Fort William (Old) Station 1970 - 1975

[clachnaharry]

Fort William (Old) station has often been put forward as an Ideal small terminus, with only 2 turnouts and 3 platforms, with the seaward line extending beyond the platform along the quay.

 

I am interested to get some information for operations in the time period from 1970 to 1975, when it was closed and replaced with more modern facities further from the town centre

 

Can anyone supply answers to the following questions.

 

1 - Platform usage. All pictures I have seen show trains arriving at the seaward line. I have seen no photographs of engines at the bay platform buffer stops. Were the bay platforms ever used for arrivals after the removal of the engine release crossover?

 

2 - Passenger coach stabling and servicing. Pictures indicate that the line extending beyond the seaward platform was used for stabling spare coaches. Was all coach servicing, including the sleeping cars carried out in the bay platforms and on this line, or were there carriage sidings further back along the line as well?

 

3 - Motorail. Were motorail vans ever included in the sleeper trains of this period. If so where were they loaded and unloaded?

 

4 - Parcels stock - Many pictures of the far north and Kyle lines in this period show passenger train formations containing GUVs, CCTs etc. but these seem noticable absent from the Fort Wlliam scene.  Is this correct - was everything of that sort just carried in Mk 1 full brakes?

 

5 - Mallaig mixed trains - The 1980's practice of attaching TTAs to the back Mallaig trains is well documented and photographed. However, during this earlier vaccum braked period, mixed trains were also a feature of the Mallaig line. In Ian Futers book on Scottish railway modelling projects, there is an intriguing shot of a goods brake van in one of the bay platforms - so did the mixed trains regularly convey a goods brake van? If so, could unbraked stock be found on these trains, or only fitted stock - fish vans, oil tankers, MCVs etc? 

 

6 - Locomotives - Mainly class 29s at the start of the period, giving way to class 27s. Did class 20, 24s and 25s ever feature on passenger trains at the station? Was the 08 pilot used for shunting coaches in the station?

 

7 - Timetable - I have yet to dig up a working timetable for the period, but I believe that the normal platform was 3 trains to/from Glasgow and 4 trains to/from Mallaig. How many of these would travel right through between Mallaig and Glasgow and vice versa?

 

Lots of questions!

[robertcwp]

I can't answer the detailed questions but here is a photo from the period:

 

27_FortWilliamOld by robertcwp, on Flickr

[The Stationmaster]

As far as No. 5 is concerned of course they conveyed freight brake vans if they were mixed trains (they'd hardly be mixed trains if they didn't have a freight brake van when you think about it).  When the Mallaig tank car was conveyed back in the late 1960s there was a barrier vehicle between the passenger coaches and it and I saw the train with a 16 ton mineral wagon used as the barrier - so consequently the freight vehicles were unfitted (which is precisely why they were mixed trains - they were used to convey non-passenger stock and some of that stock could be unfitted).

[keefer]

not sure how much this helps, but some pics at RAILSCOT: http://www.railbrit.co.uk/location.php?loc=Fort%20William%20(Old)

[clachnaharry]

As far as No. 5 is concerned of course they conveyed freight brake vans if they were mixed trains (they'd hardly be mixed trains if they didn't have a freight brake van when you think about it).  When the Mallaig tank car was conveyed back in the late 1960s there was a barrier vehicle between the passenger coaches and it and I saw the train with a 16 ton mineral wagon used as the barrier - so consequently the freight vehicles were unfitted (which is precisely why they were mixed trains - they were used to convey non-passenger stock and some of that stock could be unfitted).

 

Thanks for the replies so far. This reply is interesting - if passenger train needs a goods brakevan to be classed as a "mixed" train - what were the 1980's passenger trains with TTAs attached on the Mallaig line, or MCVs attached on the Kyle line, classified as? These had no goods brake attached. Were they officially just passenger trains?

[The Stationmaster]

Thanks for the replies so far. This reply is interesting - if passenger train needs a goods brakevan to be classed as a "mixed" train - what were the 1980's passenger trains with TTAs attached on the Mallaig line, or MCVs attached on the Kyle line, classified as? These had no goods brake attached. Were they officially just passenger trains?

The Regulations had changed but they might well indeed have become 'passenger' (as opposed to 'mixed') trains by then.  In the standard definition of the term a mixed train was one which was authorised to convey freight vehicles (i.e vehicles which were not classified as 'passenger stock' or which were not authorised to be conveyed by a passenger train).  This tended to inevitably mean that such vehicles were short wheelbase (and/) or lacked continuous brakes and equally inevitably meant the train had to convey a freight brakevan because the wagons had to be marshalled behind the passenger coaches - although some of Colonel Stephens' railways tended to ignore that final bit.

 

Now the original mixed train regulations were dispensed with some time in - I think - the 1980s basically because by then the need had largely vanished and virtually all freight vehicles had by then got some form of continuous brake.  I believe the Scottish Region might have had in place some special instructions which, in effect, created a sort of mixed train category by allowing certain types of freight vehicle to be attached to passenger trains when they wouldn't normally be authorised but I can't be sure on that and I've never seen the Instructions (Scotland did have a habit of going its own way on some things and that didn't really begin to end until the abolition of the Regions in 1992).

[keefer]

the only other regular mixed train i can remember was the single freightliner flat which was added into (i think) far north passenger trains in the 70s

 

the flat went between the loco and the coaches and was air-braked with a through vacuum pipe - so the air brake worked on the flat and the vacuum brake worked on the rest of the train.

have found out there was just one, B601999 built c.1969 and coded FGB, later FJB and that it also had a through steam pipe (which would make sense, but i hadn't considered!)

lasted at least until 1984 http://www.flickr.com/photos/25691226@N07/6061318777/

 

i have some documents, will have to rake them out to check if there's any mention re: mixed trains

 

(post edited to add info as i find it and apols for going OT)

[stovepipe]

Fort William (Old) station has often been put forward as an Ideal small terminus, with only 2 turnouts and 3 platforms, with the seaward line extending beyond the platform along the quay.

 

I am interested to get some information for operations in the time period from 1970 to 1975, when it was closed and replaced with more modern facities further from the town centre

 

Can anyone supply answers to the following questions.

 

1 - Platform usage. All pictures I have seen show trains arriving at the seaward line. I have seen no photographs of engines at the bay platform buffer stops. Were the bay platforms ever used for arrivals after the removal of the engine release crossover?

 

2 - Passenger coach stabling and servicing. Pictures indicate that the line extending beyond the seaward platform was used for stabling spare coaches. Was all coach servicing, including the sleeping cars carried out in the bay platforms and on this line, or were there carriage sidings further back along the line as well?

 

3 - Motorail. Were motorail vans ever included in the sleeper trains of this period. If so where were they loaded and unloaded?

 

4 - Parcels stock - Many pictures of the far north and Kyle lines in this period show passenger train formations containing GUVs, CCTs etc. but these seem noticable absent from the Fort Wlliam scene.  Is this correct - was everything of that sort just carried in Mk 1 full brakes?

 

5 - Mallaig mixed trains - The 1980's practice of attaching TTAs to the back Mallaig trains is well documented and photographed. However, during this earlier vaccum braked period, mixed trains were also a feature of the Mallaig line. In Ian Futers book on Scottish railway modelling projects, there is an intriguing shot of a goods brake van in one of the bay platforms - so did the mixed trains regularly convey a goods brake van? If so, could unbraked stock be found on these trains, or only fitted stock - fish vans, oil tankers, MCVs etc? 

 

6 - Locomotives - Mainly class 29s at the start of the period, giving way to class 27s. Did class 20, 24s and 25s ever feature on passenger trains at the station? Was the 08 pilot used for shunting coaches in the station?

 

7 - Timetable - I have yet to dig up a working timetable for the period, but I believe that the normal platform was 3 trains to/from Glasgow and 4 trains to/from Mallaig. How many of these would travel right through between Mallaig and Glasgow and vice versa?

 

Lots of questions!

 

I've done some research into the old Fort William with a view to making a model one day. Some of the information comes from the Coach Working Notices made available by Robert Carroll on his Coaching Stock Yahoo Group.

 

1) I have not seen any pictures with locos at the buffer stops in the bay platforms. All arrivals appear to be into the seaward line.

 

2) Coaches appear to have been stabled anywhere they could be accommodated. So along the pier line, in the bay platforms, and in the through roads of the goods yard. I've not seen any evidence they were stabled at FW junction.

 

3) Motorail didn't go to Fort William pre-1975 as far as I'm aware. Perth and Stirling were the rail heads then.

 

4) BZs (6-wheel brake vans) and CCTs were used alongside BGs up to 1970 or 1971. After that BGs seem to be almost universal.

 

5) Vanfits and fish vans were a regular feature of passenger trains to Mallaig. Not strictly mixed trains as this stock is passenger-rated. Earlier 1960s photos seem to have these vehicles on the back upon departure, later on it seems they travelled behind the loco.

 

6) Class 20s working into the station on occasion. I've not seen a single photo of a 24 at FW so far. I have seen one picture of an Eastfield 25 at FW loco. 08s were used in the goods yard, and must have made it to the station from time to time, but I've not seen a photo as yet.

 

7) The CWNs on Robert's site are well worth a look. In 1971 there were 3 'through' trains to Mallaig and return. Additionally there was 1 FW - Mallaig round trip. On summer Saturdays in 1971, the 1725 was an 11-coach departure to Glasgow and Edinburgh with Sleeper and Restaurant coaches conveyed.

 

Hope that helps!

[clachnaharry]

Stovepipe - many thanks for sharing your research here - that clears up most of the questions. I am also contemplating an n gauge model of the station now that the Dapol class 27 is available. The biggest challenges seem to be devising a suitable scenic break at the signal box end of the layout, and the "waste" of space represented by a full length quayside line, which practically doubles the length of baseboard required if modelled at scale length, for what amounts to a carriage siding.

 

Re question 5 mixed trains, there is a photograph on the Railscot website showing what looks like a pipe wagon, tank wagon, mineral wagon and goods brake behind blue/gray coaching stock, so it looks like true mixed trains survived until at least the late 60s.

 

I presume that the 11 coach train left from the seaward line - where it must have extended beyond both ends of the platform.

[The Stationmaster]

 

 

Re question 5 mixed trains, there is a photograph on the Railscot website showing what looks like a pipe wagon, tank wagon, mineral wagon and goods brake behind blue/gray coaching stock, so it looks like true mixed trains survived until at least the late 60s.

 

They definitely survived until Easter 1969 on the basis of my observations

[Pacific231G]

I've also been interested in Fort William (old) for some time and it does seem to prove the point that a compact main line terminus can offer a lot more operating potential than any BLT. Ft. William in particular as a reversing terminus with a single track main line packs an awful lot of play value  operation into a very small space so I've been trying to get answers to similar questions to yours.

 

The harbour extension used to run for some distance beyond the McBrayne's pier to a quayside where there was a run round loop and stub end siding but I'm not sure whether this was for handling fish and/or general cargo or simply coal for the steamers. This appears very clearly in the 1901 OS map but I don't know when if ever it was reduced to a single siding and it was never any longer than it appears in later pictures.

 

 

This was more than the simple extension to the lochside platform in Roy Link and Ian Futers' "plan of the month"  in the March 1994 Railway Modeller but I'm assuming they were correct for the later period. My guess is that by BR times harbour goods traffic had all but ceased so the "main line" of the quayside extension was used to hold stock needed during the day's activities to avoid having to work it back to the main yard.

 

In the main station, apart from the two points that formed the throat, there was a crossover between the two bay platforms to allow locos from incoming trains to be released but this did fall out of use. I only knew the station after diesels had taken over in the 1960s and simply can't remember whether I ever saw locos that had brought trains in being held at the buffers waiting to be released once another loco had taken their train out. This "topping and tailing" would have been needed for any train running between Mallaig and Glasgow. It was complicated by the need to add or subtract sleeper sections for the overnight London trains and to add or remove the Glasgow and Fort William based observation cars that also had to be taken to the loco shed to be turned .

 

I suspect that where possible (i.e. when only one train was reversing) there was a preference for using the lochside track simply because it would avoid fumes (steam or diesel) under the canopy but when two trains were crossing at Ft. William or an extra was being run then they would have had to use one of both of the bays as well. There is a 1961 photo by Bernard Harrison  on the disused stations site http://www.disused-stations.org.uk/f/fort_william/index22.shtml that clearly shows a steam hauled train entering the centre platform so steam locos waiting at the buffers to be released weren't at all unusual.

 

I have a description by John McGregor of the operation of Ft. William during the last ten or fifteen years of steam from the Autumn 1991 edition of West Higland News (the journal of the "Friends of the West Highland Line") 

This describes the pilot locos (usually Class J36 0-6-0s) shunting sections of trains as part of the topping and tailing process for through trains. For example, for the morning train from Glasgow, once the Mallaig coaches had departed the pilot would move the sleeper section from London that terminated at Fort William to another platform so that the Glasgow locomotive (or locomotives if double headed)  that had brought the combined train in could be released. He also describes an intensive performance towards the end of steam when the morning Mallaig-Glasgow train crossed two Fort William-Mallaig extras thus using all three platforms. Ian Futers says that in steam days there was so much work for the J36 pilots in the station and the yard that three of them were needed each day.

The operation of the single track line from the yard to Fort William station was also complicated by goods trains having to run up to the signalbox to get or give up the single line tokens that would take them to the next box (at FW junction presumably)

 

If Motorail trains did run to Fort William when the old station was still in use - presumably loading-unloading with a portable ramp on the quayside extension- then this terminus really would be the gift to modellers that keeps on giving but, according to the 1965 motorail brochure, Ft. William was definitely not on the network then so Stovepipe is probably right that they only got to Ft. William after the new station was built.  On the family holiday when I spent most time in Ft. William we came up on the the overnight motorail service from Sutton Coldfield to Stirling.

However, if I ever build a version of Fort William (old) it will be La Bastide Guillaume and set in France and may well have a Train-Auto-Couchette complete with Blue and Gold CIWL Voitures Lits.

[theremin]

Picture of an class 08 shunting sleeper stock 1996 at railscot site.

 

http://www.railbrit.co.uk/location.php?loc=Fort%20William&offset=1

 

toby

[Stewart]

This photo on Ernies Scottish Railways site shows presumably the locos from a Glasgow arrival (Black 5 and B1's didn't normally feature on the Mallaig line until the early 60's after the withdrawl of the K2's) reversing out of the station c/w parcels vehicle. Despite the platform crossover being in existence during BR steam days I haven't come across anything suggesting that it was used. Most arrivals seem to have been released by the station pilot shunting the onward coaches to Mallaig into one of the other platforms (ready for an onward loco from the shed) and the remaining stock (sleeper cars on the first arrival of the morning for instance) shunted into the seaward siding/ platform or taken to the yard. All of which would tally with Ian Futers comments about the work rate of the station pilots. The first arrival from Mallaig in the morning was often a mixed train, there is a picture in the Robotham book On West Highland Lines of one such K2 hauled working which only has one coach, often full of school children, and a selection of various vans.

 

http://www.flickr.com/photos/irishswissernie/5746114509/in/set-72157626778604158

 

All in all a lot of operating fun from a classic minories style terminus

 

There are also some good pictures of the station building in the RCAMHS Canmore collection available on line.

 

Regards,

 

Stewart

[The Stationmaster]

I'm not sure on this but I think the latter 20th century mixed train working on the West Highland Extension dates from the diesel era after the bulk of the freight services (if not all) had been withdrawn and many station had been closed to freight traffic.  In earlier years the line was quite busy with freight although I understood (from a former Mallaig Driver) that tail traffic, mainly fish, was common on passenger trains - hence seeing trains with 'a selection of various vans'.

[Stewart]

Clachnaharry,

 

Can't recommend "All Stations To Mallaig the West Highland Line Since Nationalisation" by John A. McGregor. (published by Bradford & Barton in 1982?) highly enough.

 

Only a few pictures but this little paperback is rich in McGregors recollections of the "old" Fort mainly in steam era nationalisation but also the 70's. Has chapters on "summer timetable workings" and one on "shunting observations".

 

I checked the inside cover last night to see that I paid the pricely sum of £2.50 for my copy from Douglas Blades! A quick Google confirmed that you can still pick up a second hand copy on Amazon for less than a fiver incl. P&P!

 

Kind Regards,

 

Stewart

[clachnaharry]

Stewart,

 

Thanks for that - I'm on to it!

[Pacific231G]

Clachnaharry,

 

Can't recommend "All Stations To Mallaig the West Highland Line Since Nationalisation" by John A. McGregor. (published by Bradford & Barton in 1982?) highly enough.

 

Only a few pictures but this little paperback is rich in McGregors recollections of the "old" Fort mainly in steam era nationalisation but also the 70's. Has chapters on "summer timetable workings" and one on "shunting observations".

 

Thanks Stewart

I've just ordered a copy for about a fiver.

[DavidBird]

...

 

If Motorail trains did run to Fort William when the old station was still in use - presumably loading-unloading with a portable ramp on the quayside extension- then this terminus really would be the gift to modellers that keeps on giving but, according to the 1965 motorail brochure, Ft. William was definitely not on the network then so Stovepipe is probably right that they only got to Ft. William after the new station was built.  On the family holiday when I spent most time in Ft. William we came up on the the overnight motorail service from Sutton Coldfield to Stirling.

...

AFAIK, the Motorail service to Fort William only started in the early 1990s, with the start of Sprinter operations.  Before then, the FW-London Sleeper was combined with the Mallaig-Glasgow trains.  It was only when the Glasgow trains went over to Sprinters was there capacity on the sleeper service to cope with the motorail vans.  Incidentely the lunchtime FW-Mallaig train was formed with the seating coach from the sleeper.  The return working from Mallaig had the effect, although it was never advertised as such, of a through train between Mallaig and London Euston!

[Pacific231G]

Clachnaharry,

 

Can't recommend "All Stations To Mallaig the West Highland Line Since Nationalisation" by John A. McGregor. (published by Bradford & Barton in 1982?) highly enough.

 

Only a few pictures but this little paperback is rich in McGregors recollections of the "old" Fort mainly in steam era nationalisation but also the 70's. Has chapters on "summer timetable workings" and one on "shunting observations".

 

I checked the inside cover last night to see that I paid the pricely sum of £2.50 for my copy from Douglas Blades! A quick Google confirmed that you can still pick up a second hand copy on Amazon for less than a fiver incl. P&P!

 

Kind Regards,

 

Stewart

I got my second hand copy for £3.98 on Friday. It's a brilliant book not least because it focusses so much on Ft. William and its operation. Don't be confused though by the lower picture on p68- It's been reversed. John McGregor's detailed and well observed descriptions have added detail to my own far more limited memories of the station in diesel days.

Amongst other things, McGregor confirms that the lochside platform face was the one most used, mainly because it could accomodate longer trains especially when the arrival was double headed. That did though lead to an interesting situation when the front loco fouled the McBraynes pier and would have to be uncoupled and run further along the quayside extension. There were also times though when all three platforms were required.

Goods trains did have to run to the signalbox, for departures backing their trains almost into the station,  to get their first or give up their last token.

The siding along the quayside beyond the station was doubled until the end though it's not clear whether the crossover that would have allowed a loco to run round a cut of wagons survived. 

What he's added, which only add even more to the station's operational potential, was that in his father's time the quayside sidings had been quite well used for grain shipments from ships to the various distilleries, and that the WHR had long added fish vans to passenger trains at Mallaig and that in BR days these were joined by container flats and GUVs all of which had to be shunted to the rear of the train when it reversed at Ft. William. Being passenger fitted these didn't turn the trains into mixed.

Perhaps most unusual, even though Motorail services from England never used the old station, the road to Mallaig was so bad and often congested  that for a while a car carrying service between Fort William and Mallaig was offered with vans attached to passenger trains. At Fort William the vans were shunted to and from the goods yard to be loaded or unloaded. I do remember even in the 1960s that most A roads in the western Highlands were still single track roads with passing places though I don't know when the Ft. William -Mallaig road was widened.

 

The operational possibilities of this tiny mainline terminus really do seem to keep on growing the more I learn about it. The only downside is that Fort William seems to have been so completely unique- I hope someone will tell us that it wasn't-  that a station based on this plan couldn't really be anywhere else. I do know of other termini where at least some trains reverse to take another line and where trains were often remarshalled to do so but they're all far larger.

[clachnaharry]

 

The siding along the quayside beyond the station was doubled until the end though it's not clear whether the crossover that would have allowed a loco to run round a cut of wagons survived.

 

 

The second siding was removed before the early 70s. I think that the author's reference to a defective coach being shunted to the second siding refers to an earlier period.The evidence for this can be seen on the "Disused Stations" website which has a shot taken from beyond the end of the siding at a period when an exceptionally high tide had flooded the station area.There is only one buffer stop, and a fence runs parallel and close to the surviving track. This photograph is also useful in that it shows that by this period, this line could only have been used for stock storage, as the fence leaves no room for unloading wagons etc.

[Pacific231G]

The second siding was removed before the early 70s. I think that the author's reference to a defective coatch being shunted to the second siding refers to an earlier period.The evidence for this can be seen on the "Disused Stations" website which has a shot taken from beyond the end of the siding at a period when an exceptionally high tide had flooded the station area.There is only one buffer stop, and a fence runs parallel and close to the surviving track. This photograph is also useful in that it shows that by this period, this line could only have been used for stock storage, as the fence leaves no room for unloading wagons etc.

I've been delving further and found several other photos from the early 1970s before the old station closed. These confirm that there was just the single siding on what had been the quayside so McGregor was mistaken on that point. However the line of the single siding seems to be somewhere between the line of the two quayside tracks shown on the earlier OS maps. I'm guessing that at some point the original quayside track which may have been inset- the photos do show the top of the quay wall to be a bit higher than the ground behind it- was relaid as a single carriage siding and fenced off from what seems to have become a parking area for MacBrayne's buses.

 

Though I've not been able to find any ground level photos of the quayside in earlier times, a single aerial image has now appeared on Britain from Above (http://www.britainfromabove.org.uk/asearch?search=fort%20william ). This was taken in 1949 and, though it's a bit grainy, zooming in on the image (you have to register to do that but it's simple)  shows coaches on both sidings. I think the seaward ones are closer to the quay wall than coaches appear to be in later images of the single siding.

 

It would be interesting to know when between 1950 and 1970 the quayside layout changed. From a modelling operational point of view an active cargo quay might offer more than an unusually placed carriage siding but I suspect seaborne freight apart from maybe the odd coal wagon for the steamers had already disappeared before nationalisation.