen’s yard at Linthouse was served from Shieldhall Goods, using steam engines running on the tram tracks.
 

Smith and Anderson’s “An Illustrated History of Glasgow’s Railways” has a picture of a Barclay saddle tank passing a tram on this stretch of track. The caption confirms what “cctransuk” says above - railway vehicles travelled on their flanges in the shallow grooves in the tram track. It also says that the Vale of Clyde Tramways Act of 1871 specified that railway vehicles had to be able to travel on tram tracks. That led to the adoption of the 4ft 7 3/4in gauge for the trams to allow the arrangement described.

 

The section of track was retained to service the yard after the trams were withdrawn in 1958 till the yard itself closed in 1968.

 

Here’s a picture of a pug and a tram together on that stretch of road (not the one from the Smith and Anderson book):

 

https://transportsofdelight.smugmug.com/RAILWAYS/BRITISH-INDUSTRIAL-LOCOMOTIVES/SHIPYARDS-SHIPBUILDERS/i-gf4Mhgf

 

Didn’t Portsmouth use a similar tram gauge? I don’t know if this was for the same reason though. Blackpool seems to have worked main line coal wagons over the tramway with no such adjustment (as the tramway there is standard gauge).

 

I was under the impression that it was to do with the different wheel profiles and possibly the shallower flangeway provided by grooved tram rail. Hence my question about what gauge the loco itself would be as it’s not clear whether it would need to have tramway or railway-spec wheels (presumably dependent on what type of track it spent more of its time on, though having a powered vehicle, as opposed to an unpowered wagon, running on its flanges doesn’t seem like a great idea).

 

Of course, in model form we could largely ignore this minor detail and have a very interesting layout.

[melmerby]

Dont forget that a tram wheel is not as thick as a heavy rail wheel.

The heavy rail wheel is meant to run on the coned part of the wheel on straight track as well, the flanges ideally not touching the rail,  whilst the tram wheel always is held by the flangeway on street track.

These days modern trams and railway wheels seem to use the same track profile

Sheffield Supertram Tram/Trains run on both street track & railway track.

 

(I think Dunfermline(?) also have 4' 7 ¾" gauge)

[pH]

1 hour ago, melmerby said:

(I think Dunfermline(?) also have 4' 7 ¾" gauge)

According to Wiki, Dunfermline trams ran on 3ft 6in track:

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunfermline_and_District_Tramways

 

(Edit - according, again, to Wiki, Huddersfield trams were also 4ft 7 3/4 in gauge:

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_tram_systems_by_gauge_and_electrification  )

 

(Further edit - as “009 micro modeller” suggested above, Portsmouth trams were also 4ft 7 3/4 in gauge:

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portsmouth_Corporation_Transport )

 

 

Edited May 5 by pH

[009 micro modeller]

51 minutes ago, melmerby said:

These days modern trams and railway wheels seem to use the same track profile

Sheffield Supertram Tram/Trains run on both street track & railway track.

I’m not sure about this, or that it applies to all the modern tram networks. I thought Sheffield Supertram used a compromise profile on the tram-trains and a tramway one for the other trams (a horse tram from the old Sheffield system has run on Supertram, as has a works tram from Berlin iirc). I think Manchester Metrolink uses a more railway-like profile because of how much of it is on converted heavy rail lines (not all relaid initially), but they’ve also had stock from the ELR running on parts of it.

 

The issue of the wheel profiles being incompatible also doesn’t seem to apply globally - e.g. as covered elsewhere on RMWeb there are some trolley/interurban museums in the US that also operate some very heavy electric railway locomotives, all DC overhead obviously but sometimes running off a lower voltage than the one they were designed for (a bit like if Crich operated an EM1, which obviously they don’t/can’t).

[stewartingram]

Blackpool did indeed work railway coal wagons from the mainline at Fleetwood (behind behind the tram depot), along the reserved track as far as Thornton Gate sidings (Cleveleys). There was a Blackpool loco, now preserved at Crich; when returning to Fleetwood it pushed the (unfitted) empty wagons, with a flagman on the front wagon - there was no brakevan. Must have been quite a site with the many ungated road crossings.

[Michael Edge]

The Blackpool reserved section was ordinary railway track though, not tramway grooved rail.

[melmerby]

5 hours ago, pH said:

According to Wiki, Dunfermline trams ran on 3ft 6in track:

My ancient brain not recalling the correct info!

[melmerby]

5 hours ago, 009 micro modeller said:

The issue of the wheel profiles being incompatible also doesn’t seem to apply globally - e.g. as covered elsewhere on RMWeb there are some trolley/interurban museums in the US that also operate some very heavy electric railway locomotives, all DC overhead obviously but sometimes running off a lower voltage than the one they were designed for (a bit like if Crich operated an EM1, which obviously they don’t/can’t).

There are countries where street running trams go onto proper railway tracks (ignoring Supertram) with the platforms having a low section for the tram stop

Edited May 5 by melmerby

[Fishplate]

13 hours ago, 009 micro modeller said:

I thought Sheffield Supertram used a compromise profile on the tram-trains

 

As someone involved in the track design at Sheffield, I can confirm the tramtrain does have a compromise wheel profile. That is what prompted my initial query on how the system in Glasgow worked. The tramway and railway at Sheffield are both nominally 4ft 8 1/2 inches.

 

S&C on the new heavy rail connections between the railway and tramway at both Tinsley and Parkgate, and on all the existing S&C between Tinsley and Parkgate all have new, or been modified with, raised check rails.

 

I believe there were some track modifications within the Sheffield tram system as well.

 

[Captain Slough]

14 hours ago, 009 micro modeller said:

I think Manchester Metrolink uses a more railway-like profile because of how much of it is on converted heavy rail lines

 

yes - British Rail 350bhp diesel shunters have actually worked through the street running sections of Metrolink into the city centre during engineering possessions for track relaying

[009 micro modeller]

15 hours ago, stewartingram said:

Blackpool did indeed work railway coal wagons from the mainline at Fleetwood (behind behind the tram depot), along the reserved track

Was it only on unpaved track then? That might explain why they didn’t need the gauge difference.

 

1 hour ago, Captain Slough said:

 

yes - British Rail 350bhp diesel shunters have actually worked through the street running sections of Metrolink into the city centre during engineering possessions for track relaying

Interesting - I knew they’d worked on the outer, ex-railway sections but didn’t realise they’d made it to the city centre.

[Pacific231G]

On 05/05/2024 at 18:54, 009 micro modeller said:

The issue of the wheel profiles being incompatible also doesn’t seem to apply globally - e.g. as covered elsewhere on RMWeb there are some trolley/interurban museums in the US that also operate some very heavy electric railway locomotives, all DC overhead obviously but sometimes running off a lower voltage than the one they were designed for (a bit like if Crich operated an EM1, which obviously they don’t/can’t).

Reduced voltage running is entirely possible. The very extensive rural electric tramways in Haute Vienne  ran at 10kV 25Hz in the countryside (which enabled long rural routes to be supplied from a single feed without the need for intermediate transformers) but at a safer 600V 25Hz on conventional tram poles within the city of Limoges.  That was done with an autotransformer in each power car  that converted the higher voltage to the 90-300 V required by the series wound motors . With DC you'd have to use resistors but it's still possible 

 

A few years ago I did see (and travel on) a metre gauge SNCV diesel (originally petrol) tramcar that was running up and down the quayside track between St. Valery Ville and St Valery Port on the Baie de Somme railway in France during their 2016 Fête Vapeur. This metre gauge railway uses the same crossing and checkrail clearances as the standard gauge (some of it is three rail mixed gauge) but SNCV in Belgium clearly used much tighter tramway clearances so the tramcar had to prodeed very gingerly over the one turnout it had to negotiate on its route and there was a lot of wheel drop through the crossing. 

These are not of course abandoned rails in the road - quite the opposite nowadays!

 

For street running shared with other vehicles  (most typically on docks and quaysides), railway crossing clearances require a larger gap between rail and check rail than that used by most urban tramway systems. This can be quite hazardous for other road users - especially cyclists. and was ISTR one of the reasons why the Weymouth Harbour Tramway  was lifted (shame!) However, a lot of modern urban tramways, though they run on the streets to some extent, don't actually share the same parts of the street very much with other vehicles and tend to run largely on their own reservations or on streets closed to other vehicular traffic, apart possibly from buses that tend to have wide tyres anyway. 

Edited May 6 by Pacific231G
addition of picture & date of CFBS Fete

[SHMD]

I really can't see how a 350 shunter could get to Piccadilly Gardens as there are a few "tight" corners of a radius not much more than the length of the shunter!

 

There was a metro-mainline connection just outside of Manchester Victoria station though...

 

 

Kev.

[Porcy Mane]

Going back to Fairfields for a mo.  There's plenty of images on flickr. Here's a couple.

 

https://flic.kr/p/dSpwQ6

 

Fairfield locomotive then in now. by David Campbell, on Flickr

Edited May 6 by Porcy Mane
spillin mistooks..

[Captain Slough]

3 hours ago, SHMD said:

I really can't see how a 350 shunter could get to Piccadilly Gardens as there are a few "tight" corners of a radius not much more than the length of the shunter!

 

There was a metro-mainline connection just outside of Manchester Victoria station though...

 

 

Kev.

 

there are photos in a related thread in RailUK forums showing one proceeding very slowly on the outer radius of a street corner curve

 

Edit: Were. And I can't find them now.

Edited May 6 by Captain Slough

[Captain Kernow]

On 25/04/2024 at 13:56, cctransuk said:

 

Not Virgin Media, but we have a contractor for Wildernet ripping up every street in and around Bodmin at present!

'Wildanet - the company that requires every employee to have a circus clown qualification on their CV'.

 

A complete bunch of idiots.

 

[009 micro modeller]

6 hours ago, Captain Slough said:

 

there are photos in a related thread in RailUK forums showing one proceeding very slowly on the outer radius of a street corner curve

 

Edit: Were. And I can't find them now.

Also there are the Docklands Light Railway engineering locos - seemingly fairly normal industrial shunters but I’m not sure if they’ve had their wheels re-profiled to match that of the passenger stock (which is more steeply coned to run on the sharp curves, though obviously they don’t have any street running).

Edited May 6 by 009 micro modeller

[Ben B]

13 hours ago, Captain Slough said:

 

yes - British Rail 350bhp diesel shunters have actually worked through the street running sections of Metrolink into the city centre during engineering possessions for track relaying

 

And for added railway interest, weren't they the ex-Burry Port shunters with the cut-down bodies? I'm sure I've seen pics of  Ashburnham (now on the KWVR) on the stretch near the East Lancs Railway