King's Cross Railway Lands

[CRHT1837]

Hi all
I have been exploring this discussion forum as a guest over the past few days and have found it an inspiration. So now I am coming out of the woodwork as the latest member.
For the last 10 years my focus has been on the railway heritage in and around the former Camden Goods Station. Developers' threats to this heritage led to founding the Camden Railway Heritage Trust to preserve, restore and disseminate information about this heritage. Two years ago a book on Camden Goods Station was published. All profits go to the Trust, which continues to have serious project aims for what is a busy mainline railway. The major objective is to open up the winding engine vaults, but we also are promoting a viewing platform for the Primrose Hill Tunnel east portals.
At the same time we are turning to King's Cross. I use the term Railway Lands for the area that used to encompass a variety of facilities including goods warehouses, offices, locomotive sheds, locomotive depots, basins, coal depots, gas plants, stables, etc, etc. Development has largely been pre-determined, but there are many detailed plans to challenge (eg those for "Coal Drops Yard").
As the discussion forum made clear, there is a gap in the written account of King’s Cross Railway Lands in regard to the infrastructure. A new book should not focus on passenger facilities except indirectly but concentrate on the goods depot, MPD and associated features.
The task I have set is to create a story over 160 years that will be interesting, original and readily comprehensible. Given the extraordinary transformation the area is currently undergoing, I would like to place on record, alongside the new developments, an explanation of what went before that all can understand. It is a challenging task if I adopt the same format of 96 pages, with about 20,000 words and 190 images. As before, all profits from sales will go to the Trust.
I hope that my research will lead to posting material of interest to the forum, to help balance some of the insights it has already given me. I hope to raise one or two topics over the next weeks to tap into material I have not yet found. Just as an example, there is one form of motive power that is very under-represented - horse power. I am still trying to figure out where the main GNR stables were, after those under Wharf Road and in the basements of the Transit Sheds (one now partially converted to Godown Bar/Restaurant) had been filled. They would not accommodate the 1000 horses that George Wade found in 1900 in the splendid stables he describes (The Horse Department of a Railway, Railway Magazine 8, pp208-213).
Peter

[silverfox]

You might find some useful info in the Irwell Press book
The Great British Railway Station Kings Cross by Chris Hawkins 1990 isbn 1 871608 14 7
A chapter covers the coal drops
hope this is of assistance

[Mickey]

Yes an interesting area indeed Kings Cross Goods Yard including Belle Isle the railway cutting between Gasworks & Copenhagen tunnels and Goods And Mineral Junction s/box (gone with out a trace) that small'ish area i was very familiar with during the late 1960s until 1975.

During 1974/75 as a secondman at Kings Cross loco i became familiar with the area around Five Arch shunting frame & shunter's lobbies (nowadays all gone without a trace with the re-routed York Way road from Kings Cross heading up towards Camden/Islington areas passing through the site) and the potato market sheds (some of the sheds are still there being used for commercial use) also around 1974/75 i once walked around to the open area of land south west of Five Arch shunting frame & shunter's lobbies that ended at the Regents canal which once contained many (rusty) siding roads maybe as many as a dozen or so roads all empty from memory when i walked around there although nowadays that open area of land is currently being built on for high rise housing which can be seen from a distance when riding on a 390 bus along York Way road.

Top Shed loco sheds was before my time it closed in 1963 but i remember the area just to the north of Five Arch was being used by a aggregates company from the 1980s (maybe before the 1980s?) until the late 1990s.

Mickey

[StevieG]

" .... but i remember the area just to the north of Five Arch was being used by a aggregates company from the 1980s (maybe before the 1980s?) until the late 1990s.

Mickey

... Somewhere in the Kings Cross 'Goods Yard'/ Freight Terminal's 'North Yard' (on, or next to, the site of 'Top Shed' loco depot), NW of Five Arch Bridge shunter's 'points box' and west of the York Way road viaduct, Mickey ? -

- Seem to remember, in the late 1960s/ early '70s, seeing freight trains passing places around the 'N. London line' - Camden Road must have been one of them - (& down to KX FT?), consisting dark green [ then relatively new (?) ] long, bogie, vertical-ribbed-sided hopper/tank wagons (I think their bodies might've been enclosed vessels), proudly proclaiming "MURPHY AGGREGATES" on their sides.

[StevieG]

" .... A new book should not focus on passenger facilities except indirectly but concentrate on the goods depot, MPD and associated features. ....
.... It is a challenging task if I adopt the same format of 96 pages, with about 20,000 words and 190 images. As before, all profits from sales will go to the Trust. .... "

A very worthy concept / project Peter. May I wish you and the Trust all good luck and success in these endeavours.

[Andy W]

Those Murphys wagons were an absolute pain as they occasionally used to go "straight on" into the goods yard rather than take the curve, which usually mean't a call to Jock Nicholson at Clarence Yard to get him and the breakdown team (Dick Parry, Paul Snushall, Lester Bennett et all) to sort it all out. As they were bogie hoppers they were a pig to re-rail.

The four wheeled Tunnel Cement wagons sometimes used to lock buffer on those sharp curves too.

[Mickey]

Those Murphys wagons were an absolute pain as they occasionally used to go "straight on" into the goods yard rather than take the curve, which usually mean't a call to Jock Nicholson at Clarence Yard to get him and the breakdown team (Dick Parry, Paul Snushall, Lester Bennett et all) to sort it all out. As they were bogie hoppers they were a pig to re-rail.

The four wheeled Tunnel Cement wagons sometimes used to lock buffer on those sharp curves too.

When i was working Camden Road (box) on the relief between 1987-1990 & regular between 1992-2004 i seem to recall maybe on a couple of occasions possibly in the late 1980s when they were 'off the road' at the bottom of the Kings Cross Incline with those stone wagons also i just happened to be on duty in Camden Road (box) on the night of the very last train of stone empties that ran from the Kings Cross aggregates yard hauled as usual by a couple of southern class 33 (electro/diesel) locos, it came Up the Kings Cross Incline just after 3:00am (the usual time) heading westwards across the North London line back to Angerstein Wharf in Kent on the southern, i'm fairly certain it was back in 1999.

Another thing of note was Kings Cross Freight Terminal Junction (box) a rather basic ground level all brick built construction with a flat roof and a large window facing the Arrival & Departure roads (there was no window(s) at the back of the building facing towards Belle Isle and the roads into & out of Kings Cross) that replaced both the old GNR Five Arch shunting frame & Goods And Mineral Junction (box) on both of there closures in October 1975 and which it's self only lasted for around 10 or 11 years before it was also closed & abolished sometime around 1986 (i'm not certain of the exact date of closure?). A railway bloke i use to know told me he worked Freight Terminal Junction (box) as a new signalman just out of signalling school during the mid-1980s not long before it was closed and that it had a small panel and all the signals/routes were 'slotted' with Kings Cross PSB.

Mickey

[65447]

Peter,

Might I suggest that you contact the GNR and LNER Societies, several members of which I know worked in the KX area too? Further, they have already published articles and other useful material that may be of assistance.

You might find it useful to PM (private message) 'stevewhite01' and 'jasd17', members of this forum, who I'm sure will be pleased to facilitate your researches.

In the days of the GLC, the Department of Architecture and Civic Design produced a series of London Architectural Monographs, one of which was of Liverpool Street station. There may be relevant and useful papers re KX held in archives somewhere, especially given the long history of development and redevelopment in the area.

Finally there is another recording and publishing organisation that concentrates on railway history including infrastructure of exactly the nature you intend. Contact details here: http://www.londonrailwayrecord.co.uk/

All good wishes for the success of your project.

[CRHT1837]

Thanks for all your suggestions and please keep them coming.
This forum has helped guide my book buying, and I am already waiting for Chris Hawkins' book from Abe Books.
65447 I think it would be useful to place a short article in the next GNR News and LNER Society journal. I was unaware of the PM facility, and the suggestion is very helpful. The key with these societies and with London Railway Record must be to identify the relevant articles in their publications when there is not always an index. The contacts you give should be useful in helping identify these.
The developer of the King's Cross Railway Lands, Argent plc, has commissioned industrial archaeology surveys of the area, and the final report should be published shortly. But archaeology does not bring the area back to life in the way that this forum does, at least as far as living memory stretches. On that note, I am heading to Torquay later this month to meet Peter Townend who, despite his years, is still active and must have a well of memories to draw on. Any questions you would like me to put to him?

[Mickey]

I have noticed when travelling on a 390 bus through the area that the the 'powers that be' have named several new roads, walkways and passages in the area leading off of York Way with new names that don't appear to relate to the railways prior dominance in the area so it would have been a 'nice touch' to have named a few of these newer roads, walkways and passages with former railway related names possibly like Belle Isle Lane & Five Arch Passage and maybe even Top Shed Road just a thought maybe?.

Mickey

[CRHT1837]

You are not the first to mention this. Brian Burt, who worked at Kings Cross (Top Shed?) for 7 years and gave me Peter Townend's contact details, mentioned that he had written to Robert Evans, Executive Director at Argent Group plc to voice the same concerns but not had a reply. I will mention this to Argent's head of communications when I see him tomorrow. But I believe Argent gave the public a chance to propose street names and this is the result.

[Mickey]

Another thing of note was Kings Cross Freight Terminal Junction (box) a rather basic ground level all brick built construction with a flat roof and a large window facing the Arrival & Departure roads (there was no window(s) at the back of the building facing towards Belle Isle and the roads into & out of Kings Cross) that replaced both the old GNR Five Arch shunting frame & Goods And Mineral Junction (box) on both of there closures in October 1975 and which it's self only lasted for around 10 or 11 years before it was also closed & abolished sometime around 1986 (i'm not certain of the exact date of closure?). A railway bloke i use to know told me he worked Freight Terminal Junction (box) as a new signalman just out of signalling school during the mid-1980s not long before it was closed and that it had a small panel and all the signals/routes were 'slotted' with Kings Cross PSB.

For the record Kings Cross Freight Terminal Junction (s/box) was opened on the 29/09/75 and was closed on 10/06/89.

Mickey

[StevieG]

" Another thing of note was Kings Cross Freight Terminal Junction (box) .... that replaced both the old GNR Five Arch shunting frame & Goods And Mineral Junction (box) on both of there closures in October 1975 and which it's self only lasted for around 10 or 11 years before it was also closed & abolished sometime around 1986 (i'm not certain of the exact date of closure?). A railway bloke i use to know told me he worked Freight Terminal Junction (box) as a new signalman just out of signalling school during the mid-1980s not long before it was closed and that it had a small panel and all the signals/routes were 'slotted' with Kings Cross PSB. "

For the record Kings Cross Freight Terminal Junction (s/box) was opened on the 29/09/75 and was closed on 10/06/89.

Mickey

Also, for the record, Mickey, "Freight Terminal Jn." 'signal box' ("FT") [at least some, or possibly all (couldn't be sure about that) official sources seemed not to include the 'Kings Cross'] was an installation at least as much of a misfit for categorisation as was Five Arch Bridge.
It had an IFS (Individual Function Switch) panel, with 17 switches.

Although I was thinking that FTJ had always been a Grade 'A' signalman post, I'm now having some doubts :
FTJ didn't control any running lines and had no Main signals of its own; only ground position-light signals (GPLSs) and PL signal routes, so on the face of it its operators could have been made shunter's grade.
Now they might've been just that initially, because I've a vague recollection that early on (late 1970s?) there was some fuss when it was proposed to run a through Up train from the Finsbury Park direction, straight up the NLI to Camden Road and beyond (possibly a diversion because of unplanned obstruction of another route): the LDC were against it because a through move meant that the FTJ operator ought to be a proper signalman-grade post rather than just dealing with moves/'shunts' of trains in/out/within, the yard : I think it was stated that the only way the K signalmen would co-operate for such a train was if it first went into the yard, then backed out again before going up the NLI, thus making the sort of moves that the FTJ men normally dealt with.
I don't recall more detail or what happened in the end, but whatever it was or had been, I am sure that at some time/some way, FTJ did become an 'A' signalman post (perhaps when it was first planned to include through Up moves up the NLI in the WTT)..

[ Once very occasionally there had been risk of/actually, no Grade 'A' person available (I think it was the only 'A' around - Hornsey C.S. Cabin might've been a 'B'?), possible recurrence was avoided by obtaining a few volunteer Grade 'F' men from the power box who learned and were 'passed out' for FTJ. (Not bad pay for filling-in at such a simple job!) ]

The points for the yard entry/exit connecting with the No.1 Slow/Down Slow were Kings Cross PSB's (K2037), released by FTJ (FT17?), with both the Down direction GPLS (FT8?) at those points, and the No.1 SL/DSL Up direction K300 Main + position-light signal, both jointly slotted by K and FTJ for the in/out routes via 2037s Reverse.
Then also, the N.L. Incline single line was under overall control of Camden Road box, which had a slot (CR13) on FTJ's signals' routes reading onto that line.
So if there was a movement from the from the No.1 SL/DSL (including any off the Up Slow from the Holloway direction) to go up the North London Incline line (NLI), obviously the K and FTJ signalmen had to co-operate, but so did the FTJ and Camden Road signalmen, because FTJ's signal to the NLI (slotted by CR) had to clear before the FTJ slot on K300 would allow that signal to also clear for the move off No.1 SL/DSL.

Apart from all the above, the other FTJ signals/routes (so, just those between 'the Goods Yard's remaining arr./ dep./ shunt lines & North Yard to/from the then very short engine spur right beside Copenhagen Tunnel's western bore) were entirely his own, but were all of the position-light type.

AFAIK, the NLI line wasn't worked under standard Track-Circuit Block regulations; more like just a signalled/track-circuited 'through siding', presumably with box-box communication only by 'phone (as was between FTJ and K for moves in/out of 'the Goods Yard').

It was when it was decided that the NLI line should be upgraded to running line status, with Main running signals/aspects on and to/from it (and including catering for possible passenger trains); (by which time, I suppose 'the Goods Yard' was either used even less or had been/was to be closed completely), that FTJ 'box' was closed, what was left of its points and signals transferred to K PSB, and the working between K and Camden Road was made more normal [unsure whether, then, it was by block bell or train describer (or both, with bell retained for emergency code messages as I think may have still been usual then {at least for minor locations} before the "Emergency Alarm" system started being brought in everywhere where signalling was completely new or modified].
Later still of course, the NLI line itself, in connection with creation of the CTRL/HS1 in this area, has been re-levelled, realigned, and now has one or two new connections part-way along, to/from St.Pancras and/or an HS1 line (have they ever been used?), but control is still by Kings Cross ("K"), and by Upminster IECC ("NL") which now controls Camden Road.

Incidentally Mickey, You may recall that, from introduction of the then new connection south of Copenhagen Tunnel, between the new Slow lines running through the tunnel's western bore, and the new layout into Kings Cross Goods Yard & to the NLI, the Sectional Appendix acquired the name "Freight Terminal Junction" for this connection.
But now, seemingly with the laying in of the new Slow lines/Canal Tunnel lines junction here (to the not-yet-in-use new tunnelled lines to the 'low level' 'Thameslink' line's St.Pancras International platforms underground), under the HS1 lines' overbridge, I believe that the junction(s) now go under the name "Copenhagen Junction" - more geographically-descriptive, and coincidentally reviving the name of the old close-by Down passenger lines-only signal box of the same name (closed c1967/8).

[ And apologies to CRHT1837 if this post is deemed too detailed and/or off at too much of a tangent away from this thread's topic.

[Mickey]

Very interesting Stevie the funny thing is i was working Camden Road (box) from about Oct/Nov 1987 onwards as a relief signalman until June 1990 (i was also a regular signalman at the box between 1992-2004) and between late 1987 until mid 1989 i can't really remember to much about the working of trains over the Kings Cross Incline during that short'ish time period other than (like you said Stevie) Camden Road (box) controlled the 'slot/release' for trains entering upon the Kings Cross Incline at either end of the single line and also (like you said Stevie) when i first worked Camden Road (box) the Kings Cross Incline had ground position light signals either to enter the single line or to exit the single line but during 1989 the Kings Cross Incline was 'up graded to passenger status' which meant at the Camden Road end the facing trap points coming off the Kings Cross Incline were abolished and the track was plain lined and both ground position light signals to enter and exit the single line became x3 aspect colour light signals instead.

Another feature of the working of the Kings Cross Incline prior to the mid 1989 'up grading' of the Kings Cross Incline to passenger status was that the overhead live wires were 'normally' left ISOLATED and would have to be re-energised by the signalman who would have to have the A/C ISOLATION CANCELLED with the ECO before a A/C electric locomotive could travel over the Kings Cross Incline in either direction and once the A/C loco had passed clear of the single line the Kings Cross Incline would have to be become ISOLATED again, i think this was done because if the A/C OHLE was left 'switched on' on the Kings Cross Incline it interfered with something eletrical at the bottom of the Kings Cross Incline i vaguely remember?.

I remember that we had a long'ish 'black metal box' type TD (Train Describer) in Camden Road (box) which was the same as the one in Western Junction (box) at Dalston for describing trains over the Kings Cross Incline but i think that was only provided when the Kings Cross Incline was 'up graded' to passenger status during mid 1989 but prior to the up grading of the Kings Cross Incline to passenger status i have a vague feeling that all trains travelling over the Kings Cross Incline were described between Camden Road (box) and Kings Cross Freight Terminal Junction (box?) and vice versa via the telephone BUT i am not 100% certain about this as it all seems a long time ago now to remember exactly what the set up was?.

Mickey

[Hatfield Shed]

... I am heading to Torquay later this month to meet Peter Townend who, despite his years, is still active and must have a well of memories to draw on. Any questions you would like me to put to him?

You can certainly mention how much his book 'Top Shed' continues to be appreciated.

Any recollection of how the ex-GCR N5 69266 came to be allocated briefly to the KX inner suburban area in 1959ish, possibly shedded at Hatfield?