Withered Arm/North Cornwall Railway

[cary hill]

I am giving serious consideration to building a North Cornwall based layout but I find inconvenient quotes like "a remote railway infrequently serving small scattered communities obscurely located in a rather barren landscape" a bit off-putting although they are obviously true. So I think I need to develop a scenario or two to generate more train services and revenue earning opportunities to redress the balance. I have considered the former prototype locations on which a model could be based in 4mm (It would be BR(1960?) and I have maybe 16-20' by 9' available) and ruled them out below on the following(spurious?) grounds:

 

Wadebridge - way too big - I think 20' does not even get me from the southern eastern approaches to Molesworth St level crossing and I think a faithful reproduction of the track layout would be getting on for 4' wide near the Station Building/Goods Shed.

 

Padstow - surprisingly large again approaching 20' long and quite wide with a lot of water if the prototype quays are modelled fully and all for only one platform face - I want at least two.

 

Boscarne Junction - do-able but I think this is primarily an excellent shunting opportunity - absolutely nothing wrong with that but not my bag at all and I am doubtful that this, coupled with the odd passing 'P' and 'B' sets with their small locos, would sustain my interest long term.

 

Wenford Bridge - a bit similar to Boscarne but presumably one engine in steam only - I think I can guess which class and no passenger workings at all - so it won't work for me.

 

A.N Other NCR passing station - already been done far too well, although I have not had the pleasure of seeing one "in the flesh" so far. I am going to suppose that most of these stations South of Launceston were never built anyway.

 

Before I slightly rewrite the area's railway history I should perhaps state that I have a copy of the "NCR" bible, various Middleton Press publications covering the area and a copy of 'Branches and Byways - Cornwall' and other relevant publications from which I have freely borrowed and distorted various proposed schemes. I have "done" the Camel Trail and visited the sites of several of the former stations along the lines whilst on holiday. I have also spent far too long poring over Google satellite and contour maps looking for non-existent centres of population to exploit.

 

So my alternative history goes like this:

 

Delabole slate quarry was connected to Wenford Bridge by a light railway or Welsh style narrow gauge line in the 1840's or 1850's - it doesn't matter exactly when as long as it is well before the North Cornwall Line was built - I think this was actually proposed.

 

I am assuming that funds for railway construction are somewhat more plentiful and that construction did not drag on for so many years.

 

There is now no need for the North Cornwall Line to go anywhere near Delabole and the company accountants find there is no case for spending money on fairly substantial station buildings to serve the likes of Tresmeer(182 souls) and Otterham(171 souls) with stations up to 4 miles away. The company's main objectives remain reaching Truro, Falmouth(ocean mail?) and Penzance(why?) as quickly as possible. The chosen route now goes much nearer to or actually through Camelford(there are a couple of modern road bypass proposals which I might be able to use as possible routes) and continues down the Camel valley through Wenford Bridge and on to Boscarne Junction, Wadebridge and Padstow. The old Wenford Bridge section is rebuilt to mainline standards as part of the thrust "westwards" completely ruining several future photographic opportunities. Surprisingly the gradient profile for this section does not look as fearsome as I thought it would.

 

I have reached Padstow around 1890 but the GWR has cunningly had the foresight to already build the Chacewater and Newquay Railway some fifteen years earlier than actually happened (1889? not 1905) as a partial blocking move to thwart LSWR westward ambitions towards Truro and beyond. The GWR has already realised that, apart from possibly Perranporth, revenues are disappointing but nevertheless it still proposes that it and the LSWR jointly build a further speculative line from Tolcarne Junction to a triangular junction just outside Padstow station permitting GWR locomotives to work to Padstow and Wadebridge and the LSWR locomotives to work to Newquay(more coaches for the ACE eventually?).

 

I think most of the above reflects, admittedly via a distorted and selective mirror, things that could have happened in an alternative world.

 

I now identify my possible modelling "what if" scenarios - I am still leaving Wadebridge alone as a possibility, although I might shut the loco depot and move it to Padstow or Boscarne Junction and conveniently view Wadebridge as slightly less important. It is still too big to model except perhaps as a half-model of the classic end of the station.

 

I will now reconsider Padstow as I have just had a look at the original station plan which looks to have less width if the later outer dock wall is never constructed. I am thinking in terms of a station with two or three platform faces which might resemble a "mini-Newquay" with a small loco depot and slightly less reliance on the fishing trade as I might need to move the fish quays beyond the platform buffer stops to fit things in, although the quays might be useful if I need a link "offstage" for a "roundy-roundy" for loco running in. I am hoping for a population increase to justify the enlarged station.

 

I would be happy to model Boscarne Junction (Station) now - not sure how much I can plausibly cram in without expanding the site massively and it is plainly in the middle of nowhere - but I am seeing possibly a Great Central style island platform but built using NCR stone architecture but with the living accomodation elements at the side of the track. It is still an interchange point but for passengers as well now. I might have a small engine depot sited there as I think the Beattie tanks will have to work the Delabole Quarry line(it turns out that it wasn't narrow gauge after all) as I have already rebuilt the line to Wenford to mainline standards.

 

Wenford Bridge has now become much more interesting as well as I have my branch line from Delabole Quarry joining there and mainline passenger services passing by and I can have more than one engine in steam and they don't have to be Beatties or very small panniers - not really seeing this in any detail yet.

 

My fourth possibility might be "Camelford Junction" based on a fairly major rewrite of Cornish history which supposes that King Arthur has been proved to be entirely a Cornish King nothing to do with the rest of Britain, Britanny,Wales and so on and that he and his successors kept Cornwall independent until the Normans cheated by using cavalry. I am going to have the Cornish language surviving for much longer because of this and a Cornish cultural and Arthurian centre established at Camelford which eventually evolves into Cornwall's first university (still waiting for this in the real world I believe). I have increased the population significantly with academics and students. I will still have the Victorian(Edwardian?) obsession with King Arthur but it is now so huge that a branch line is built to the cliffs at Tintagel! I might have excursion traffic - I have just been looking at a photograph of a Torrington to Totnes excursion with a WC Class - what's that about?) - so I don't see why not.

 

If you have followed these ramblings (sorry it's a bit long) and reached this point I would appreciate any comments as to whether any of the above has "legs" before I commit to any detailed planning - quite happy to receive comments along lines of "total nonsense" or "why mend something that's not broken" through to something more constructive including the pointing out of any inconvenient facts I have may deliberately ignored.

 

David

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Gwiwer]

I think the first thing we need to establish is that for your own layout you play by your rules and are limited only by your imagination. You clearly have a theme but equally are not suggesting that you are about to set forth on a scale re-creation of a specific locality at any given time.

 

A good many of us have layouts of varying sizes themed along similar lines including myself; in my case I have taken the GWR main line from St. Austell to Newquay and back to Truro rather than through the middle of nowhere much, and have linked Padstow to Newquay as well.

 

When looking at narrow gauge operations around Wenford Bridge don't forget the De Lank quarry line which once went higher onto the moors from that point so there may be a precedent for your route to Camelford as you say.

 

Keep us posted and good luck!

[Oldddudders]

I think the first thing we need to establish is that for your own layout you play by your rules and are limited only by your imagination. You clearly have a theme but equally are not suggesting that you are about to set forth on a scale re-creation of a specific locality at any given time.

Exactly. Your ability to put a revised history together, and to describe it in cogent detail, indicates that quite clearly the nitpickers are going to have a hard time deconstructing your version of what happened and when. Don't rush it, though, and feel forever free to modify the history to suit the unfortunate hard facts of what fits the baseboard! You have woven a multitude of threads into an interesting and utterly plausible tapestry.

 

In my yoof, everyone read Railway Modeller and built a GWR BLT. LSWR in the far West has now emerged as a popular prototype for reasons discussed elsewhere on RMWeb - but every take on that theme is different, as yours certainly is. As Gwiwer says - do keep us posted!

[2ManySpams]

With my interest in the area I'll certainly be watching this thread!

[Yan]

A very interesting alternative universe. My slant/twist on history for this area is a little different to yours and is still being developed/modified. I do like to research and develop a plausible alternative, building on history and the what might have beens. It gives room for projects to breath, become personal.

 

If your interested, my thoughts and musings for my alternative universe can be found here at http://grogleyjuncti...gley%20Junction

 

I'll be watching this thread with great interest.

[Gwiwer]

I have always thought, with respect to various published sources, that the territory was going to be difficult to carve out a decent main line. The B&W existed for a specific purpose and was later shoe-horned and bolted on to other bits and pieces to create a bigger railway. As well there was the race to the ports and resorts of the south west though the GWR had effectively already won that by linking the Hayle, West Cornwall and Caradon Railways. The LSWR's rearguard action was a too-little too-late attempt at blocking and abstracting some of the traffic for themselves.

 

One look at the geography of the Bodmin and north Cornwall region will show that for any decent alignment (as opposed to slow, tightly curved and circuitous routes) there would have been a need for tunnels, viaducts and earthworks on a huge scale far beyond the value of any likely traffic. The short gap between Padstow and Newquay alone might have required two or three major viaducts and probably a tunnel as well.

 

Turning back to our own models my own version of history has it that Newquay would have been a through station on the GWR main line and the LSWR would have run in from Padstow. The line at Padstow would have crossed the harbour and entered Prideaux Tunnel (beneath the estate of that name) swinging from north to west as it ran beneath the hillside to emerge at Treator. It would then run as close to the coast as geography permitted and would have included massive viaducts above Mawgan Porth and Watergate Bay.

 

That does at least allow me to run green trains with Bulleid light Pacifics and other appropriate motive power at times and it will also be a lead into the next project which will see a small NCR / SR-style junction station built with a Wadebridge sub-shed for a Beattie well-tank to live in. Already in my timetable there are through trains from Falmouth to Portsmouth and Penzance to Brighton as portions of the main Plymouth trains joined at Okehampton. The future branch on the next project might even be worked by a thumper as indeed might have happened had the SR and not the WR remained in control west of Salisbury.

[Etched Pixels]

Fortunately for my more modern image modelling Wadebrdge got rationalised a lot, so I'm slowly building a Wadebridge in N with the assumption that it merely got hacked right down and survived. That lets me run several configurations with some slight scenic changes and a couple of drop in buffers and the like. It's basically the late 1970s plan (real one - the book one is wrong) but with the Padstow line left and the NC, and the two front of house sidings vanished due to lack of baseboard space (its only 30cm wide).

 

BR 1970s - freight as it was at the real 1970s Wadebridge, and if I'm feeling likeit an added DMU service Bodmin-Padstow, holiday trains

Ditto but with the North Cornwall still open to Delabole. Station buildings out of use, single side gate entrance only part of the main platform in use, and the island unused.

 

Regional railways in the same style

 

Modern image - expanded services. SWT 159 summer "Atlantic Coast Express", and the odd Voyager etc in summer

 

and the same configuration also works with a buffer stop inserted/footbridge added and, when I build it, a station building on the island for the 'BR ends at Wadebridge' model with part of the North Cornwall assumed to be preserved and running to Padstow (effectively the non island platform becomes a Network Rail/BR SLT with buffer stops, the island a passing loop and the two sidings off the island stock sidings. I still need to figure out how to add removable lights to the island platform - the white lines I can compromise on, if it was open as a station maybe someone had a spare tin of white paint left 8)

 

 

I wish I'd had a ton more space - then I think Launceston would have been so much better a choice with the GWR/SR mix and the divided arrangement and GWR loco servicing making it ideal for a preserved terminus on the old GWR site combined with a light North Cornwall local service.running through the SR side (perhaps still with two platforms in use for passing but the sidings gone)

 

Some of the other NC stations are pretty compact and have the bridge at one end so you don't need much of a fiddle yard run or platform ends modelling - Otterham and Tresmeer are both compact in different shapes.

 

The last idea sounds fun too.. I've always liked the idea of doing a microlayout entirely in Cornish, and got as far as drawing it up but not building it. Perfect excuse for all trains to stop as well - it can have the customs post 8)

 

Alan

[2ManySpams]

And of course you'll now be able to get an O2 to run on the layout too, thanks to Kernow...

[cary hill]

And of course you'll now be able to get an O2 to run on the layout too, thanks to Kernow...

 

 

30225 looks a strong candidate to be renumbered as 30200(or 30203), which I believe to be the long term residents of the Class at Wadebridge, although 30192(very early fifties) and 30236(1959-60?) appear to be minor alternative candidates.

 

30225 appears to have been based at Plymouth Friary between 1955-62 and the Push-Pull fitted 30182 was also based at Friary in the early fifties and was apparently at Exmouth Junc. in 1959 - I wonder what services they undertook.

 

I can at least now complete my Ex-GWR Class 1366 locomotive kit safe in the knowledge that it will be finished before a R-T-R model appears, although that is also pulling in the direction of a "Wadebridge" model - perhaps it will have to have curved approaches and be called "St Breock and Egloshayle Junction" if I have remembered the names correctly.