The LNER Encyclopedia

Some time ago I acquired a copy of the WTT 'King's Cross District & Doncaster District (Main Line) 4th July to 25th Sept 1938"

I'm presently putting it into an Excel spreadsheet, but it's a slow process as I only realy get time on infrequent long train and bus journeys.

I thought before I got it that it would inlude goods and passenger workings across London via the 'Widened Lines' but everything begins or ends at Kings Cross passenger or KX goods.

My question then is;- Is/was there a working timetable for the London area?
If so was it LNER produced? London Transport? SR?

I wonder in how they slotted the freight workings in amongst the passenger trains. I guess mostly they ran at night.

Also I would be interested to know of the availability of any other WTTs for the GNR section for the period Jan 1937 - Sep 1939.
I know there are one or two in the National Archives at Kew and one in the Ken Hoole collection.

Does anyone know of others that are available to view or get photocopies/pdfs of?

Alan

Evening Seagull.

I can't speak for the pre WW2 era but the WTTs I have for the 1950s show SR-ER transfers in the Section B WTT (London Suburban), not in the Section A WTT (ECML London - Doncaster). This was quite common for the LNER / BR(ER). The GE maintained Suburban WTTs and Mainline WTTs to avoid them becoming overlarge.

Hello WTT

Thanks for that it at least points me to what I am missing.

The sample page on your website shows empty carriage workings (as does the WTT I have) but does it also show freight workings?

Alan

Hi Seagull.

Up to 1953, most LNE / BR(ER) WTTs were combined freight and passenger. However, the King's Cross suburban WTT was split into separate freight and passenger WTTs.
I've just had a look and it seems I've put in a bad link for the '51 freight WTT (it's showing the passenger WTT). I'm going to update the website in a week or so because I have new items imminent but, for now, I'll drop a copy of the Freight WTT sample on this message.
As it shows, it covers freight to Farringdon, Southern, GE Section, Poplar and others besides.

Hi Seagull,

The LNER Society, the NER Society and the Great Eastern Society are among the groups that have pre-Nationalisation WTT facsimiles available for purchase. They all have web sites. It might be worth having a look.

Regards,

Vernon

Hello Vernon,

Thanks for suggestions.

The NER and GER societies don't have WTTs for the GNR section for the period I am interested in 1937-8.
I do have the 1932 Carriage Working Book facsimilie from the NER, which is useful for the ECJ expresses.

I am a member of the LNER society, but I have not seen anything on their publications lists to say they sell copies of WTTs, only Carriage Working books.
Have I missed something?

Alan

Hello WTT,

the 1951 freight WTT looks interesting. Even though it is a few years too late I would guess that most of the additional information pages had not been changed from LNER or even pre-war days.

I'll get in touch sometime in the next week to order a copy.

Alan

Seagull wrote:Hello Vernon,

Thanks for suggestions.

The NER and GER societies don't have WTTs for the GNR section for the period I am interested in 1937-8.
I do have the 1932 Carriage Working Book facsimilie from the NER, which is useful for the ECJ expresses.

I am a member of the LNER society, but I have not seen anything on their publications lists to say they sell copies of WTTs, only Carriage Working books.
Have I missed something?

Alan

Whoops, sorry, I think you're right. I've had Carriage Books from them and made the foolish assumption that they did WTTs as well.

Vernon

That is not to say that there are not any WTTs in the LNERS Archive - contact the Archivist, details in the Journal or Newsletter...

Also have you tried the GNR Society?

65447 is quite right the LNER Society Archive contains the following which may be of interest.

John

Hello John,

Thanks for that information.

Hopefully I shall shortly be getting my grubby mits on an original of the same.

Alan

65447 wrote:Also have you tried the GNR Society?

Hello 65447, can I call you J15 for short?

I have looked them up, but though their website says they produce 'an increasing number of publications' they seem to be reluctant to tell anyone what they are.
If only all the societies could follow the lead of GER society and tell you what publications they have for sale and what they have in their archives.

The problem I have is that I spend so much time away working that making time to go off and do basic research is difficult
Hence it's easier and often cheaper (when you allow for travelling costs these days) for me to try to buy the items that I need to consult often.

With the two timetables I have nearly cracked what goes on north of Kings Cross.
I can work the passenger traffic down the Widend Lines to Moorgate etc with public timetables.
That just leaves me with figuring out what they did with the freight.

Maybe they loaded it in to Tesco lorries in Kings Cross goods yard........

Alan

Seagull wrote:With the two timetables I have nearly cracked what goes on north of Kings Cross.
I can work the passenger traffic down the Widend Lines to Moorgate etc with public timetables.
That just leaves me with figuring out what they did with the freight.

Maybe they loaded it in to Tesco lorries in Kings Cross goods yard........

Alan

Alan,
Whilst WTTs give you a good idea of traffic, a lot more traffic ran unscheduled as 'Control Specials', especially coal traffic and the like. I work at Doncaster and when I started there in 1989, none of the coal traffic that ran was shown in any WTT. Everything ran on a weekly basis and the Area Freight Centre sent out a weekly coal plan, such was the dynamic nature of the business. The same was true in the steam era, except that it was many times greater.

The WTT paths are only for the feeder services. Variable traffic was dealt with on the day. Seasonal traffic (such as beet, vegetables, fruit, etc.) was dealt with on circulars and also didn't appear in a WTT.

Frustrating, isn't it!

Also have you tried the GNR Society?
I have looked them up, but though their website says they produce 'an increasing number of publications' they seem to be reluctant to tell anyone what they are.
If only all the societies could follow the lead of GER society and tell you what publications they have for sale and what they have in their archives.

Alan,

I act as one of the Exhibition officers for the society. Our website is currently going through a review and we plan to relaunch it, with access to a number items this includes our society sales list and I believe the photograph collection. I can post the sales list to this message if considered appropriate. The WTT's we offer cover the GNR period so are before your timescale.

Ironically I have also been undertaking a similar project to yourself but my timescale is 1932-1935 and my interest is the Southern end of the GN area, Knebworth. I have produced the Down workings, to date, in an excel spreadsheet and have used WTT and CWN to populate the services... due to lack of some documents there are some assumptions made but it is early days and like you done generally when traveling. (I have also 1962 in progress!)

With regards to cross London working, the required details are in the "London(Suburban), Hatfield, Hitchin & Branches" volume. I have access to a 1933 edition and the table is "South London Trains".

Like you, I am in the LNER Society so am interested in Johns earlier post.

Regards

Steve

WTTReprinter wrote: a lot more traffic ran unscheduled as 'Control Specials', especially coal traffic and the like.
The same was true in the steam era, except that it was many times greater.

The WTT paths are only for the feeder services. Variable traffic was dealt with on the day. Seasonal traffic (such as beet, vegetables, fruit, etc.) was dealt with on circulars and also didn't appear in a WTT.

Hello WTT,

That makes a lot of sense. The coal traffic would have been seasonal for domestic use and factory/gasworks use would also fluctuate through the year to some extent.

I had not thought of trains for crops etc. And I should know better!

Anyway my plan is to produce an Excel copy WTT for the period summer 1937 - summer 1938 initially for the GN section to Shaftholm & York.
Mostly for my own use but also I plan on looking at a way of making it more widely available.
If possible I will include what carriage working information that is available at least for the ECML express traffic - I'm doing fairly well with collecting that information.

Mostly my interest in the London freight traffic is to work out how it was fitted in amongst the scheduled stuff.
I guess this far away in time a lot of the information is probably permanently lost, but if possible I would like to try to collect and include what I can.

Any further suggestions or information you or anyone else is welcome.

Thanks

Alan