Whitby Prospect Hill

[Steve Taylor]

Morning all,

 

Having decided that the work for Broomielaw deserves an attempt at building to real scale dimensions as possible, I've been doodling and looking for inspiration to make an entry in the 2010 challenge. For personal reasons I'm going NE and while the prototype often requires more like 2010 square feet rather than inches, one place that i've come across is Prospect Hill junction in Whitby. Now before I organise trips to the NRM and Kew or disturb the NYMR or NERA archivists, would anyone out there have any planwork or clear photos of the location? It was Geoff Plumb's fotopic site that gave me the idea, but would anyone have the equivalent images when the location was operational.

 

One further option is to "modernise" the location supposing that it was reopened as planned in the early seventies for potash traffic from a location on the Whitby Scarborough line - this was abandoned in favour of Boulby Mine and the Skinningrove route to Teesside. A brief stroll through Mr Bartlett's site reveals some detail of the COVHOPs for the early BR traffic from Boulby but does anyone know if this sort of traffic existed prior to Boulby and therefore what the predeccessors to these would be?

 

THanks all

 

Steve

[Dampflok]

Thanks for the mention with regard to Prospect Hill and glad to hear the photos on my site were behind your inspiration for this project! Sadly, I can't help any further as I never saw this location whilst it was operational.

 

It might be worth trying to check out Ken Hoole's collection of North Eastern locations as he was a very prolific photographer of the area and may well have pictures at this location before closure:

 

http://www.darlington.gov.uk/Culture/headofsteam/KenHoole/kenhoole.htm

 

Best of luck with the project,

 

Cheers, Geoff

[edcayton]

there is a model of this location in this area(Welwyn Garden City), I think it was built by the deHavilland Model railway Society.

 

Ed

[Steve Taylor]

Thanks for getting back to me.

 

Geoff, some very usefull stuff on your site and not just with refernce to Prospect Hill, a very big thank you for posting them all. My apologies though for failing to place a link up. I shall re-edit and add those in if you like. On my challenge thread, would you mind if i linked to those pics directly? Also should this attempt proceed would it be possibly to get hi-res scans to work from? There's a lot of detail to be had in those pertaining to the rodding and fitting out as well as working out the dimensions overall for track building (yup i'm gonig the masochists route).

 

Ed, cheers for the deHavilland ref. I've googled them and their site shows a definite leaning towards things NER, but they re-use Prospect Hill as Prospect Fell repositioned away up by Middleton-in-Teesdale so I guess its still a valid location.

BTW - I've looked at the NERA line diagram booklet and though West Cliff is in there, its stations only so junctions don't appear sadly. Once there's enough evidence that this will work i guess its off to the NRM search engine.

 

Cheers all

Steve

[Stuart]

Well, I went to school right next door, but in 1968, there was only the gently rusting track and I didn't think it worthy of a few shots on the Instamatic (hindsight!). The track had been left in, as you say, in anticipation of traffic from a proposed potash mine at Hawsker. Needless to say, neither mine nor traffic appeared.

But - try Railways Around Whitby by Martin Bairstow, Volume 2, it has a two page article by a former signalman with two photos of trains (one steam, one DMU) passing the signal box plus a signal box diagram. Volume 1 has but a single photo which shows the box and a couple of signals but no train.

Backtrack's Railways of the North York Moors has another single photo.

Lastly, the Dalesman Railways of the North York Moors by Ken Hoole has another two photos, one looking north under the box, the other of a tablet exchange right underneath it ( but only with a DMU.

HTH

Stuart

[Nortonian]

For photographs of what you are looking for , go to www.disused-stations.org.uk and scroll down the list of stations, ie Whitby Westcliffe, scroll to bottom of page and click `view more photo`s, do the same again on that page, and on there, ie page 3, there are some photo`s of Prospect hill.

 

Kindest

 

Ian

[Steve Taylor]

Thanks again chaps. I've hit subrit/disused stations, flickr, fotopic and a few others and have a reasonable idea of what was up there and will try to excavate the storage dept and see if i have the Bairstow book or as i suspect .... not.

 

One usefull thing that has turned up is that google earth has a measuring tool and comparing that with measuring from the OS 1:25k, gives an average measurment between the two overbridges of about 890' and a max trackbed width of about 60'. The pics show one left-handed point, one right- handed, one Y and one set of traps. As far as i can see the junction points are protected by FPLs not locking bars with two small rodding runs of two rods each coming north from the box to serve the junction points and the y-point for the loop. I would assume the south end of the loop on the coast line was also an FPL but it is unclear from the picture of dereliction through the undergrowth what was there. If the signal diagram is forthcoming i can then work out the movements properly but if anyone has any memories of how the loop was worked I'd be very interested to hear. Was it purely a run round loop or for changing ends when coming up from Whitby Town and then proceeding to Scarborough and vice-versa or was it a genuine passing place? Anyways it looks promising and could always be re-worked for that grimy 70's vibe.

 

Cheers

 

Steve

[Nortonian]

Hi Steve,

 

I have just dug out my copy of `The Scarborough & Whitby Railway` by J. Robin Lidster. ISBN 0-86067-016-3

There are four pages in the back of the book with photographs and in one of the photo`s, the double track section is described as a `Passing loop`.

I am sure I have seen a signalbox diagram of this junction, but where, I cannot recall. May even of been at the NYMR. The Bairstow books normally come up trumps in that department.

 

Regards

 

Ian

[Stuart]

I think the loop was worked as a passing loop - the copy signalling diagram shows the lines signalled and described as such.

Yes, there was an FPL at the southern end of the loop.

In the summer 1963 working timetable, there only appears to be one booked crossing, the 0955am Middlesbrough-Scarborough is shown as arriving at Prospect Hill at 1126 and departing at 1130, whilst the 1023 Scarborough-Middlesbrough arrives at 1123 and departs at 1128.

Same on Sunday.

The goods didn't finish until 1964 but I have no timings for that train (most (all??) NE local goods only had one timetabled time and that was departure from the originating station).

Plus the scenic specials.

 

Stuart

[luckymucklebackit]

Hi - You might want to try the Alan Godfrey 1911 map of Whitby - http://www.alangodfreymaps.co.uk/whitby.jpg these are reasonably priced at ??2.25 +P&P and have a surprisingly high degree of detail.

 

Jim

[LNERGE]

http://www.yfaonline.com/yfapublic/assetDetails.cfm?film=3645&keyword=&sortby=&decade=24&by=decade&start=11&fromSearchValue=fromBrowseBy

 

Pretty good.

[Boris]

Can I offer a really good suggestion? You want the Marsden rail DVD called Brakevan to Whitby which includes extensive colour footage of Prospect Hill Jcn and also some footage taken inside the cabin, this may well be the best way of getting some good information. Also, if desired I can go and take some photographs of the location as it is now for structural referance (the bridges, retaining wall arrangement etc.), that can be arranged as I work very near the site. Contacting the NYMR archive won't do you much good at the moment as it is all currently being moved into the new building.

[the penguin of doom]

Can I offer a really good suggestion? You want the Marsden rail DVD called Brakevan to Whitby which includes extensive colour footage of Prospect Hill Jcn and also some footage taken inside the cabin, this may well be the best way of getting some good information. Also, if desired I can go and take some photographs of the location as it is now for structural referance (the bridges, retaining wall arrangement etc.), that can be arranged as I work very near the site. Contacting the NYMR archive won't do you much good at the moment as it is all currently being moved into the new building.

 

There is also a snippet on Marsden rail 31, (I think thats the number), Yorkshire byways. I'd also recommend the Ken Hoole book, I used to have it, but it's long gone. Good photo's in there though, if you can get hold os a copy.

 

You could also try PM'ming michnick who knows all sorts about NE regon signalling, but I've only used him for information south of Scarborough..... You'll find him on here though.

 

Cheers.

 

sean.