Theory of General Minories

[KeithMacdonald]

On a different OS map, a different view of Baker Street

 

 

https://maps.nls.uk/geo/explore/#zoom=18&lat=51.52308&lon=-0.15669&layers=168&b=1

[Regularity]

6 minutes ago, KeithMacdonald said:

different view of Baker Street

We seem to be winding our way down there…

[KeithMacdonald]

47 minutes ago, Pacific231G said:

That's correct. You can see it in this image.

... It's interesting to consider how the station might have developed in more modern times had it not been closed. A possible subject?

 

I concur. Here's an image on Flickr of the other end of the station, thanks to Chris Stanley.

 

Quote

 

Ramsgate Harbour Station

Opened in 1863 , closed in 1926. (Collection)

 

 

 

[KeithMacdonald]

Just now, Regularity said:

We seem to be winding our way down there…

 

But no saxaphone solo yet?

[kitpw]

23 minutes ago, KeithMacdonald said:

Does this help? Rotated about 45 degrees to suit display here

...well found!  It's that edition I have in printed form.  I thought (and still think) it would make an interesting model but with limited operational potential given that that the northwards extension was predominantly a passenger line.  It was, of course, all standard gauge (unlike the Edgware Road depot) and so lacks the appeal of both broad gauge and standard gauge in the same layout. 

 

 

 

[Pacific231G]

4 hours ago, KeithMacdonald said:

 

I concur. Here's an image on Flickr of the other end of the station, thanks to Chris Stanley.

 

 

 

Interesting

With the 1905 OS 25 inch map, this and other images seem to show that working stock from the arrival to departure side involved a shunt into the tunnel. using the trailing crossover (that was half in the tunnel. I don't know how far into the tunnel the steep gradient began. I'm guessing that on busy days a number of trains arrived in the morning and were shunted back to the kickback carriage sidings and then brought out one by one for the evening return. That return would have involved shunting them into the down platform then up into the tunnel and back to the departure platforms.

[simon b]

On 30/06/2022 at 01:30, Pacific231G said:

That's not necessarily so Mike. Ramsgate Sands was a busy passenger terminus. especially for holiday and tripper traffic   but it had a very small two road goods yard tucked between the terminus and the cliffs behind that I assume served just the harbour and beachfront area. 

 

I thnk there was a small goods shed and it also seems to have handled coal, possibly for the fishing fleet and local guest houses etc. 

 

The main goods depot of a mainline railway associated with its major terminus would indeed be large, as at Paddington or Bishopsgate (Liverpool St), and probably separated somewhat from the passenger terminus. However, a fairly large terminus could ocassionally have a relatively  small goods yard serving just the local needs of the district the terminus happened to be in while the passenger terminus served the whole city.

Though it's not in Britain, there was a particularly good example of this at the St. Paul station in Lyon where a busy five platform passenger terminus handled mainly commuter traffic  but with a relatively small goods shed and yard alongside it even though the city's main (and very large)  goods yards were elsewhere. 

 

I think that in a large city, and possibly also at Ramsgate Sands, such a local yard would probably be served by trip workings rather than being a destination/origin of longer distance goods trains.

Alternative approaches are to use a kickback goods yard but assume that it's one end of a much larger yard stretching back alongside the main line or to make the goods sidings not a goods yard as such but rather the exchange sidings for a line serving  docks or local industries. 

 

 

Another example would be North Woolwich, even complete with the turntable at the end of the platforms. Busy urban terminus with a small goods yard between the station and the river.

 

 

 

[St Enodoc]

7 hours ago, KeithMacdonald said:

 

I do like that double slip.

[Flying Pig]

5 hours ago, St Enodoc said:

do like that double slip.

 

One for the finescalers, I feel.  Mind, it's all pre-group pointwork, with short switches everywhere.

[RobinofLoxley]

7 hours ago, St Enodoc said:

I do like that double slip.

 

I have always wondered why many seaside promenades have covered seating areas that remind you of signal boxes.  Now I see they may have been repurposed...... and moved 10 feet to the left

[roythebus1]

The copy of the Edgware Road map recently copied onto the FB Metropolitan Railway group shewed (vintage spelling) carriage sheds there as well. Note the traverser to get locos in and out of the shed on the eastern end. Remember the Met was originally operated by the GWR for the first couple of years and the broad gauge extended to Hammersmith. That too would make an interesting terminus! It also had the LSWR Addison Road (Olympia) to Richmond line running under the Met at Goldhawk Road (now Shepherds Bush bus garage), then along side up a gradient then curving sharply to the west to the disused viaduct that now carries the District and Piccadilly lines! 

Hammersmith Depot is the original as are the station buildings and signal box. The LSWR signal box was extant until fairly recent times. But we digress...

[roythebus1]

The person who knew a lot about Ramsgate Beach was the late Malcolm Parker of The Model Railway Club. He done a lot of research into the station and IIRC started building the model when he lived in Tivoli Road in north London.

[KeithMacdonald]

14 hours ago, St Enodoc said:

I do like that double slip.

 

8 hours ago, Flying Pig said:

 

One for the finescalers, I feel.  Mind, it's all pre-group pointwork, with short switches everywhere.

 

Yes indeed, I tried some virtual modelling with Code 100, and it doesn't really work very well. The original double slip and the other trackwork nearer the esplanade must have had much more acute angles. A bit too much "artistic license" is needed.

 

 

Edited July 2, 2022 by KeithMacdonald
Double images

[Pacific231G]

4 hours ago, KeithMacdonald said:

 

 

Yes indeed, I tried some virtual modelling with Code 100, and it doesn't really work very well. The original double slip and the other trackwork nearer the esplanade must have had much more acute angles. A bit too much "artistic license" is needed.

 

 

That looks pretty close to me Keith. I've tried blowing up the throat from the 1905 OS map and I don't think i'm seeing anythnig more acute than a 1:6 crossing and most of it seems to be 1:8 or 1:10. I agree though that an authentic model of Ramsgate Beach probably would require handbuilt pointwork.

Clearly the L.C. & D. R.  faced the same constraints on both length and breadth that we do and the principle of the station's layout is interesting.  A seaside terminus with a high level of day  trip traffic (so within an hour or two of major conurbations) would have almost a commuter pattern with a good proportion of trains arriving in the morning and departing, probably over a longer time period in the late afternoon and evening (at least in summer)  That would make it more important to get arrivals into the carriage sidings as quckly as possible but with rather more time to get stock from the sidings to the departure platforms.

It would certainly provide some interesting traffic and probably a greater variety of stock than a City commuter terminus.

What also makes it interesting is that it does provide a good prototype for a busy double track passenger terminus with a very small goods yard- something we've discussed endlessly. It's also a prototype for  a double track terminus with only a single crossover, so necessitating working based on separate arrivals and departure platforms, and a fairly limited numberof points.  

I looked at the SRS index but I don't think they have a signal box diagram but that and a WTT would be very interesting.  

I wonder if the L.C. & D.R.  anticipated Ramsgate becoming as important a resort as Margate. Tunelling down to the beach wouldn't have been cheap (though the Kemptown tunnel so the potential for attracting trippers must have been thought worth it.  I lived in and around Brighton for three years and always wondered why the station was so far from the beach- particularly when I lived in a guest house near the seafront and had to walk to Brighton Central every morning to get the train to Falmer!

[Pacific231G]

6 hours ago, roythebus1 said:

The copy of the Edgware Road map recently copied onto the FB Metropolitan Railway group shewed (vintage spelling) carriage sheds there as well. Note the traverser to get locos in and out of the shed on the eastern end. Remember the Met was originally operated by the GWR for the first couple of years and the broad gauge extended to Hammersmith. That too would make an interesting terminus! It also had the LSWR Addison Road (Olympia) to Richmond line running under the Met at Goldhawk Road (now Shepherds Bush bus garage), then along side up a gradient then curving sharply to the west to the disused viaduct that now carries the District and Piccadilly lines! 

Hammersmith Depot is the original as are the station buildings and signal box. The LSWR signal box was extant until fairly recent times. But we digress...

Not a digression at all Roy. Apart from the LUL stock using it. Hammersmith on the H&C is the most Minories like station I know.

One of my favourite "almost was" (rather than just "might have been") termini is Shepherds Bush (GWR)  This was to have been the terminus of the Ealing and Shepherds Bush Railway, a double track branch from Ealing, authorised in 1905,  intended to connect (for passengers not trains) with the Central London Railway at Shepherd's Bush (and with the West London Extension railway . In the end the GWR decided that it would be better to make the connection to an extended CLR at Ealing Broadway by giving them running powers over the GWR's Ealing and Shepherds Bush Railway. Shepherds Bush (GWR) could have been even more of a Minories than Hammersmith.

[St Enodoc]

44 minutes ago, Pacific231G said:

I lived in and around Brighton for three years and always wondered why the station was so far from the beach

The walk up West Street and Queens Road must have given you a clue!

[Regularity]

8 hours ago, Pacific231G said:

What also makes it interesting is that it does provide a good prototype for a busy double track passenger terminus with a very small goods yard- something we've discussed endlessly. It's also a prototype for  a double track terminus with only a single crossover, so necessitating working based on separate arrivals and departure platforms, and a fairly limited numberof points.  

I looked at the SRS index but I don't think they have a signal box diagram but that and a WTT would be very interesting.  

The arrivals side could also be used for departures, in fact 4 trains could be ready to take day trippers home. The photo below shows what appear to be facing point locks in the 4 foot on the arrivals side of the station. (Also, the centre road - note the open carriage door and the wider track spacing - and arrival bay are being used for stock storage. Not sure what is standing in the up bay: appears to be a single carriage, but there are only a couple of vents/lamps on the roof, it could be NPCS - perhaps a “Grand Vitesse” van?)

 

I believe the station was a bit of a nightmare on the prototype: the need to shunt using the tunnel, plus the approach being on a steep gradient down to station and damp on the rails caused lots of problems.

 

 

See also the September 2000 Railway Modeller for Peter Smith’s (kirtleypete of this parish) 7mm scale model.

[Nick C]

8 hours ago, Pacific231G said:

 

I looked at the SRS index but I don't think they have a signal box diagram but that and a WTT would be very interesting.  

There is a diagram on the SRS site: https://www.s-r-s.org.uk/html/sre/T1117.htm, dated 1914.

 

It shows two crossovers, the other (for down trains into the up platforms) being inside the tunnel, and both home and starting signals for all four platforms. 

[Regularity]

24 minutes ago, Nick C said:

There is a diagram on the SRS site: https://www.s-r-s.org.uk/html/sre/T1117.htm, dated 1914.

 

It shows two crossovers, the other (for down trains into the up platforms) being inside the tunnel, and both home and starting signals for all four platforms. 

It has suddenly become less interesting!

As that is dated 1914: I wonder if it reflects some alterations/additions made during joint committee ownership?

Edited July 3, 2022 by Regularity

[t-b-g]

2 hours ago, Regularity said:

It has suddenly become less interesting!

As that is dated 1914: I wonder if it reflects some alterations/additions made during joint committee ownership?

 

I think it illustrates the difference between building a model of a real place and using real places as inspiration for fictional models.

 

That setting, with the sidings in front of the rock face and the tracks vanishing into the cliff is pure model railway if you ask me.

 

So I would be looking to model something more like a conventional Minories plan in that sort of scenic situation, with a couple of added carriage sidings in front of the fiddle yard (as appeared on Bradfield Gloucester Square, a superb example of this type of arrangement) and then setting it in an area and a period where and when I can run the types of trains that I would like to have.

 

You could even put the three roads of the Minories together between two platforms, have a turntable at the end and a central release road/storage siding and an overall roof.

 

I attach a sketch to show the idea.

 

 

You could extend the loco spur into a small goods yard if you wanted to include one.

Edited July 3, 2022 by t-b-g
To add content

[Pacific231G]

7 hours ago, Regularity said:

It has suddenly become less interesting!

As that is dated 1914: I wonder if it reflects some alterations/additions made during joint committee ownership?

Oh well, it still leaves us with a very small goods yard alongside a fairly large MLT. There were very visible additions showing up in old images.

 

5 hours ago, t-b-g said:

 

I think it illustrates the difference between building a model of a real place and using real places as inspiration for fictional models.

 

That setting, with the sidings in front of the rock face and the tracks vanishing into the cliff is pure model railway if you ask me.

 

So I would be looking to model something more like a conventional Minories plan in that sort of scenic situation, with a couple of added carriage sidings in front of the fiddle yard (as appeared on Bradfield Gloucester Square, a superb example of this type of arrangement) and then setting it in an area and a period where and when I can run the types of trains that I would like to have.

 

You could even put the three roads of the Minories together between two platforms, have a turntable at the end and a central release road/storage siding and an overall roof.

 

I attach a sketch to show the idea.

 

 

You could extend the loco spur into a small goods yard if you wanted to include one.

I probably would include the small goods yard and one of photo of Ramsgate Beach does show what looks like a loco servicing pit near the start of the back goods shed road about where the water tower was so it could and presumably did act as both a goods road and a loco spur.

 

This is an early (and very touched) up image and shows that the down bay platform was a later addition. It also suggests that only the up platforms had starters before the down bay was added so I suspect that was when the facing crossover further into the tunnel was also added. Before then it does appear that there was one arrivals platform and two departures.

 

Note the very small signal cabin and an even earlier image shows this having a single signal post with two opposite facing arms, one arm allowing trains to enter the station and one facing the platform heads for departures.  

Something I am wondering is how, if the down platforms could handle departures, did passengers get to them? herding them over the barrow crossing between platforms and turntable was possible but, on a busy summer Sunday with a lot of train and loco movements and no platform gates?   

 

If I was adapting this scheme from Minories I think I'd add the centre road as a point off one of the upper two  and keep the third platform as Brian Thomas did with Newford (S.R.)

 

The other problem I see with basing a terminus on Ramsgate, with the turntable beyond the station is that it's a bit like using traversers for loco release or running passenger trains through the streets to a harbour station (a good excuse for a small terminus handling prestige trains) . Both  were AFAIK unique in Britain, to  Birmingham Moor Street and Weymouth respectively. Were there any other examples of an MLT with an end turntable. (There was a socking great sector arrangement at Boulogne Maritime acting as a loco release for five or sx platform tracks but again that was unique to there)

I don't though think that stops Ramsgate being a useful prototype for an MLT with a very small goods yard as its far more credible that there were others.

 

Edited July 3, 2022 by Pacific231G

[Pacific231G]

16 hours ago, St Enodoc said:

The walk up West Street and Queens Road must have given you a clue!

Well yes but only if you accept that as being the only route into Brighton. I accept that running gently down the Steyne probably wouldn't have got through parliament. It would have been rather too close to the Pavillion. Of course, when they built the terminus anyone who could afford to holiday in Brighton would have simply taken a hansom cab so would never have had to trudge up the hill as I used to. I think Ventnor station was doomed (when Sandown and Shanklin weren't) by simply being too far from the actual resort part of the town (Ventnor West was far better placed)

[john new]

On 03/07/2022 at 17:04, Pacific231G said:

Oh well, it still leaves us with a very small goods yard alongside a fairly large MLT. There were very visible additions showing up in old images.

 

I probably would include the small goods yard and one of photo of Ramsgate Beach does show what looks like a loco servicing pit near the start of the back goods shed road about where the water tower was so it could and presumably did act as both a goods road and a loco spur.

 

This is an early (and very touched) up image and shows that the down bay platform was a later addition. It also suggests that only the up platforms had starters before the down bay was added so I suspect that was when the facing crossover further into the tunnel was also added. Before then it does appear that there was one arrivals platform and two departures.

 

Note the very small signal cabin and an even earlier image shows this having a single signal post with two opposite facing arms, one arm allowing trains to enter the station and one facing the platform heads for departures.  

Something I am wondering is how, if the down platforms could handle departures, did passengers get to them? herding them over the barrow crossing between platforms and turntable was possible but, on a busy summer Sunday with a lot of train and loco movements and no platform gates?   

 

If I was adapting this scheme from Minories I think I'd add the centre road as a point off one of the upper two  and keep the third platform as Brian Thomas did with Newford (S.R.)

 

The other problem I see with basing a terminus on Ramsgate, with the turntable beyond the station is that it's a bit like using traversers for loco release or running passenger trains through the streets to a harbour station (a good excuse for a small terminus handling prestige trains) . Both  were AFAIK unique in Britain, to  Birmingham Moor Street and Weymouth respectively. Were there any other examples of an MLT with an end turntable. (There was a socking great sector arrangement at Boulogne Maritime acting as a loco release for five or sx platform tracks but again that was unique to there)

I don't though think that stops Ramsgate being a useful prototype for an MLT with a very small goods yard as its far more credible that there were others.

 

If people are being pedantic Weymouth Quay was not accessed by running through the terminus station but by a branch off which ended up running on the other side of the goods yard - the divergence for the Quay and Portland Branches being two or three hundred yards before the terminus platforms and their approach point work. The stub of the branch still does but the goods area is now just a car park. The Class 33 is coming off the branch spur.

 

Details: During the afternoon of 5th July '14 D6515/33 012 Lt Jenny Lewis RN and the 9 Mk 1 coaches of the "Royal Wessex" excursion were stabled on the live Quay Branch stub. The reason was three SO services ran to Weymouth on the 5th (The, then, regular SO IC125 from Bristol plus two excursions) and there are only two available roads in Jubilee Sidings. The 9 + loco formation is the maximum length able to be fitted in the signal block. The train was worked back to London via Salisbury (reversing at Southampton) with the 33 initially leading and Black 5, 44932, visible on the right, trailing

 

Edited July 4, 2022 by john new
Added the caption details.

[t-b-g]

2 hours ago, Pacific231G said:

Oh well, it still leaves us with a very small goods yard alongside a fairly large MLT. There were very visible additions showing up in old images.

 

I probably would include the small goods yard and one of photo of Ramsgate Beach does show what looks like a loco servicing pit near the start of the back goods shed road about where the water tower was so it could and presumably did act as both a goods road and a loco spur.

 

This is an early (and very touched) up image and shows that the down bay platform was a later addition. It also suggests that only the up platforms had starters before the down bay was added so I suspect that was when the facing crossover further into the tunnel was also added. Before then it does appear that there was one arrivals platform and two departures.

 

Note the very small signal cabin and an even earlier image shows this having a single signal post with two opposite facing arms, one arm allowing trains to enter the station and one facing the platform heads for departures.  

Something I am wondering is how, if the down platforms could handle departures, did passengers get to them? herding them over the barrow crossing between platforms and turntable was possible but, on a busy summer Sunday with a lot of train and loco movements and no platform gates?   

 

If I was adapting this scheme from Minories I think I'd add the centre road as a point off one of the upper two  and keep the third platform as Brian Thomas did with Newford (S.R.)

 

The other problem I see with basing a terminus on Ramsgate, with the turntable beyond the station is that it's a bit like using traversers for loco release or running passenger trains through the streets to a harbour station (a good excuse for a small terminus handling prestige trains) . Both  were AFAIK unique in Britain, to  Birmingham Moor Street and Weymouth respectively. Were there any other examples of an MLT with an end turntable. (There was a socking great sector arrangement at Boulogne Maritime acting as a loco release for five or sx platform tracks but again that was unique to there)

I don't though think that stops Ramsgate being a useful prototype for an MLT with a very small goods yard as its far more credible that there were others.

 

 

I would agree with what you say about the turntable arrangement. I really included it to show the way that I look at a prototype and then play with it to turn it into a fictional location. If I was building that layout, I may still call it Ramsgate Victoria or something like that to show that it is homage to the real place without being an exact copy.

 

I have designed several layouts that use a traverser to release the loco to save length but have hidden it under an overall roof so that the illusion is hard to spot. Again, I attach a sketch.

It would have been a two platform, double track terminus with a two road goods yard but with only 4 standard points to make/use. The roof would have been based on Grimsby. I kept looking and thinking and couldn't decide if I liked it or not, so it didn't get built.

 

I couldn't convince myself that I would be happy with a very rare prototype arrangement, as I prefer modelling the typical rather than the rarity.

 

Apart from that, I really like the scene at the terminus end of a station with a line of bufferstops, perhaps with a centre road occupied by a gas tank or a horse box awaiting its next duty.

 

In that respect, I think Chesterfield Market Place is a huge influence on me. 

[Regularity]

3 hours ago, Pacific231G said:

The other problem I see with basing a terminus on Ramsgate, with the turntable beyond the station

I can’t think of any inner city examples, but the SER station in Bromley ended in a turntable. This may have been a branch in prototype terms, but it was double track and in (then) outer London.

 

Talking of the SER, although deviating substantially from Minories, there was Margate Sands.