C126

Sorry to lurch back in time, and with shots not nearly as good, but please may I share my E.M.U. archive, before it turns to dust... 1702, January 1988, Lewes, up to London. 1280, Brighton, May, 1988. S76667 nearest camera. 6311, May 1988, Southover nr Lewes (ex-Brighton). 1271, 2106, 1817, 1F29, Lewes, 2nd June, 1988. Princess Di's visit (she had the back unit, I think, locked out for her use). I was hoping for the Royal Train, I admit... Bits of 8104 (right) and 8024, dumped at Newhaven sidings, 3rd June, 1988. Full details available if wished. 2204, S76564, Lewes ex-London Victoria, 20th December, 1988, 12.53. 1803, Lewes, 20th December, 1988. 13.10 ex-Brighton. 1719 (ex-Seaford?) joining the London Victoria service, Lewes, Summer (August?) 1989. Ditto, thought I ought to add for completion. 1281, Down boat-train, Lewes, August 1989. 1204 approaching Lewes, 18th August, 1989, 17.17.

Hope these are of interest. I wish to retain the copyright, but do use them for personal interest. Thanks. More to follow when I have time. 47 584, Southerham nr Lewes, 17th September, 1988, 10.14. 47 435, 6th August, 1988, Lewes. 47 451, 21st May, 1988. Eastbourne. 47 330, 25th June, 1988. Eastleigh Depot. 47 477, 4th June, 1988, 10.14. Lewes. 47 156, 6th May, 1988, 16.06. Lewes.

Please accept my apologies if this is the wrong message-strand, but I have found the following, showing 60 001's first venture from the Brush works to the railway boundary fence one evening. I hope it might be of interest. 60 001, Loughborough, 23rd June, 1989, in the evening.

Having completed scanning and labelling my first batch of photos, I hope they might be of use to some readers of this site, and are an inadequate 'thank you' from me to many others on this web-site for their rather better, informative, and often inspiring shots. Alas, I was let down by being 'not very good', wearing spectacles, and having a cheap camera, but they are, at least, a record of events. 33 211 11th April, 1988, 09.11. Lewes. 33 009 20th December, 1988, 12.36. Lewes. 33 023+33 060, 18th February, 1988, 13.24. Lewes. 33 011, January 1988, Somewhere near Barnham, I think, racing along from Brighton to Bristol Temple Meads. I hope these are of interest, and I will post some more later. Thanks.

Dear Phil and colleagues, I was at the Swindon National Monuments/ Historic England archive in November last year searching for aerial photographs of this very area. From those seen, I can confirm that in the 1960's the lines were a positive spaghetti (including a couple of diamond crossings) from Newhaven boat station eastwards, along the 'ridge' between the lagoons and beach proper. I chose photo no. MAL/76063 frame 039 to be printed as a good illustration of this, but it was rejected by H.E. because the copyright is held by the Environment Agency, inherited from the National Rivers Authority. They would be willing to print it if I can prove permission from the E.A., but to be honest, I have not the time to investigate to whom I should apply. I do recommend a beautiful oblique photograph taken on 5th Sept. 1943 (RAF/239/AC188.0.3017) looking eastwards, showing the lagoons, Tide Mills, barrage balloons, etc., that shown the layout of the waters, beach, and docks. I also bought a print of another, vertical (RAF/58/2937.F42.0040) of 15th June 1959, that stretches from the current waste incinerator down to the east beach, showing all the yards and sidings in the area. There were many other photographs I would have bought if cheaper, including showing the Royal Sovereign light-house platform being constructed as mentioned above, plus the sidings filling in the lagoons in the 1970's. From what I remember, towards the end of the project, these tracks consisted of a few long sidings eastwards, and then a parallel pair of 'kick-backs' pointing north-west, with piles of spoil each side that were used to build the hard-standings and warehouses on now extant. I also remember the area from my childhood, and am delighted to have a 3rd-rail insulator pot, dated "APR 66", rescued from the debris one summer, that now props open the door to my library. The ref. no. of my search undertaken I think was "116002". One might be able to cite this to the enquiry dept. to save time, and they could simply look out the same results for any visitor intending to purchase prints, etc. I hope this is of use. Be warned: these results do not include the Aerofilms collection, which I did not realise! This needs a separate search request, so I fear I will be returning to Swindon soon...

Plus a sequence of 47 812 heading to Eastbourne one summer's evening.

Hope these few scans of the old 'Sussex Scot' might be of interest.

My hearty thanks as ever to you all for giving this question your consideration, and such prompt replies. I had no idea the original yards were so extensive. I should just correct the Middleton Press title as "London Bridge to East Croydon", and published 1988. There is a picture (pl.112) in Mr Marsden's 'Diesels on the regions : Southern region' (1984) of a '33' and inspection saloon passing a fan of sidings on the west of the main line (adjoining the depot), which I thought might be the yard. There is another similar I have seen, but can not locate, of an '08' propelling a few wagons into these sidings as well. Thank you especially to 'SED Freightman' and Dave/'Unravelled' for the maps. I see now how the rest of my week will be spent...

A simple, and probably silly, question: where were the locations of the old Norwood (Up and Down) Yards? Please could someone point me to any photographs in the usual photographic literature. Have they been swallowed up in the huge Selhurst Depot site, or was they east of this, the other side of the main lines to London Bridge? Did one close, leaving the other to be just "Norwood Yard", or were they both closed together? I was disappointed not to see them featured in the Middleton Press volume ('East Croydon to London Bridge'). For such an important location (handling inter-regional wagon-load freight for the Southern Region), they appear to be little illustrated, although there are several photographs around of goods trains thereto/from. Many thanks as ever.

(So sorry; I posted this initially in the wrong thread.) - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Observed formations to/from St Leonard's West Depot, 1985-1987. (Times approx. passing through Lewes) 12.55 5/2/85, Up. '73', OBA (Railfreight red livery), 4xTTA, VEA (Railfreight livery). 10.40 12/2/85, Down. 2xZRW, '73'. 10.05 27/2/85, Up. '33', approx. 10xMDV (bauxite/rust). 14.00 19/4/85, Up. 73 132, VIX (baux.), 2xTTA, ZRW, 2xTTA, CCT(?) (brown? olive?). 10.40 23/4/85, Up. 73 103, OBA/ZDA (baux., with side-stanchions), OCA (Rf red). 14.00 24/5/85, Up. 73 003(?), VIX (baux.), VDA (baux.). 10.20 14 or 21/11/85, Down. 4xTTA, 73 111, 33 045. 09.55 5/12/85, Up. 73 132 (large logo), VIX (baux.), 4xTTA, VIX (Rf red), HAA (!). 10.10 6/3/86, Down. VIX (Rf), VIX (baux.), TTA, CCT (olive), 7xTTA (some "BP"), 73 140 (large logo). 10.05 17/4/86, Down. 3xTTA, CCT (olive), 2xZRW, 73 (large logo). 09.25 5/9/86, Down. TTA, 6xHBA/HEA (5 baux., 1 RF red), 73 005 (large logo). 10.45 26/9/86, Down. TTA, 73 (large logo). 10.40 17/10/86, Down. 2xTTA, 73 (large logo). 10.22 24/10/85, Down. ZRW, '33' (old blue/yellow). 10.45 7/11/86, Down. TTA, '33' (old b/y). 10.15 14/11/86, Down. 2xTTA, '33' (old b/y). 10.45 21/11/86, Down. TTA, '33' (old b/y). 10.40 5/12/86, Down. TTA, MCV (baux.), TTA, ZRW, '33' (old b/y). 10.50 12/12/86, Down. 3xTTA, '33' (old b/y). 10.15 9/1/87, Down. TTA, ZRW, 73 005 (large logo). 10.45 23/1/87, Down. 2xTTA, 73 (Gatwick Express livery, pale blue name-plates). 10.40 6/2/87, Down. 2xTTA ("BP"), TTA, '73' (GX livery). 10.20 13/2/87, Down. TTA, 73 114. 10.45 20/2/87, Down. TTA, 73 001 (large logo). 10.15 6/3/87, Down. TTA, '73' (large logo). 10.45 20/3/87, Down. ZRW, '73' (GX livery). 11.25 27/3/87, Down. TTA, '73' (GX livery). 10.15 10/4/87, Down. ZRW, 5xTTA, 73 126 (large logo). 10.00 1/5/87, Down. CCT (olive), ZRW, '73' (GX livery). 10.15 8/5/87, Down. TTA, ZRW, TTA, '73' (large logo). 10.35 22/5/87, Down. VIX (baux.), TTA, '73' (large logo). 10.00 5/6/87, Down. TTA, 73 005 (large logo). 10.45 3/7/87, Down. ZRW, '73' (GX livery). 10.40 24/9/87, Down. 'ZRW un-hooded?', '73' (GX livery). N.b., the wagons most likely will be the departmental-use vehicles (e.g., CCT, VIX). "TTA" could be any of the T.O.P.S. short-wheel-base silver/grey tankers. Hope this helps. [Edit: for 'ZRW' read "ZRA". Sorry.]

May I, again, thank you all for your contributions. It is good to know what wagon-loads were handled in the last few years of such yards. I had Chichester and Crawley New Yards in mind, but what prompted my ideas were the splendid 'daily routine' photographs of Rochester Yard, etc., on another thread here a while ago. It occurred to me that if a model is built to handle two feet of OO wagons (not including loco) in a daily train, if one has three loading/un-loading sidings these need be only eight inches long in theory. I was hoping for an excuse to use longer sidings, and more than necessary as the model's space would allow. One sees layouts in magazines where every siding has wagons on it, but presumably this is less accurate for 1970's/1980's practice. Thanks and best wishes again to you all.

May I thank you all for the replies received so far, and and apologise for any confusion caused. I did not realise such 'general user' yards had almost died out by the 1980's. Having seen so many photographs on this site, I thought some yards that survived into the Speedlink era still had sidings for irregular dispatches by rail (e.g., a large yard in Bristol somewhere?). I wanted to model such a (smaller) arrangement (which now seems verging on total phantasy, especially as I wanted to base it on the Southern) with a siding to a warehouse, plus two either side of a hard-standing. This got me wondering how many extra sidings I would need for operational requirements. I thought yards in this time would handle, if offered, intermittant but economic, traffic flows. Now it appears not, alas. Sorry for my pauses in reading/contributing. Access to computer and internet is irregular at the moment with me. Thanks again to you all.

Please forgive what might be a foolish question, but can someone please tell me if a goods yard of the 1970's (wagon-load era) and/or 1980's (Speedlink) would have its wagons taken away the day after delivery by a once/twice daily trip working, or if turnover of stock was slower (e.g., 2-3 days or more). I am curious to know about siding capacity, and whether there was space for wagons remaining for a few days, as well as the (twice?-)daily delivery and returns to the local marshalling yard(s). I assume a yard's capacity was calculated as: 1x train length for delivery, 1x train length for returning, and a fan of sidings for the allocated wagons of each arriving daily train. Or would there be also extra capacity for wagons 'loitering' a while? Is this situation correct, or have I misunderstood how trip freights to terminals worked? Many thanks for any advice.

Sorry for my tardy reply, but if of interest, I can supply a few observed formations for the Hove(?)/St Leonard's depot works trains from 1985-1987. Best wishes to you all.