Manors Railway Station, Newcastle

[52D]

Pinza another station in the barely open category surely has to be Chathill on the ECML north of Alnmouth. Once a junction for North Sunderland and served by Newcastle Edinburgh stoppers it has a miniscule service in todays timetable.
At least a few miles further north Scotrail are looking at the possibility of reintroducing Edinburgh Berwick stoppers and reinstating long closed stations such as Reston.

[PinzaC55]

Chathill is a classic example. I used to bash Deltics between Newcastle and Chathill in the late 70s and of course there were passengers intending to holiday in Seahouses. A local taxi operator usually had a taxi either at the station or nearby and the fares were very reasonable so it was a convenient to visit on a nice day.Now there are - what? - 2 trains a day with the first one ludicrously early.The reason why the trains don't go to Berwick is because Berwick is "owned" by GNER / NXEC / Gordon Brown and they don't want the competition.

[Jonathan1973]

Pasco,

Thank's for the advice. I made Alan Young's acquaintance about 17 years ago. It did indeed feed the obsession. I think part of Manors' attraction is the fact that it used to be a vast, attractive, rambling place of which there are a few tantalising remains. A Gormenghast of the North Tyne Loop. A book about the station is a fab. idea, although I think it would have a small (if select) readership.

Jonathan

[PinzaC55]

BTW according to Wikipedia , Chathill recorded 1,847 passengers a couple of years ago.The station has NO northbound service and it would be interesting to know how "they" managed to get away with withdrawing a service in one direction?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chathill_railway_station

[60041]

BTW according to Wikipedia , Chathill recorded 1,847 passengers a couple of years ago.The station has NO northbound service and it would be interesting to know how "they" managed to get away with withdrawing a service in one direction?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chathill_railway_station

Chathill has one northbound arrival and two southbound departures each day. There is no crossover available at the station, so the first northbound local service of the day runs straight through ECS, crosses over at Belford, reverses and calls at Chathill on the way back south. The evening local calls at Chathill to set down northbound, then after reversal at Belford, calls to pick up southbound. Its all a bit different from the pre privatisation days when we had a decent local Newcastle - Berwick service, occasionally a class 47 with three coaches, and Chathill had four trains in each direction. The Post Bus was timetabled to connect with these trains for onward journey to Seahouses and Bamburgh

[PinzaC55]

Yes but as far as passengers are concerned there is no PASSENGER service northbound thus Chathill has been converted into a terminus.

[60041]

Yes you are right, I occasionally get the evening train from Alnmouth to Chathill and back just for the ride out (sad isn't it), I keep hoping that one day I will get the chance of a trip to Belford but it hasn't happened yet!

[stembok]

The posts on Chathill reminded me of the Eaglescliffe -Northallerton section of line some years ago, Virtually closed to passenger traffic. Nowadays, it has been completely revived with a good Trans-Pennine service and also the Grand Central services.

[Deltic18]

Remember the good service between Stockport and Stalybridge (off region I know) but that ended up as one train a week on a Friday lunchtime from Stockport and the unit returning ECS.
Looking at it, there have been instances off this all over the rail network. Some have survived and some have sadly disappeared.

Keith

[PinzaC55]

Yes the Stockport to Stalybridge service is another skeleton service used to prevent having to go through the legal procedure to keep the line open.

[third-rail]

Yes the Stockport to Stalybridge service is another skeleton service used to prevent having to go through the legal procedure to keep the line open.

yes bus services appear to be the same, here today gone tomorrow ,services run to suit the maximum subsidys available and not to suit where the passenger wants to go in hurry in fact if there was no passengers would probably suit them better.i see there is no post buses now in a lot of northumberland.

[PinzaC55]

The lack of buses is of course down to Thatcher. One of the ironies of stations like Manors and Chathill is of course that they have to be fully maintained to the high standards demanded by the H&SE - despite the fact that hardly anyone uses them so they bring in virtually no revenue! Meanwhile places like Washington and Ferryhill and indeed Belford have no station despite having large populations.

[52D]

Pinza i was addressing a few points this afternoon on google earth. Belfords station is not in a good location for the community it serves it may be ok for a station if a bus link and good car parking was available. The majority of the Northumbrian ECML local stations had similar problems i think the only reason they kept Beal open for so long was the foot traffic to Lindisfarne (there was once a plan put forward for a branch from Beal crossing to Holy Island).
I could see 2 extra stations being very useful on the ECML 3 if you include Belford the first a new station about a mile further north of Longhoughtons former station adjacent to the centre of the village and an entirely new build at Tweedmouth with a brand new transport interchange thrown in as well.
To top that lot the rival companies could have thier collective heads banged together and Scotrail could service Newcastle and local stations with Northern or whoever the franchise holder is doing the same in the opposite direction pathways permitting.

[PinzaC55]

Well Berwick council have made reopening the station a priority -

http://www.berwick-advertiser.co.uk/new ... 4779239.jp

[PinzaC55]

Back to the original topic, I have just posted my hand drawn copies of the signalling plans for Argyle Street Signalbox 1904 - http://www.flickr.com/photos/pinzac55/3 ... otostream/
and Manors Signalbox 1886 - http://www.flickr.com/photos/pinzac55/3799827305/
on Flickr.To see these in more detail click on "original" size near the top of the page.