Private siding quandary

[signalmaintainer]

I'm stumped. Jiggered. Up against a wall.

 

This was to have been the site of a small crushed limestone quarry loader and perhaps a halt. However, I've been wavering for months now on that idea because I'm not certain if it's really the right type of industry for this spot.

 

I've also debated with myself about placing a small heating oil industry here. This is supposed to be Cumbria in the late 1950s, and I'm not certain whether that type of industry would have been making an inroads against King Coal at this time and in this region of England. A petrol distributor is another idea, and I do like tank cars. I've also considered something in the agricultural vein, such as a feed mill for local farmers, or even a processing plant for poultry grit (derived from local limestone).

 

I've played arround with different mockups, fascia flats, etc. Never been this baffled for ideas before. I like the track arrangement (the drawing is crude, sorry for that); in person it's flowing and fits the space well.

 

Of course, the easy way out would be to make a small goods yard. Would there have been such a thing with only a halt to serve local passenger traffic?

 

Thanks for any advice you can provide.

 

 

[Dave777]

I can hardly see the diagram it's so small, can you make it any bigger?!

 

Bit of a kop out, but the non-descript 'factory siding' allows a variety of stock to be run. Personally I like the even more vague 'storage siding', where engineer's stock and overnight storage of freight is kept. That really does allow you to run just about anything (even the odd coach with 'brake problems', or a failed loco just shunted out the way temporarily to get the line clear).

 

 

[Guest Max Stafford]

Since limestone is both 'big' in South Cumbria and also a logical choice for track ballast then why not a ballast loading siding. You could bring in Dogfish or Grampus wagons or ex-company three-plank wagons which were previously popular with the engineers. All you'd mostly need is a loading bank for dump trucks (tippers) from the local quarry for direct loading.

 

NB Cumbria per se didn't exist until 1974. The southern Cumbrian area you're interested in Paul is pretty much on the cusp of what was west Cumberland and north Lancashire.

 

Dave.

[34theletterbetweenB&D]

...I've also debated with myself about placing a small heating oil industry here. This is supposed to be Cumbria in the late 1950s, and I'm not certain whether that type of industry would have been making an inroads against King Coal at this time and in this region of England. A petrol distributor is another idea, and I do like tank cars. ...

You can justify almost anything: all it needs is something like a forward thinking retired military officer, who has invested his gratuity in such a business, based on experience gained in military logistics which has shown him which way the wind is blowing in preferred fuel choice.

[Karhedron]

Milk could be a good choice as much of the equipment is contained within the creamery building. I am doing something slightly similar and the creamery is up against the backscene as a half-releif building with loading platform in front. This reduced the amount of industrial equipment you need to model (unless of course you enjoy the challenge of such work). Milk also has the advantage of being in closed tankers which means you don't have to worry about wagons arriving full when it should be empties inwards (or vice versa).

 

As for the halt, if your industry is labour-intensive then it could have been built specifically to carry employees to work. There are certainly plenty of examples of such halts.

[Guest stuartp]

As Dave says, quarrying is big in the area. Limestone and granite are both quarried, often next door to each other (Shap) and there are/were large and small quarries all over the place. Plenty of dairies too, as well as milk tanks you can run 12 ton vans for cheese and other products. If you search the forum for 'Metalbox' you should unearth at least one discussion (possibly on RMweb2) concering the strange BR 12 ton end-loading vans which worked between Metalbox at Carlisle, the Carnation Milk factory at Dumfries and McNeil & Bibby's creamery at Milnthorpe.

 

Other ideas from the wider area - paper mills (Burnieside, had it's own tramway with pics on the CRA site), pottery (Weatheriggs, mostly coal inwards from what I can remember reading), gypsum/anhydrite (top end of the S&C mostly) or the rather cliched military stores (Warcop, 14MU at Carlisle but that was on a vast scale).

 

Gypsum might be too geographically fixed for you, it shouts 'Eden Valley' rather than 'Cumberland/Lancs' but the others are typical of the area without tying you down too much geographically.

['CHARD]

How about a skinworks?

 

I only mention it because I've never seen a siding into one modelled, having recently discovered the term while researching local working arrangements at Galashiels. Which, whilst I know is in the Borders, shares many socio-economic similarities with the north west of England. Especially in your chosen era.

[signalmaintainer]

Thank you for all the great feedback and ideas -- better insight than all the many hours of Web-based researching I've done.

 

The quarrying ideas are even more attractive now that I have a better understanding of the possibilities. The heating oil depot seems even more of a go too, as my rationale for it was a forward-thinking individual who took a risk and built a small depot in the area! I've got a Walthers Cornerstone HO kit (unbuilt for my stillborn Milwaukee Road layout) waiting in the wings. Should adapt OK to the site with some kitbashing.

 

How about a skinworks?

 

That's not going to get me in trouble with my wife, is it? ( I take it that a skinworks is what we here call a tannery. And I could model the smell, too!)

['CHARD]

Hehehehe! I guess it must be a tannery, the local instructions at Gala clearly had their origins steeped in the 1800s, and I expect once designated The Skinworks Sdg that's what it remained until it was taken out of use in the early sixties. Not identified what the facilities looked like beyond the fact it was a single trailing siding protected by a catch-point.

 

You know what I'm like for trying to take a cross-section view through history in justifying what appears in model form

[hmrspaul]

Milk could be a good choice as much of the equipment is contained within the creamery building. I am doing something slightly similar and the creamery is up against the backscene as a half-releif building with loading platform in front. This reduced the amount of industrial equipment you need to model (unless of course you enjoy the challenge of such work). Milk also has the advantage of being in closed tankers which means you don't have to worry about wagons arriving full when it should be empties inwards (or vice versa).

 

As for the halt, if your industry is labour-intensive then it could have been built specifically to carry employees to work. There are certainly plenty of examples of such halts.

 

Another advantage of a milk loading place, or creamery, is that it can justify large passenger or mixed traffic locomotives as they were worked forward as express passenger. Jubilee or Royal Scot could be quite suitable for a Cumberland layout. Also, doesn't have to be very big as a partial train can arrive and the tanks in the siding can be added and then worked forward. Several similar sidings may be present in a milk producing area.

 

Paul Bartlett

[edcayton]

I said this to someone else recently, but why not run the private siding through the backscene to the fiddle yard and then your imagination is free to roam (thinking Rowntrees in York, Shredded Wheat in Welwyn Garden City and many others)and can even have its own loco(s)?

 

Ed

[BB17005]

Millom Ironworks

Possibly a bit grand for what you're thinking but worth checking out the CRA site.

 

Here's a link to a wonderfully atmospheric photo on that site

Saddle Tank at Millom Ironworks

[edcayton]

Surely that is based on Walker Marine!!!

 

Ed

[signalmaintainer]

Another advantage of a milk loading place, or creamery, is that it can justify large passenger or mixed traffic locomotives as they were worked forward as express passenger. Jubilee or Royal Scot could be quite suitable for a Cumberland layout. Also, doesn't have to be very big as a partial train can arrive and the tanks in the siding can be added and then worked forward. Several similar sidings may be present in a milk producing area.

 

Paul Bartlett

 

A creamery was definitely on the list of possibilites, Paul. Though a Jubilee or Royal Scot might feel a wee bit put out working a train on a former light railway now an out-of-the-way branchline!

 

I said this to someone else recently, but why not run the private siding through the backscene to the fiddle yard and then your imagination is free to roam (thinking Rowntrees in York, Shredded Wheat in Welwyn Garden City and many others)and can even have its own loco(s)?

 

Ed

 

I considered that too, Ed. However, that idea was discarded as my expansion plans for Ettinsmoor involve relocating the fiddle yard, extending the layout to include the junction with the rest of the BR network (an opportunity for many more signals), and modeling a small engine depot and station. That, in turn, means the private siding track through the backscene would become an orphan, requiring a different industry. That led me back to where I started.

 

 

Millom Ironworks

Possibly a bit grand for what you're thinking but worth checking out the CRA site.

 

Here's a link to a wonderfully atmospheric photo on that site

Saddle Tank at Millom Ironworks

 

Thanks for that photo! Small industrial locomotives are always winners!

[Guest Max Stafford]

Your entire milk train could come off the shelf from Hornby, Paul. A handful of 6-wheel tanks and an ex LMS 50'BG would suffice. Trains from the creameries at Appleby and Aspatria would often consist of such a load and would generally be headed by class 4 or 5 power.

 

Dave.

[Etched Pixels]

If you really can't make up your mind the make the siding area removable and you can build several swappable ones !

[signalmaintainer]

Your entire milk train could come off the shelf from Hornby, Paul. A handful of 6-wheel tanks and an ex LMS 50'BG would suffice. Trains from the creameries at Appleby and Aspatria would often consist of such a load and would generally be headed by class 4 or 5 power.

 

Dave.

 

So tempting, Dave! But I've got the fuel depot bee in my bonnet now. Although there's precious little in the way of photographs on the Web of 1950's era British fuel depots served by rail.

 

 

If you really can't make up your mind the make the siding area removable and you can build several swappable ones !

 

That's an idea I should consider when I expand the layout. I saw the concept presented in Model Railroad several years ago. I like it.

[Oldddudders]

Not sure it's much help, Paul, but a quick Google produced this from another forum. Just thought it might help you to search for specific photos of such depots, although not all will have been extant in the '50s, maybe. One that comes to mind - and is now up for sale as new housing! - is the former Galley Hill sidings near Bexhill, Sussex, but I haven't yet found any pics.

 

http://www.railforums.co.uk/showthread.php?t=24012

 

About halfway down the page is a long list of candidates, including at least one in Cumbria.

[The Stationmaster]

So tempting, Dave! But I've got the fuel depot bee in my bonnet now. Although there's precious little in the way of photographs on the Web of 1950's era British fuel depots served by rail.

 

 

To some extent it depends how big you want it to be (I know that sounds a bit silly in relation to your site but what I mean is that even simple single siding depots could have very extensive unloading facilities if they happened to be ex Ministry of Supply or they could be very simple affairs).

 

Which are you after?

[signalmaintainer]

Not sure it's much help, Paul, but a quick Google produced this from another forum. Just thought it might help you to search for specific photos of such depots, although not all will have been extant in the '50s, maybe. One that comes to mind - and is now up for sale as new housing! - is the former Galley Hill sidings near Bexhill, Sussex, but I haven't yet found any pics.

 

http://www.railforum...ead.php?t=24012

 

About halfway down the page is a long list of candidates, including at least one in Cumbria.

 

Thanks, Olddudders! More leads for Google searches is exactly what I needed. I see Dalston so that's where I'm looking first.

 

One site where I've already derived a wealth of knowledge is here. I've found this site to be a terrific resource.

 

 

To some extent it depends how big you want it to be (I know that sounds a bit silly in relation to your site but what I mean is that even simple single siding depots could have very extensive unloading facilities if they happened to be ex Ministry of Supply or they could be very simple affairs).

 

Which are you after?

 

Something that will accommodate two to three tank wagons, with the goods trains switching out the siding one to two times per week. Not a large distributorship, but not diminutive, either.

[Guest stuartp]

There were some articles or correspondence in MRJ some years ago regarding small commercial depots, and there's a very good write up of the faclities at (I think) Aberystwith in (I think) Copping's "Oil On The Rails" (sorry to be a bit vague, I'm 300 miles from my references balancing our kid's laptop on my knee). The unloading facilities might be no more than a stand pipe in the goods yard with a secure compound nearby for storage, filling cans etc.

[Etched Pixels]

There were some articles or correspondence in MRJ some years ago regarding small commercial depots, and there's a very good write up of the faclities at (I think) Aberystwith in (I think) Copping's "Oil On The Rails" (sorry to be a bit vague, I'm 300 miles from my references balancing our kid's laptop on my knee). The unloading facilities might be no more than a stand pipe in the goods yard with a secure compound nearby for storage, filling cans etc.

 

Although long out of service the Aberystwyth facility is still present and can be viewed pretty well from public areas and from Google maps. It's a very very simple facility indeed - a single siding with the station run around loop available if needed.

[signalmaintainer]

There were some articles or correspondence in MRJ some years ago regarding small commercial depots, and there's a very good write up of the faclities at (I think) Aberystwith in (I think) Copping's "Oil On The Rails" (sorry to be a bit vague, I'm 300 miles from my references balancing our kid's laptop on my knee). The unloading facilities might be no more than a stand pipe in the goods yard with a secure compound nearby for storage, filling cans etc.

Thanks for the tip, Stuart!

 

 

Although long out of service the Aberystwyth facility is still present and can be viewed pretty well from public areas and from Google maps. It's a very very simple facility indeed - a single siding with the station run around loop available if needed.

You guys are amazing on this forum! To Google maps I go. . . .