Some thoughts on goods yards

[Peter Kazmierczak]

Before I lay the final bits  of track, a few questions please. The model is based on a LMS/LMR Midland Division background. 

 

1. Does the plan look OK? It's derived from a combination of parts from several Midland Railway prototypes.

2. Are the postion of the goods facilities workable?

3. Goods sheds are pretty large and a surprising number of stations didn't have them. I don't quite like the juxtaposiition of the goods shed/station building being so close to each other. Should I not have a  goods shed or would it work if I swapped the postions of the goods shed with the coal yard?

4. Operationwise, would incoming freights arrive directly into the loop, or go into the passenger station and then reverse into the loop, before shunting commences?

[C126]

Hullo, Peter.  What time period is this, please?

[Peter Kazmierczak]

5 minutes ago, C126 said:

Hullo, Peter.  What time period is this, please?

Ranges a bit; 1945 until 1965 with the focus on 1955-60.

[Cwmtwrch]

54 minutes ago, Peter Kazmierczak said:

Goods sheds are pretty large and a surprising number of stations didn't have them.

Not what is conventionally thought of as a goods shed, perhaps, but a complete absence was unusual at a country station. Some were just a lock-up store at the back of a loading bank. Even a station [i.e. with staff present for at least some of the day] with no other goods facilities might have a lock-up store on the platform for secure weatherproof storage of parcels, etc arriving by passenger train or the 'station van' pending collection. Stations in built up areas with a large goods yard not too far away were a different matter.

 

1 hour ago, Peter Kazmierczak said:

would it work if I swapped the postions of the goods shed with the coal yard?

Yes, but the coal yard would probably be on the siding furthest away from the platform. A side and end loading bank with a goods store on it would be possible, but there would have been some sort of secure store or shed for reasons of security and weather.

6 minutes ago, Peter Kazmierczak said:

1945 until 1965 with the focus on 1955-60.

The canal wharf, and quite possibly the canal, would almost certainly be derelict in a country area after about 1950 or so, possibly earlier.

[C126]

Thank you.  I admit I know almost nothing about this era, but having come across information 'peripherally' while browsing for others, may I suggest an extra siding between the station platform line and the Goods Shed.  I think the station would have had one (a Goods Shed) as a terminus.  You'll need somewhere for 'spare' wagons arriving/departing.

 

If you wanted the front area 'fatter' and the Goods Shed area 'slimmer', swap the Coal Yard and Goods Shed locations, but that is all I can think of, to be honest.  Hope this helps.

Edited February 15, 2023 by C126
Goods Shed clarification.

[Flying Pig]

1 hour ago, Peter Kazmierczak said:

Should I not have a  goods shed or would it work if I swapped the postions of the goods shed with the coal yard?

 

The goods side of the layout looks fine, but I'm not sure about the other side.  The coal siding is very inconveniently placed - wouldn't it be better in the goods yard?   And I'm not sure how the Midland would have connected the canal basin siding.  Possibly from the goods loop, crossing the main line with a diamond, rather than shunting from a passenger road?

 

Would the signal box be better next to the main line so the bobby doesn't have to cross the track to exchange tokens?

[C126]

I thought the coal siding could be located in that area as a 'legacy' of the canal's precedence, prior to the railway's arrival.  Although why the merchants would not have moved it to the Goods Yard, I do not know.  Just a thought.

[The Stationmaster]

First point - the layout is pretty good and quite credible.  Going backa very ling time the coal siding at our local station was originally on the opposite side of the running line from the goods shed and siding.   So if it was good enough for the GWR that should be ok on a lesser railway 👀

 

Second point - less is more.  The layout looks spacious with the sidings spread out, no need to add more and clog up the view with more track

 

Third point 0 the freight trip might possibly arrive on the loop but the running line will take a slightly longer traom for run round purposes.  So why bother to provife de the necessary signal in order for the train to run to the loop on arrival?  (I'll assume no gradient problems).  It's just as easy to run round a train of n the running line as it is to run round a train arriving on the loop and you can readily do your coal siding shunt from the main.   And it's easier in interlocking terms to shunt the canal wharf from the main than it is from the loop

 

Arriving on the main to run round gives you an extra shunting move  - and shunting is fun.

[Peter Kazmierczak]

Thanks for all the comments, guys. I do like the remark about the position of the coal yard reflecting the legacy of the canal era.

Still in two minds about the goods shed though. As Mike notes, I don't want to cram the yard too much. I'll see if I can find  a small Midland prototype. One had in mind from the old yard at Rowsley (plans in "Through Limestone Hills" by Bill  Hudson), is the correct length, but just too wide - even if modelled as HO rather than OO. 

More delving I think...

[Schooner]

I really like it! A couple of thoughts only:

• Signal cabin location, as per @Flying Pig. Could it usefully sit at the end if the loop, and so help mask the exit?
• Try moving your coal merchant to the canal wharf. This would be reasonable whether or not the canal is disused. 
• The current 'coal yard' spur could then be removed if more space is required; left plain as a secondary mileage or dock road (didn't Teignmouth have a spur sticking into the station forecourt in a similar manner?); set up for specialist traffic - whatever suits your time and place; modeled in a state of advanced neglect etc as you see fit when you get to building it.

 

 

Edited February 16, 2023 by Schooner
Sp!

[Peter Kazmierczak]

Current state of play...

[Peter Kazmierczak]

So this is the area for the goods yard, with all track laid.

[DCB]

Looks good except most of the traffic at a small BLT 1900 to 1965 would have been coal.   Except maybe in mining areas where coal was outbound and loaded at t'pit.    Quite often at the end all the traffic was coal.     I would use all the siding beyond the cattle dock and the adjacent siding for coal.     Shunting out empties from a long row of wagons is actually interesting, the coal wagons would have different grades and were not necessarily completely emptied in the order they arrived.   Merchants would sometimes prefer to pay demurrage charges and leave the coal in the wagons until they sold it rather than unload it store it and re load it.

Lots of pics of BLTs showing loads of coal wagons and little else.   Again most BLTs seemed to have generous goods sheds.   It was the wayside ones with smaller goods sheds

Cattle wagons didn't occupy cattle pens for very long so pens were often apparently "in the way" of other operations.

 

 

Edited February 17, 2023 by DCB

[The Stationmaster]

Peter I love the corrugayed cardboard 'baseboard top' arrangement.  I used it on part of a module to help get the levels correct and it is not only handy but gives veruy quiet running (I suspect that might also be influenced by the adhesive used).

 

As for the predominant traffic being coal at a small branch terminus I think it depends on numerous things and it probably changed a lott over the years.  The two intermediate stations on our branch finished their freight traffic days as coal class traffic only  but in the 1938 RCH Handbook of Stations  one of them is shown as 'Goods' and had a 1ton 10cwt crane and old photos show traffic other than coal in the single siding while the other was also shown as 'Goods' with a 3 ton  crane plus the facility to handle wheeled vehicles.   Our branch terminus -serving a town of c.10,000 inhabitants post WW!!, plus country cartage rounds by the 1930s, had the complete range of freight facilities and a 6 ton crane (fortunately privately preserved only a few miles away).

 

Generally looking at various branches , including Marlow with a layout little different in some respects from yours (no canal wharf being the main difference in freight facilities) the tonnage of general goods received in the 1930s - as here, where there was a gasworks - considerably exceeded the tonnage of coal received.  Coal really only grew to greater prominence after the decline of other freight traffic in the 1950s and was often the only traffic left by the end of many branches although that wasn't the case locally (population by then c.11,000).

Edited February 17, 2023 by The Stationmaster

[Peter Kazmierczak]

The idea behind this layout (see also the "Shardlow" thread) was to use old track I had from a previous layout. Hence the use of PECO code 100. The pointwork (dating back to when Thatcher was PM and electrics were still traversing the Woodhead route) was cut out from the old chipboard baseboard. Hence the different levels to accommodate that thickness and also adds a bit of interest away from a dead flat baseboard. I glue my track with Araldite/ PVA, so no problems using some corrugated cardboard left over from Christmas parcels - also keeps the weight down. 

I like to get my ideas from the prototype, rather than seeing other models as they can occasionally be rather sterotyped.

I was surprised, when looking at ex-MR stations, how often there wasn't a goods shed present. Cattle pens - yes. Some form of coal merchants facilities - yes (but more often than not just piles of coal rather than the regimented coal staithes often modelled).

 

Still in two minds about that goods shed...

[KingEdwardII]

On 15/02/2023 at 14:03, Peter Kazmierczak said:

Goods sheds are pretty large and a surprising number of stations didn't have them.

My view is that an amazing number of small stations DID have goods sheds. As an example, all but the very smallest stations on the East Somerset & Cheddar Valley railways (Yatton to Witham via Wells, in Somerset) had a goods shed. Cranes were also a very common item in the goods yards, as were loading docks.

 

Yours,  Mike.