Gasworks Tunnel North End Signals.

[StevieG]

Hi Tim Watson,
Finally found the images of the 3-position Belle Isle signal ; also some further date details, received some years ago, from some long-term research by GNR Society member Don Anderson.

Don's info includes that : -
'the Up Relief line was earlier a shunt line from the station, buffer-stopped at the north end of Gasworks Tunnel, becoming so when the third tunnel bore was completed in 1892; the official Inspection of the works taking place on 28th May 1892.
According to Circular No. 12,742a, the shunt line became connected at the Belle Isle end as a through track named Up Carriage, from noon on Sun. 28th August 1898.

Then, from signalling diagrams and notes of the respected GN/GE/M&GN researcher the late Michael Back, the Up Carriage was 'converted' to be the Up Relief on 22/01/22', (so still within GNR times).

Then the images etc.,
Unfortunately I seem to unusually be having great difficulty in attaching them here, but I will persist, even if having to default to trying to get them to you by a Private Message within this site.
They were once sent to me within part of a Railway Magazine article, "Traffic Improvements at King's Cross, London and North Eastern Railway", on pp. 209-223, annotated, by hand, only as "1923" (no month), which also includes mention that the Up Carriage had been operated '...on a permissive basis and reserved for bringing into the station empty trains and light engines...', but that 'the up carriage line has been equipped as a standard running line , being now known as the up relief line, so that up trains can run directly into all the platforms on the departure side.' [ plus seemingly platforms 4 and 5; so in total, platforms 4-6 and 10-13 (roads 7-9 still being sidings without platforms at that time) ].

Unfortunately this info now makes the reason/event causing issue of the previously mentioned 1927 Circular No. 43,091a rather less clear to me.

[Tim Watson]

Many thanks for more clarity on this area Steve.

Tim

[StevieG]

Tim Watson,
.... finally got time to have another go at getting you the Belle Isle '3-position' signal images.
Crossed fingers .... and it's worked !

The Notice Board on the signal's main post reads : -

"WHEN MINIATURE
SIGNAL IS OFF
STOP AT SIGNALS
INSIDE SOUTH END
OF TUNNEL
WHETHER ON
OR OFF"

[Tim Watson]

Well there’s a challenge. Usefully shows more information on the gantry behind.

Many thanks
Tim

[60048]

Tim,
Sorry to resurrect an old thread, but as the topic was related it seemed a local place to query this. Prior to the King's Cross remodelling, Platforms 3 and 4 were shorter suburban platforms. Does anyone know, were these just arrival platforms, the stock then being shunted to Platforms 11+ for departure, or could trains actually depart from here? I ask because looking at the signalling diagrams for Belle Isle Down and Copenhagen, there does not appear to be any crossovers from the Down Main (after No.1 and No.2 lines joined) onto the Down Slow? That suggests to me that Platforms 3 and 4 were only arrival roads, but it is conjecture and assumption on part.

Rich

[Mickey]

Sorry to resurrect an old thread, but as the topic was related it seemed a local place to query this. Prior to the King's Cross remodelling, Platforms 3 and 4 were shorter suburban platforms. Does anyone know, were these just arrival platforms, the stock then being shunted to Platforms 11+ for departure, or could trains actually depart from here? I ask because looking at the signalling diagrams for Belle Isle Down and Copenhagen, there does not appear to be any crossovers from the Down Main (after No.1 and No.2 lines joined) onto the Down Slow? That suggests to me that Platforms 3 and 4 were only arrival roads, but it is conjecture and assumption on part.

A bit confusing to workout what you are getting at Rich unless I am reading your post wrong?. The west side suburban platforms started at platform no.11 (or no.9 from 1972 onwards) and as far as I am aware platform no.3 & no.4 at the terminus on the main line arrival side weren't 'suburban platforms' in fact I don't believe there was a platform no.3 until the 1972 re-numbering of all the platforms. Where a platform no.3 would have been in the earlier days during the 18880s-1900s it would have been just a 'carriage road' used for stabling coaches although I don't really know much about the terminus in GN days?.

[StevieG]

Tim,
Sorry to resurrect an old thread, but as the topic was related it seemed a local place to query this. Prior to the King's Cross remodelling, Platforms 3 and 4 were shorter suburban platforms. Does anyone know, were these just arrival platforms, the stock then being shunted to Platforms 11+ for departure, or could trains actually depart from here? I ask because looking at the signalling diagrams for Belle Isle Down and Copenhagen, there does not appear to be any crossovers from the Down Main (after No.1 and No.2 lines joined) onto the Down Slow? That suggests to me that Platforms 3 and 4 were only arrival roads, but it is conjecture and assumption on part.

Rich

Rich,
It may not help to write just of 'the remodelling' - what period are you referring to ?

But anyway, although Tim may have more definite date information available to him, I can say that the Platform 3 and 4 faces certainly were short from earlier times of GNR days, and well into the LNER period.
The platform 3 face and line was situate under the northern part of the trainshed only and used to end roughly at the footbridge. No.4, although a full length track, had its platform face start only from behind the buffer stops of 3.
It was I think c.1934 when 3 was abolished and its face extended westwards to make 4 platform face of 'main line' length.
That means that 3 was still available for use at the time of the power resignalling into the new 1932 signal box, which was the one that stood at the north end of Plats. 5/6 until c.1975.

I can't help much with what definitely 3 and 4 were actually used for and how they were operated, but unlike the, e.g. approx. late 1910s(earlier?), situation where Up passenger trains could only arrive into 1-5 (because what became the Up Carriage, and then in 1923 the Up Relief, line through the centre bore of Gasworks, had been only an empty carriage shunting line inaccessible from the Belle Isle direction), Down trains could depart from the whole of the east ('Arrival') side but only to Down Main No.1, and had then to continue along DM1/DM until reaching Holloway South Down box.
[ Although at some time during or after the (?)1930s, the layout at Copenhagen Jn. box was changed from including the crossover pointwork from the Down Slow to the 'engine line' (officially the Up South London Goods) to Belle Isle Up box having only a trailing slip in its crossing of the Down Main, to instead being DS/DM and DM/USLG crossovers 'in series', meaning that Down Main (latterly Down Fast) trains could then be signalled onto the DS there at Copenhagen.]

I suppose that, given the above and excluding suburban trains which ran to and from the City Widened lines via KX York Road platform and the Hotel Curve (with the later Plat.16/14), 3 and 4 were in fact most likely to have seen Suburban arrivals that could then have been shunted via the centre bore carriage siding or DM1 over into the short platforms 11-13 (+14 & 15 after the loco yard was moved to the site of the former gas works).

It was only in the 1970s - IIRC c.1972 (around the time, but not necessarily when, control of the first power signalling was actually transferred to the then new, and still current {just!} power signal box) - that the platforms were renumbered to run consecutively, as they do today, and thus, as operational platforms, the number 3 re-appeared and 9 came into being for the first time.

[60048]

Guys,
Thanks for that, much appreciated. Sorry for not putting the time period in - I have been reading up on the remodelling work that went on the 1920s, when the loco yard was moved, and subsequently the power signalling of the 1930s. Certainly Platform 3 had been removed when the power signalling was done, as only Platform 2 and 4 are show on the power signalling diagram, but it was still there in 1923 according to a plan of the station I have. I suspect Stevie that you have 'hit the nail on the head' in that it was suburban arrivals, for traffic not going through to Moorgate, and was subsequently shunted to one of the higher numbered suburban departure platforms - that would also explain the lack of a crossover from a point after Down Main 1 and 2 join together, connecting to the Down Slow - there would be no need for such a move.

Rich

[Mickey]

Back at the end of the 1960s I was told by a railway friend who worked at Kings Cross station on the Reservations counter on platform no.10 that Kings Cross porters (platform staff) who had to deal with any 'stroppy punters' who wanted to know which platform his train departed from was usually told that it departed from platform no.3 (the non existent platform).

I forgot Rich the old Kings Cross loco was where the later west side suburban station was built.

[StevieG]

" .... Certainly Platform 3 had been removed when the power signalling was done, as only Platform 2 and 4 are show on the power signalling diagram, .... "

Rich,
The LNER official Notice referring to the three stages of the 1930s resignalling is numbered R.R. 93, issue date 20th August 1932, and refers to : -
- Stage 1 having been carried out on 19th June 1932,
- Stage 2 to be carried out on 2nd October 1932, and
- Stage 3 to be carried out on 30th October 1932.

However Circular 153* or 158* issued 5*th March 1934 is the one concerning the Sunday 11th March 1934
"Conversion of Nos. 3 and 4 Platforms into one Platform."
* - (details from a mostly readable feint photocopy, but which is indistinct in some areas including these details.)

So whatever diagram of the old power signalling it is that you have referred to, it is presumably one of a date after Plat. 3 had been removed.

[60048]

Interesting, thanks Stevie.

It was this diagram - https://www.flickr.com/photos/95430950@ ... otostream/ - which has been posted on here before. Looking further it was from a Siemens leaflet, so was obviously included to give the final layout after all works had been completed, despite being issued in 1933.

Rich

[StevieG]

Interesting, thanks Stevie.

It was this diagram - https://www.flickr.com/photos/95430950@ ... otostream/ - which has been posted on here before. Looking further it was from a Siemens leaflet, so was obviously included to give the final layout after all works had been completed, despite being issued in 1933.

Rich

E r r r, okay Rich.

But I plainly see platform 3 in the diagrams of that publication.

[Mickey]

Kings Cross station on reflection was built on quite a restricted site even more so in earlier times when the Battlebridge road overbridge spanned all the tracks in the area between the platform ends and the Gasworks tunnel entrance. Down line departures from a standing start had to contend with the 'dip' just inside the tunnel under the Regents canal and the following rising gradient on the Down lines on through Belle Isle and Copenhagen tunnel to the top of the 'Holloway bank' before the roads levelled out approaching Finsbury Park which probably tested the firemen and locos alike.

Was re-platforming of main line coaches ever performed at the station maybe between the 1880s-1920s?. If it was that would have stopped everything (except possibly on the Down slow line) while that shunt move took place.

[60048]

Interesting, thanks Stevie.

It was this diagram - https://www.flickr.com/photos/95430950@ ... otostream/ - which has been posted on here before. Looking further it was from a Siemens leaflet, so was obviously included to give the final layout after all works had been completed, despite being issued in 1933.

Rich

E r r r, okay Rich.

But I plainly see platform 3 in the diagrams of that publication.

Well the motto in that is never post late at night when you've had a busy day! Sorry Stevie, that was the 1933 plan that I had, but I had another, which I cannot find on the iPad at the moment, must be on the main PC that showed the signalling layout without P3!

Rich

[StevieG]

No problem Rich.
Your 'later' one will undoubtedly be correct for post-Plat.3 abolition.
At least it's been established that 3 was included in the resignalling, even though it only then lasted about 17 months.