Speed Limits and fines on Forth Bridge 1936 to 1946

[amsquared]

My mother worked as a secretary to the Manager of DGPM (Director General Performance Management) LNER at Waverley station Edinburgh from about 1936 to 1946. She lived in Rosyth and travelled to and from work between Inverkeithing and Waverley stations. One of her many stories of her time at Waverley was that she had to produce weekly reports for all trains that had crossed the Forth Bridge and either broke the speed limit by crossing too quickly or took too long to cross the bridge. She stated that train drivers were fined for going too fast or too slow. Can anybody let me know what the speed limits were then and whether drivers were fined for breaking the speed limit or time limit for crossing the bridge. I'm writing a biography of my mother's life for our family history and just want to check whether the story is true. I know there are speed limits on the bridge for different classes of trains. The attached photograph shows my mother 3rd from left seated with the DGPM staff c1939

Thanks

[colinh58]

My grandfather was signalman in Forth Bridge North for many years from 1944 onwards. As far as I'm aware the maximum speed limit during the majority of his time there was 40mph. There might have been other limits set during the war years.

Never heard before that there was a system in place for fining drivers and assume they would need to use signal box registers to do this. The idea of fines for going too slow is interesting, but it was a busy section of line at times.

[v3man]

Forth Bridge North signalbox has always fascinated me since was a child crossing on the ferry in the late 1940s onwards. From the ferry it always seemed to stand on it's own just before the viaduct on to the bridge and must have been an eerie place on a dark windy night. There was also a very tall signal on the down side almost opposite the box which must have required a very good head for heights to climb the ladder.

Not that many photos of it seem to be around and I've never seen the signalbox diagram.

[meldrum]

An interesting story. I have never heard of drivers being fined for going too slow but, as has been said previously, if it was a very busy section then slowness would have had a lot of knock on effects. Having said that this is surely true of many parts of the railway years ago so is this unique to the Forth Bridge or did this go on elsewhere?
I agree that the SB register would need to be consulted to gather the information for issuing fines. This would probably be the responsibility of the local station master (I assume only one SB register would need to be consulted), perhaps on a weekly basis when he made one of his regular visits to the local SB. I would imagine that the District Inspector would have been too busy for such a regular visit.

[colinh58]

Forth Bridge North signalbox has always fascinated me since was a child crossing on the ferry in the late 1940s onwards. From the ferry it always seemed to stand on it's own just before the viaduct on to the bridge and must have been an eerie place on a dark windy night. There was also a very tall signal on the down side almost opposite the box which must have required a very good head for heights to climb the ladder.

Not that many photos of it seem to be around and I've never seen the signalbox diagram.

The signal you refer to was the down home which I think was a standard 45' ex NBR post. It did look much taller due to it's position on top of the embankment right at the end of the North approach viaduct. It was replaced in the mid sixties by a much shorter BR standard tubular post.

I too would love to see a copy of the signal box diagram again. Now 50 years since my grandfather retired & I was last in the box.

[Caledonian]

The system of speed checking on the Forth Bridge is covered in some detail in Volume 2 of John Thomas' book on the North British Railway [pages 29-30]. Essentially the Forth Bridge was run by an autonomous company: the imaginatively named The Forth Bridge Railway Company, which was responsible for all maintenance and financed by tolls on traffic. There was indeed a speed limit of 40mph and it was checked.

[v3man]

I'd rather hoped someone would come up with a copy of the diagram for Forth Bridge North which colinh58 (18.07.20) and I would both like to see. I would have loved to visit that box but it wasn't one you could get to easily.

[v3man]

It's just occurred to me I'd wuld really like to see a picture of the inside of forth Bridge North if one exists.

[colinh58]

Best photos I have available. Photo 1 was taken December 1949, 2 around 1964. Also external shot taken from a seldom photographed angle.

[Danby Wiske]

Splendid photos - thank you for sharing them!

[thesignalman]

I'd rather hoped someone would come up with a copy of the diagram for Forth Bridge North which colinh58 (18.07.20) and I would both like to see. I would have loved to visit that box but it wasn't one you could get to easily.

Can do - sorry I didn't rise to this earlier but I don't call in here particularly frequently.

I have put a diagram on my site at https://signalbox.org/~SBdiagram.php?id=%201293

Hope this helps,

John

[v3man]

Great photographs, I've never seen the box from that angle (except from a train!) I remember back in the late 1940s for some reason it was not unusual to have a signal stop in the up direction on the bridge which was quite eerie in the dark.

Thank you John for the diagram, I would loved to have visited the box.

The first signal box I visited was Wallyford Siding which I discovered when I got my first bike which would probably have been in the summer of 1953. I spent a lot of time there so that was my introduction to signalling and working the box. From then I was hooked regularly visiting Smeaton Junction and working Newhailes Junction and Portobello West boxes. Also visited Dalkeith Colliery box once and Monktonhall Junction a few times and once I was on the Bank's relief staff in 1961 I spent a few evenings in Abingdon box and visited Kyle of Lochalsch box. Retirement saw me on the West Somerset Railway where I passed out for Williton, Blue Anchor and Minehead boxes retiring from signalling in 2013.

I was on duty in Minehead box one day when the station office rang to say a couple of enthusiasts would like to visit the box (which is off the end of the platform). When they arrived to my surprise both had strong Scottish accents and one turned out to be the late Forbes Alexander so we had a long chat about Edinburgh area signalling.