Trivia: Railway infrastructure/buildings that were never used for their intended purpose (if at all)

[Spartacus]

Did the old Motor-rail ramp at Wakefield Westgate (the multi-storey station car park is now on the site) ever get much use? It was sat unused for as long as I can remember, and can't imagine Wakefield being a huge draw for motor-rail.

Wasn't it always intended for unloading car trains rather than motor-rail, but people jumped to the wrong conclusion? I know it did see a little use for car trains.

 

[DelW]

My local tube station - you don't realise walking around it how much land there is here going to waste! Have there ever been plans to build houses? Would be pretty lucrative I'd think.

I believe that the high level station forms the roof of the tube station below - at one time there were problems with rainwater ingress which needed repairs to be made to the high level building. So demolition and house building would pose problems for operation of the tube station.

 

[61653 HTAFC]

Wasn't it always intended for unloading car trains rather than motor-rail, but people jumped to the wrong conclusion? I know it did see a little use for car trains.

It may well have been, but then my comment about Wakefield still stands: why was it provided there, and particularly in that location in the middle of the city centre rather than at any number of freight facilities on the outskirts (Healey Mills, or the Freightliner terminal area for example)?

 

[swt_passenger]

I believe that the high level station forms the roof of the tube station below - at one time there were problems with rainwater ingress which needed repairs to be made to the high level building. So demolition and house building would pose problems for operation of the tube station.

That’s how I’d heard it explained. [Highgate] The only practical means to use the apparent overall space would be piled foundations all around the tube tunnels and concourse, with a massive raft over it all. But it‘s probable that land availability hasn’t reached the stage where it would ever be commercially viable. Would be different in a city centre...

 

[Spartacus]

It may well have been, but then my comment about Wakefield still stands: why was it provided there, and particularly in that location in the middle of the city centre rather than at any number of freight facilities on the outskirts (Healey Mills, or the Freightliner terminal area for example)?

I'm sure there was something about them being located very close by, and the land was available, unloading them there meant they could be easily be driven to where they were needed instead of having to go on a road car transporter, which would probably have defeated the whole object.

 

[geoffk]

The building which became the Grange Furniture shop in Watford High Street was intended to be the terminus of the Metropolitan's Watford Branch. Now a Wetherspoons apparently; there's another thread on it. Not sure if this really counts as railway infrastructure.

There was a line in the Forest of Dean which never opened. (from Wikipedia) The Mitcheldean Road & Forest of Dean Junction Rly was formed to build a line from Whimsey, near Cinderford, northwards to link up with the Hereford, Ross & Gloucester Rly at Mitcheldean Road. The line was taken over by the GWR in 1878 and completed but never fully opened.

 

[Taunton]

Highgate high level station still looks as if services could stop there in a few months time!

I believe the basic structure at Highgate is retained and indeed periodically has work done on it because it is the most effective way of keeping ground water out of the Underground station platforms which are directly underneath, otherwise a notable problem to deal with. So a continuing example of buildings "not being used for their intended purpose".

 

[61653 HTAFC]

I'm sure there was something about them being located very close by, and the land was available, unloading them there meant they could be easily be driven to where they were needed instead of having to go on a road car transporter, which would probably have defeated the whole object.

I suppose that makes sense... but it slightly smacks of that old BR Railfreight thinking of "assume what x industry sector will need, then give them something different and they'll have to like it or lump it". Of course, most industries decided to lump it and used large transporter trucks for the whole journey instead.

 

[Midnight Sun]

Dartmouth railway station. Never used as a station due to the refusal of permission to build the railway down the west bank of the Dart. It did however get used as a ticket office for many years.

More of a case of the Navy putting a block on any bridge being built over the river.

 

[matchmaker]

Cromarty and Dingwall Light Railway. Partly constructed but not completed. Some of the earthworks are stiil visible, I understand.

https://www.railscot.co.uk/Cromarty_and_Dingwall_Light_Railway/index.php

 

[DerekC]

At Whitchurch (Hants) there is an abandoned bridge just north of the one which carries the Newbury Road over the ex-LSWR Basingstoke - Salisbury line. The parapets are still there at road level but the rest of the bridge was buried when the cuttings were filled in. it was built for a never-completed north to west link between the Didcot, Newbury & Southampton and LSWR lines which crossed just west of the station.

 

[Western 52]

At Gwain cae Gurwen there are 2 viaducts built about 100 years ago. The southern one was never used and no track was laid. The First World war was apparently the reason.

 

[bassmike]

Yes, it was done, see eg https://www.sixbellsjunction.co.uk/60s/610902lc.html and https://www.sixbellsjunction.co.uk/50s/560505lc.html

The centre platforms at E finchley are sometimes used by short-working trips etc:

 

[faltskog36abba]

There was a cattle dock built in the 1950s next to Manchester Abbatoir and the now closed Park station, Little used at first then left to rust away for 40 years.

 

[LOL The Irony]

And the similar facility at Manchester (Longsight). The sign "Le Eurostar Habit Ici" that was painted on the side of the depot was nothing short of an embarrassment.

You took mine . Built for the NoL services but to my knowledge, never saw a single 373, NoL set or otherwise. Now leased by Alstom to CAF for the testing & delivery of TPE trains. At least to NoL sets stuck to their name and saw some service north of London with GNER.

 

[Dr Hoo]

The centre platforms at E finchley are sometimes used by short-working trips etc:

Definitely. Oddly enough on my first visit to East Finchley (whilst 'ticking off' all the Underground stations) I used one of the short workings from a centre platform for the next leg and thought nothing of it for years later.

I suppose that makes sense... but it slightly smacks of that old BR Railfreight thinking of "assume what x industry sector will need, then give them something different and they'll have to like it or lump it". Of course, most industries decided to lump it and used large transporter trucks for the whole journey instead.

Perhaps my memory is playing tricks on me but I am pretty sure that Ford Transit vans used to go to Wakefield from the erstwhile plant at Swaythling, either from Southampton Bevois Park or Eastleigh.

Ford was a very big customer for BR and I pretty sure that the conversation went pretty much along the lines of "we need to move a lot of vans to West Yorkshire, what can you offer?" Healey Mills was a rail-locked marshalling yard, not relevant to block automotive trains. Leeds Stourton Container Terminal was for, er, containers. Wakefield fitted the bill nicely.

I know that RailUK Forums seems to have an obsession with 'County Towns/(Cities)' as if they all have the commercial and real estate significance of Manhattan or Singapore but have never been entirely convinced that Wakefield fitted that description in the 1970s.

 

[Dr_Paul]

There are bridge abutments each side of the North London Line between Acton Town and Willesden Junction a little south of the bridge under the A40. These are the remains of a bridge for a projected line from the GWR at Acton Mainline towards Addison Road (now Olympia), see this map, which was never built (the line to Olympia that was built came off the GWR's Birmingham line, and the Central Line runs parallel with its now abandoned course). I'm pretty sure that the bridge was there when I was a kid, but it's just the abutments now. My dad used to say that this was part of a never built main line from London to Wales; I don't know where he learnt that, but I've seen other people refer to the same mythical project on various Internet sites.