Welwyn Garden City

[StevieG]

I believe that the war-time closure of the North London Line's passenger services into Broad Street must have released some capacity. No attempt was made to re-introduce it after the war because it had been hit badly by bus and tram competition in the early and mid 30's.
421

Sorry, you've lost me - what are you on about?

? Was the comment trying to refer to the Broad Street-Poplar service; - which was never restored. ?

[chaz harrison]

Here's a question that I ought to be able to answer from memory, having seen it happen loads of times but sixty year old brain cells...

At WGC a terminating passenger train (2 quad arts with an N2 or L1 on the front) would arrive in the down platform. It would then move forward on to the up fast line. Reversing over the trailing crossover and then the crossover between up fast and up slow to come to a stand in the up platform.

And the question....? On which side, up or down, would the loco run round the train? I suppose a signal diagram might answer, as ground signals would be provided to allow the move.

Incidentally would the N2s have struggled to get over that new flyover, given the sharp curves and wicked gradients?

Chaz

[R. pike]

It just so happens..

http://richard2890.fotopic.net/p54349899.html

My guess is the loco ran round in the down platform as the down fast is signalled for a bang road move via 20 disc to the limit of shunt board outside 11/12/23 signal. The loco could then drop back onto the train and then, once coupled, propel it out onto the down fast then haul the train into the up platform via 30 disc and 29 and 27 crossovers.... Just a guess but it is signalled for it..

[chaz harrison]

You may well be right RP, however peering at the signal diagram your link brings up shows sufficient ground signals on the down side crossovers to make a run-round on that side feasible. Could it be that either side might be used on occasion depending on the traffic passing through?

Chaz

[R. pike]

I think your right. The bang road move gave some flexibility if up road traffic got in the way. It's easy to see why it has a flyover now..

[StevieG]

Quite correct RP. However, if later diesel-hauled days were anything to go by, presumably not wanting to occupy the Down Fast for that long, I saw sets hauled out to the DF (actually "Down Main" I think, because the 2nd line to the north then was a 'Goods'), then propel back to the Up Slow. Theoretically the loco could then have RR via the Up Back Platform, but one option when (as when I observed) next working was not imminent, was to get train to the UBP, by either continuing to propel through to the south, then draw forward into UBP; - or stop in US plat., draw forward to US Limit of Shunt board (adjacent to the Hertford branch's turning away from the ML), then propel back into UBP (or straight into Up Yard if stabling).

WGC was a place that could really have made good use of a GN-style through crossover from one side right across to the other (probably Down Goods, or even Luton Line; to 'Up Back' or Up Yard), with slips, avoiding the need for extended occupation of the DF plus simultaneous lesser time no-train opportunity on DF & UF, for such shunts, but presumably due to its relatively more recent birth, it didn't get one because track layout policy had become more 'modern'.

[StevieG]

You may well be right RP, however peering at the signal diagram your link brings up shows sufficient ground signals on the down side crossovers to make a run-round on that side feasible. Could it be that either side might be used on occasion depending on the traffic passing through?

Chaz

Is there some confusion here between which side is 'Down' and which is 'Up'?

[chaz harrison]

Oops, you are quite right StevieG, I should have typed "up side crossovers". That's what I meant. I know up from down, just a brain tangle between thought and keyboard. A view of WGC...

Sorry about the appalling quality - the snap was taken with a plywood 127 camera that my father gave me (he won it in a children's comic competition some time in the thirties). It's viewfinder was a square frame from wire that pulled up out of the box. The single element lens was not really up to the enprint size which I copied this morning with my digital compact.
The engine is No 13. I would guess the train is the Yorkshire Pullman. It's certainly a down train! Note the prosperous looking good yard, well populated with vans and wagons.

Chaz

[chaz harrison]

I was at WGC yesterday and, as I promised, paused to take a few photos...

above - looking south seen from the down platform - that open wagon in the yard has been there for months. In the distance is the flyover that replaces the trailing crossover as the way terminating trains regain the up side.

above - The down side platform. A sign of the times? - after I had taken several snaps I was challenged by the bloke in the high-vis, who wanted to know what I was up to. The train in the distance is for Cambridge and is the one I had just alighted from. Shame it wasn't The Cambridge Buffet with a B1 on the front.

above - The up side buildings, intact and mostly still used.

above - The view looking north, with Hunter's Bridge much as it was when I was a kid.

above - The footbridge. A replaced section from the up platform, across the down and on into the loathsome Howard Centre. The eastwards section is the original.

There are a couple more snaps in the set, but I have hit the 5 uploads max', so I will post them later.

Chaz

[chaz harrison]

Two more photos from yesterday

above - the view looking south from the footbridge, with the (almost) empty yard. The LH running line, seen under the flyover, continues for some distance beyond The Twentieth Mile Bridge before ending with a stop block.

above - the remains of the private sidings. i am standing under the end of the footbridge looking north. The erstwhile Shredded Wheat factory is on the right with Bridge Road in the distance, beyond the gates.

Chaz

[hq1hitchin]

Thanks very much for these, chaz, certainly brings back some memories. First day at work on the railways saw me shyly reporting to Mr Evans, the Welwyn Gdn City SM, in his office on the Down Slow platform not knowing quite what to expect. I must have liked it because I went on to make a career out of it. In your photo looking south from there, the little brick hut on the right was where all the defective tail lamps from the Kings Cross Division were sent for examination by the Freight Trains Inspector. I bet he doesn't do much business now...

[Bryan]

Looks like a BASS wagon in the sidings.

The employee that questioned you, Is that a cigarette in his hand or a pen?
Shouldn't be smoking on the station should he?

[chaz harrison]

Interesting nugget of information about the hut on the downside, hq1hitchin. Here are two more surviving huts.

above - The concrete platelayer's hut (?) at the north end of the up platform - probably not long for this world.

The brick built shed that stands alongside the old Hertford line platform.
An aside
When I was travelling back from Retford some time ago on a Hull Trains diesel set (very impressive) there was a fatality on the line at Hatfield and the train was held in the "Hertford" platform for about ten minutes.

Interesting contrast between WGC station, which has survived largely intact, with the only notable demolitions being the signal cabin, goods shed and ticket hall; and Hatfield where the only evidence of the original station is the staggered platforms.

No Bryan, he wasn't smoking.

Chaz

[hq1hitchin]

The brick built building in your lower shot used to be the shunters cabin as WGC had a decent amount of freight traffic at one time, enough to warrant five extra sidings being installed in WW2. The concrete hut in the top shot wasn't somewhere I went much, have a vague notion of hiding some flags and lamps there one Friday so we could get an engineers possession off to a flying start on a Saturday night, instead of looking around for the blessed things and finding something missing. I do seem to recall one of the oldtimers (like I am now ha ha) telling me it once housed the token equipment for the Hertford branch. Years before that, I can also recall returning from evening classes one winters night and going to the bike shed (which was next to the goods shed) to retrieve my moped, only to be jumped upon by a bloke in civvies,which was quite frightening in the dark. He turned out to be the British Transport Police detective sergeant from Hitchin and lost interest once he realised I was no crim but a tired sixteeen year old just wanting to get home! Certainly the station buildings of Welwyn Garden City are relatively modern in railway terms (1926?) wheras those at Hatfield were rather delapidated and were replaced by the rather dull ones we have now in about 1974. One of the gems which went was the Royal Waiting Room, originally used in connection with visits to nearby Hatfield House and latterly as a signalling school. Oddly enough, there is a railway club building on the downside at Hatfield (or was the last time I went out of KX), which also dates from the mid 1970s. It was built but never used, don't ask me why - anyone know the answer?

[chaz harrison]

Thanks, hq1hitchin, for more info' on WGC station. The sort of detail only someone who had worked there would know.

One small point that you might be able to confim - am I right in thinking that there was a capstan installed by the track that went through the goods shed? I have a memory of seeing one of the dumb bollards (?) but never actually saw a wagon being moved this way.

Chaz