history of tayport harbour

[derek miller]

Hi. I'm a member of Tayport Harbour Trust. Tayport Harbour was I believe built by LNER around 1847 and was used for a rail/ferry link between Tayport and Broughty Ferry on the north bank of the River Tay. (arguably one of, if not the first, roll on/roll off rail/ferry links in the world). I am looking for sources of information about the building of the harbour which could lead me to plans for its construction, and possibly details of the legislation or orders which empowered LNER to operate this harbour
The harbour is now operated as a leisure sailing marina, but I'd like to gather information on its history, as well as details of its construction to aid on-going maintenance

[52D]

Derek, The harbour would have been opened by the North British Railway one of the constituent companies that formed the LNER in 1923. The NBR have an active study group just try to google them.

[wehf100]

I'd certainly start with the North British Study group because they seem very active. Coupled with that- North British Railway archives remain in Scotland at the National Archives of Scotland. If original plans/ drawings don't survive, any big schemes that entailed acts of parliament would have been lodged in draft form with (amongst other bodies) the local courts for inspection. The County Record office will therefore almost certainly have a good selection of plans somewhere in their basement! I don't know enough about scottish law, but in England I'd ask for 'Quarter Session enrolled plans'.

Will

[jwealleans]

There is some information in Ransome-Wallis, The Train Ferries of Western Europe including a drawing of the ferry and linkspan. The whole affair was begun by a predecessor of the North British whose name presently escapes me and designed by Thomas Bouch, whose engineering successes are now rather forgotten in the shadow of his failed bridge.

One of the Scottish modelling groups has built a magnificent model of Burntisland which includes the ferry and linkspan and shows how it all worked.

[derek miller]

Thanks folks, took me a while to get back to the forum, but the info and advice is much appreciated.
Derek

[EM2]

The whole affair was begun by a predecessor of the North British whose name presently escapes me and designed by Thomas Bouch, whose engineering successes are now rather forgotten in the shadow of his failed bridge.
It was the Edinburgh and Northern Railway.