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Goods Yards and Freight Handling


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I enjoyed the thread 'Goods Train Operation' started by Andy Rush, which gave examples of how to accurately portray the trains.

For as long as I can remember I have been interested in freight trains and in the 1980s took quite a lot of pictures.

Many layouts have a goods yard or freight terminal and hopefully this will give some ideas to help make them realistic.

Here are some of my photos showing freight yards including some with goods being unloaded.

I was not intending this thread to be specific to any era or region, my own are taken between 1980-86 mostly Western Region.

Feel free to post pictures showing unloading by hand, crane, forklift etc, also general yard views, dates and location would be helpful.

(For Marshalling Yards and Sorting Sidings I was thinking of starting a separate thread).

 

To start off today here are 3 from Barnstaple in 1983, I have posted these before:-

 

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A  view of the yard at Barnstaple, there are cement PCAs, a vanwide (?), and a ferrywagon awaiting collection,

there is a general aura of decay that I remember well from those days, 31/10/83.

 

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The Blue Circle Cement silo, and  VDA 210291 with bagged sugar beet pulp nuts being unloaded by hand, 31/10/83

 

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VDA 210291 with beet pulp nuts being manually unloaded. 31/10/83

 

 

cheers

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Good idea for a thread.

 

Can I contribute these, possibly seen already elsewhere, but useful I hope:

 

Ferry-registered tanks ("Simotra" I think) with china clay slurry [edit in Jan 2019: perhaps chalk slurry] for the paper industry, being off loaded into a tanker lorry. Note the open hatch on top of the tank, presumably to equalise the pressure. Rochester 1985.

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And "big bags" of fertilizer being offloaded from OCAs using a forklift, onto a Dalgety(?) lorry. Banbury 1986.

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Here are two more pictures from Bridgwater, I have already posted, but I will add them here for continuity.

 

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47202 positions a flask under the gantry, it had arrived on 7V52 17.22 MWO Sellafield - Bridgwater, 9/8/83

 

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Scammell GTC 603X under the gantry crane at Bridgwater Nuclear Flask Compound, 9/8/83

 

cheers 

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Good idea for a thread.

 

Can I contribute these, possibly seen already elsewhere, but useful I hope:

 

Thanks, that was the idea.

 

The discarded pallets are the sort of detail that can help bring a scene to life in my view.

Also I am not much good at recognising appropriate road vehicles or forklifts so that is helpful.

 

cheers 

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Kingsland Road Yard in Bristol was one of the main Goods Yards.

There was a fan of 8 double ended roads, which when I knew the yards in the late 1970s, was used for sorting traffic.

There were further roads used for full loads traffic with cartage and craneage available.

 

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A view from one of the lighting towers.

On the left are two of the mileage roads with the yard offices in the distance,

The left hand of the roads was used for unloading the Hemmings Waste skips from Malago Vale carriage sidings,

the road on the riight (no 11 OUT I think), was being used to unload Guinness amongst other things, 20/9/83

 

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Guinness being unloaded by Premier Transport at Kingsland Road from VGA 210545.

This came from Park Royal, and for a while was an important flow of Speedlink traffic,

it was also handled in Exeter (Central and later St Davids) as well as elsewhere, 20/9/83

 

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Guinness being loaded onto a Premier Transport lorry at Kingsland Road, 20/9/83

Is the lorry or anything similar available RTP?

 

cheers

 

 

 

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Kingsland Road Yard in Bristol was one of the main Goods Yards.

There was a fan of 8 double ended roads, which when I knew the yards in the late 1970s, was used for sorting traffic.

There were further roads used for full loads traffic with cartage and craneage available.

 

attachicon.gifscan0027a.jpg

A view from one of the lighting towers.

On the left are two of the mileage roads with the yard offices in the distance,

The left hand of the roads was used for unloading the Hemmings Waste skips from Malago Vale carriage sidings,

the road on the riight (no 11 OUT I think), was being used to unload Guinness amongst other things, 20/9/83

 

attachicon.gifscan0028.jpg

Guinness being unloaded by Premier Transport at Kingsland Road from VGA 210545.

This came from Park Royal, and for a while was an important flow of Speedlink traffic,

it was also handled in Exeter (Central and later St Davids) as well as elsewhere, 20/9/83

 

attachicon.gifscan0029.jpg

Guinness being loaded onto a Premier Transport lorry at Kingsland Road, 20/9/83

Is the lorry or anything similar available RTP?

 

cheers

The tractor unit has an Ergomatic cab; there are several similar vehicles available:-

EFE do a selection of rigid Ergomatics, covering AEC, Albion and Leyland; you could probably transplant the cab onto a Base Toys tractor chassis.

Base Toys do a Leyland Mastiff artic- Premier used to run these as well, IIRC

Base Toys do the kegs..

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Any ideas to getting rebar off BDAs without overhead cranes ? 2 forklifts in formation ?

One forklift/telehandler with a spreader bar? Small mobile crane with spreader bar? You wouldn't want slings slipping along the bars when you lifted.

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Great pics and a most interesitng thread.

 

I'm currently building a layout depicting a small 1980s Speedlink Era yard and having difficulty finding pics of small goods yards and their facilities.

 

Looking for to seeing more pics,

 

cheers,

 

Mal

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One forklift/telehandler with a spreader bar? Small mobile crane with spreader bar? You wouldn't want slings slipping along the bars when you lifted.

The received wisdom from the relevant BR Manual is to use slings, though you'd make sure they were looped in such a way as to avoid slippage. This is certainly how I saw such loads being handled at Longport, which dealt with both long lengths and coils of re-bar. When dealing with the long lengths, the forklift would only move the long bars parallel to the wagon, with the lorry reversing under the suspended load. Far safer than having to manoeuvre the suspended load...
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'Hand-balling' lasted a surprisingly long time- I've got the knees to prove it! In 1979/0, I worked for Manpower in Stoke. One day, the boss, who was always a bit vague about what a job entailed, told me I'd 'got a bit of work, unloading a few railway wagons ' at BR's Longport yard. When I got there, I discovered that the wagons were the then-new VTG Ferryvans, each carrying about 65 tonnes of bagged plaster. They were on pallets, or at least had been until crossing the North Sea in mid-winter; no-one had thought to shrink-wrap them together. The result was that we would have to maul 60kg paper sacks on to new pallets, stack them, then shrink-wrap them- I was a lot younger and fitter then. In comparison, those beet-nut sacks would probably be only 25 kg.

It wasn't only sacks that were handled like that; on an adjacent track, BR's own staff were handling loose kegs of Guinness in 12t vans. This involved them lifting down loaded kegs from head height.

The curious thing about those beet-nuts is that it looks as though they might have been on pallets in the rail wagon- presumably, the customer wasn't willing to pay BR to fork-lift them off..

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Aft'noon all,

 

Here is a little freight handling mid-eighties, Buxton style from my Flickr site....the new cabin for the shed turn driver is being moved from Hindlow (on the former Buxton to Ashbourne line) to Buxton station on a p-way trolley roped at the end of a metal bar to the drawhook of a 37. Note the tail-lamp hanging by a thread!

 

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One of the rarest yards for visits and pictures is Tunstead yard...here is a mid-eighties picture. The man made tunnel on which I stood to take the picture acts as the shelter for any BR locos in the quarry when blasting takes place. The single line to Buxton is closed when this happens and the first loco over the line once blasting has finished is responsible for examining the line. Blackwell Mill, site of the well known former triangular junction between the Midland route towards Derby and the Buxton via Ashwood dale line is just half a mile or so beyond the far end of the yard.   

 

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Freight handling in a self propelled manner here as one of the machines for Sunday engineering work is manoevred off of an engineers train at Poynton

 

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Distinctive masts provide a good clue as to the location of this yard. Ashburys was part of the Manchester - Sheffield - Wath DC railway until 1981. The yard later became a stone terminal with rail operations having been transferred to the lower sidings adjacent to the station.

 

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More freight handling on the main line with Mermaid ballast opens tipping at Frodsham as 40143 creeps forward

 

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In the mid-eighties the yard at Peak Forest was a haven for vacuum braked wagons

 

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Here is one more picture from Kingsland Road in 1983.

 

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The Guinness traffic from Park Royal came in a variety of wagons, the two on the left I think are a VDA and a VBA, then there are 4 VGAs.

Among them is a ferry van which I assume was conveying other traffic, although I think cargowaggons were used for Guinness traffic.

On the right are vehicles belonging to Premier Transport who handled the traffic at Kingsland Road.

 

On an earlier visit to Kingsland Road on 18th June 1980 I took a couple of pictures in the yard.

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There appears to be a trailer loaded with kegs in the distance, otherwise not much activity,

the pilot 08900 is as usual attached to a brake van which was common in the Bristol area.

 

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On the same day this vehicle, 70 9296 005-1, was present, I don't remember its contents, 18/6/80.

 

cheers 

 

 

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Kevin,

That ferry-van's an Italian one; for some reason they left the ventilator covers in galv. finish, rather than painting them in the same brown as the body, as other railways did.

Not sure, but that middle vehicle from Premier looks as though it might be a Mastiff. Just did a bit of Googling- Premier were based around the corner at Day's Road, St Philips. The original firm's gone, but the owner was on of the founders of the Palletline network. They also did work for Speedlink at Exeter, I believe.

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Kevin,

That ferry-van's an Italian one; for some reason they left the ventilator covers in galv. finish, rather than painting them in the same brown as the body, as other railways did.

Not sure, but that middle vehicle from Premier looks as though it might be a Mastiff. Just did a bit of Googling- Premier were based around the corner at Day's Road, St Philips. The original firm's gone, but the owner was on of the founders of the Palletline network. They also did work for Speedlink at Exeter, I believe.

Thanks Brian,

I remember we received ferry vans from the continent for Kingsland Road and Temple Meads Goods at that time, but cannot remember the traffic,

it may have been foodstuff, either fruit or veg.

 

cheers

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Kingsland Road looks like it might make a nice subject for a banger blue era layout.  Any trackplans?  I looked on Old Maps UK but the relevant 1:2500 map for the 70s is not very legible.

 

Was it part of the Speedlink Network?  I can recall late Sunday evenings at Cheltenham Spa in the mid 80s waiting for my train back to Poly in Nottingham and enjoying the Enterprise blasting through, usually a 47 but sometimes a 45.  VDA, VGA and Carogowaggons mainly and sometimes steel bolsters...

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Kingsland Road looks like it might make a nice subject for a banger blue era layout.  Any trackplans?  I looked on Old Maps UK but the relevant 1:2500 map for the 70s is not very legible.

 

Was it part of the Speedlink Network?  I can recall late Sunday evenings at Cheltenham Spa in the mid 80s waiting for my train back to Poly in Nottingham and enjoying the Enterprise blasting through, usually a 47 but sometimes a 45.  VDA, VGA and Carogowaggons mainly and sometimes steel bolsters...

There are large scale track plans from the BR/OPC collection at the NRM under references 16905, 16908 and 17506. They are undated and might be a little early for Speedlink. Does anybody have an authenticated closure date for Kingsland Road - presumably by January 1989 as the Speedlink Timetable for that date doesn't mention it.

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Thanks, Andy

 

btw - what's a mileage road?

A siding (road) used for Mileage Traffic.  By the time Kingsland Road was operating in the manner seen in the pics above the technical description 'Mileage Traffic' was no longer appropriate as it had gone out of use some decades previously.  What the term actually refers to is traffic loaded in full wagon loads and charged on a mileage basis (in addition to the rate variation for the type/class of traffic concerned).

 

Mileage Traffic was usually dealt with in on open sidings (= mileage yards, mileage roads etc) at all but the largest fully covered depots.  The goods shed was used to handle 'smalls traffic'  (consignments of less than 1 ton) although that could occasionally include full wagonloads for warehousing - if the depot had warehousing facilities.  The big advantage of using the shed was easy transfer to and from the deck (=platform in non-railway talk) plus room to sort and stand traffic for delivery rounds - a big advantage if the depot wasn't using stand trailers or had rounds which didn't operate every day.

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Was mileage traffic generally expected / was to be unloaded by the consignee rather than the railways staff?

Depends on the era Mickey.  Once upon a time it was all invoiced so there was a hope that the invoices would arrive at the same time as or before the wagons.  But invoicing was gradually almost completely abolished - by the late 1960s the only wagonload traffic which was invoiced was shipment traffic to docks as far as I can remember.

 

But the consignee would usually be expecting traffic although not necessarily by exact day of arrival of course.

 

Mileage traffic could come in several ways - for example coal class traffic was invariably unloaded by the consignee in many parts of the country and obviously traffic into private sidings was similarly handled by the consignee.  Traffic received into railway owned yards could be consigned as 'CBP' (carted by public) which meant the consignee provided the transport but the railway normally undertook the handling although sometimes the handling might involve special kit and an agent could possibly undertake the work.  Depots were technically only open to public cartage if they were 'public' goods depots or sidings and in some depots handling by non-railway staff would not be countenanced, especially at larger depots where there was a strong union element.

 

At small depots in reality I think just about anything went as long as railway jobs were not at risk.  And of course full public access came about - for full loads - in the late 1960s if memory serves me right.

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Kingsland Road looks like it might make a nice subject for a banger blue era layout.  Any trackplans?  I looked on Old Maps UK but the relevant 1:2500 map for the 70s is not very legible.

 

Was it part of the Speedlink Network?  I can recall late Sunday evenings at Cheltenham Spa in the mid 80s waiting for my train back to Poly in Nottingham and enjoying the Enterprise blasting through, usually a 47 but sometimes a 45.  VDA, VGA and Carogowaggons mainly and sometimes steel bolsters...

 

Hello Dr.

Here is a trackplan from a document drawn up by the TOPS Implementation Team in 1972.

There were two headshunts, the outside one to shunt roads 1 Out - 14 Out, the Inside  one to shunt roads 1 In - 9 in.

It was not a large yard by some standards, probably almost as wide as it was long.

 

When I first knew it in 1978 it was the only remaining location in the Bristol area that was carrying out local marshalling,

most traffic was received from, and sent to Severn Tunnel Junction.

In the Speedlink era it was only served by Speedlink trips or feeder services to or from STJ.

The Sunday evening service you remember would probably have started from South Wales.

 

post-7081-0-25412400-1366290054_thumb.jpg

 

cheers 

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