The good old goods shed? when did the finish.

[Hugh Flynn]

Hi

As the title says I have been looking through some books and most towns,country station yards,city,s had them but when did they actually finish.

I remember going to Goole in the 70,s and seeing staff working unloading vans but cannot remember seeing staff working in small town goods sheds ,now if anyone has blue diesel photo,s dropping off wagons inside goods sheds or anything any latter?

thanks in advance

Hugh

[Fat Controller]

Hi

As the title says I have been looking through some books and most towns,country station yards,city,s had them but when did they actually finish.

I remember going to Goole in the 70,s and seeing staff working unloading vans but cannot remember seeing staff working in small town goods sheds ,now if anyone has blue diesel photo,s dropping off wagons inside goods sheds or anything any latter?

thanks in advance

Hugh

Most of the smaller ones, and many large ones, would have ceased operation following the 1967 Transport Act, when the Sundries traffic (less-than-wagonload consignments, the mainstay of such buildings) was handed over to National Carriers. The majority were then closed down, with road distribution from a small number of regional terminals, and rail (though increasingly road) trunking between them. This was really only a continuation of a practice that had started pre-Nationalisation. Some sheds remained in use as Rail Express Parcels depots- Longport, in Stoke on Trent being one.

[edward66]

Our local shed in Caton on the Little North Western finished to all intents and purposes by about 1960, occasional pickup goods traffic was stuff unloaded outside as far as I recall. The line closed finally in 1967 but the goods shed has survived as a Catholic Church!

 

Edward

[The Stationmaster]

Basically 'through the 1960s' although some had gone earlier - a lot earlier. Concentration schemes for goods smalls (consignments of less than 1 ton) started in the 1930s under various names and some local goods sheds began to fall out of use then. The process began again in the 1950s but really got underway post the Modernisation plan of 1955 and then had its final impetus with the Beeching plans to rationalise freight. By the mid 1960s an enormous number of local freight depots had closed or had been reduced to wagonload traffic only (which in many cases normally meant coal class traffic only) and smalls were delivered by road from larger centralised depots.

 

The death knell came with the transfer of the Sundries Division (smalls having been rechristened 'sundries' in the '60s) to national Carriers as Brian (Fat Controller) has already explained although some were retained by BR as parcels depots - principally where they had become dual freight sundries/parcels depots in BR days and NCL didn't want them (the Act required NCL to return to BR any property which it ceased to use but the normal course of events was for NCL to commercially rent it out and ignore what they were supposed to do).