Caledonian Road Goods Depot

[JeffB]

Can remember working up there once while I was at Topshed in the early 60s, propelling a couple of wagons up there with a 350. If my memory serves me right, Rowntrees sweets had a drop of point up there.

[Mickey]

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[sandwhich]

Yes you are right Jeff B about Rowntrees having a depot up there, it then went to Wood Green which probably spelt the end of these sidings. I think that it has already been mentioned that part of the film "The Ladykillers" was shot in that yard with a "house" built in the yard itself, but this was well before my time on the railway. But I do remember many people talking about it.

[StevieG]

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[StevieG]

Yes you are right Jeff B about Rowntrees having a depot up there, it then went to Wood Green which probably spelt the end of these sidings. I think that it has already been mentioned that part of the film "The Ladykillers" was shot in that yard with a "house" built in the yard itself, but this was well before my time on the railway. But I do remember many people talking about it.

viewtopic.php?f=9&t=7791&p=73520&hilit= ... ers#p73520

[lemmo]

If the GN had cattle docks at Holloway then why did they go to the trouble of opening Caledonian Road as well? Remember access to Caledonian Road involved a lot of engineering work just for a few sidings. I still wonder whether there is significance in the fact that the headshunt pointed straight at the cattle market, which was quite substantial.

Fascinating thread this, and Kudu thanks for keeping asking the question: why was this strange little branch ever built? Got to be worth a question to the historians at the GNR Society...

[manna]

G'Day Gents

I did read somewhere ! that one of the reasons that the line and sidings was built, was although the GN had this huge goods yard at Kings Cross, the main entrance was at the other end of the yard and a long way from the only other goods yard that served that area around Caledonian Rd, which was owned by the North London Railway, so to glean some of the freight traffic being produced by the new factories being built in and around Holloway/Caledonian Rd area, they effectively muscled their way in.

manna

[CRHT1837]

This discussion does not look very active currently, but interested me. I was looking for any vestiges of the Great Northern Stables that were built around 1899 in a yard behind Blundell Street, and found that they were not only still there, but instantly recognisable. They had accommodated some 190 horses. They sit alongside the site of the reversing spur that allowed access to Caledonian Goods and Coal Depot. I was shown around by one of the tenants who took me to near the tunnel portal. They had been there a long time and recalled the "farm" that came up earlier in this discussion. This was a real farm, with livestock, not another name for the Depot. You can see the farm quite clearly on aerial photos and Google images. I suspect it became a City Farm for visiting schoolchildren over time before it disappeared under the usual commercial pressures. It is a subject that merits research.
The southern stable is believed to have been largely rebuilt following a fire in the 1970s. But the easternmost parts of this range appear original, albeit with additional buildings added on the south side, fronting what is now Lawson’s timber yard. The western range is clearly original.
Peter

[rockinjohn]

Hi always knew this as Frederica St coal yard& in my youth thought this was serviced by the N.L.due to its proximity,I once visited this yard in the mid 50's & can only remember coal trucks there & a coal merchant by the name of Francis who I believe were purchased by John Hudson around the same time,cant remember the Rowntrees depot maybe later in the 60's,I was led to believe some cattle came thru the North London Maiden Lane goods yard(later Freightliner) entrance on York Way, the abattoir being very near in Market Rd.

[rockinjohn]

Just under the Caledonian Road lner(ER) Bridge as the Holloway Bank started on the "Down" were some sidings that the Anglo-Scottish Car Carrier loaded from,why I mention this, is because there were some very "cattle"looking fences&pens? in the proximity of the sidings, did in fact in years gone by unload cattle from there.

[manna]

G'Day Gents

Hi, Rockinjohn, Yes, Cattle and sheep, were unloaded in those sidings, they were then 'driven' along the streets to the cattle yards and slaughterhouse,about a quarter mile away.

manna

[sandwhich]

If the Caledonian Goods Yard (the farm) was ever used for moving cattle for the nearby slaughterhouses I do not know, but the cattle pens at what became Caledonian Road Car Carrier terminal were used until at least 1963, I remember as a secondman moving a couple of wagons of live cattle from the Goods Yard to the cattle pens one Sunday morning in that year, movement by rail must have been at a minimum by then with most coming in by road, the slaughter houses closed in 1964.

[Mickey]

I thought those cattle pens were still there at Holloway South Up around 1967-68 although I could be mistaken?.

That old cattle dock at Holloway was used for car carrying Motorail service GUVs back in the 1960s and maybe early 1970s.

[StevieG]

I think it was 1970 when Holloway North Up was rationalised down to only about 32 levers working of its 85- frame (with those remaining functions being transferred onto South Up not long after and NU was abolished). That rationalisation included removal of NU's High Level Crossover connections in the Up Goods (& Up Slow), and access from the 2-way Up Coal road, meaning that trains could no longer depart northwards from the cattle dock Down the Up Coal and across to the Down lines at North Up / Down.

[pjgregory]

Hi

In the early 60's, my father worked as a stone mason for the firm of W Knight, located in the old Caledonian Goods Yard, off Frederica Street. One day during the summer holidays, I took an old 8mm cine camera and made a film of the yard and the masons working in it. Sadly I did not have enough film to take any footage of the Kings Cross main line from the top of the Copenhagen tunnel.

The link to the film is here.

https://youtu.be/iYqt03xP_7s

I now want to make an OO gauge model of the yard and the approach from the mainline below. I have already looked at a number of images from various web sites, including this one, and of course there is the "Ladykillers" film. If anyone has images from inside the yard or the surrounding streets and could post them here, I would be most grateful.

Paul