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What are the strange structures in this photo?

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randyrippley

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an afterthought to this, the photos date from 1931. According to http://www.toffeetown.org.uk/tales/title/Rileys-Toffees/post/4696 the Riley Toffee factory was damaged in a major fire in 1918. I wonder if these were emergency wall supports after a section of roof had gone? Post-war, repairs may have taken a long time and when they finally did happen the timbers were taken by the locals for use as firewood?
Pure conjecture, but seems possible
 

Cowley

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Unfortunately (from my work) it's not plausible at all. Sound deflects / diffracts around barriers, light doesn't bend significantly in public health or nuisance terms. I reckon the light screens are definitely the most likely answer.
I think you’re probably right. I’m a bit tired and posted without thinking about it properly.
They still seem very substantial just for keeping light out though when something could easily be attached to the windows themselves.
 

AndrewE

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They still seem very substantial just for keeping light out though when something could easily be attached to the windows themselves.
Actually a sheet of black paper or cardboard would keep the light out, but it wouldn't survive the first shower of rain! I think they are robustly boarded to withstand the wind and so that they don't rot away in a couple of years. As I said earlier, I think the railway created the nuisance and was persuaded to deal with the problem by structures on its own land, which would have been the easiest way out for them.
 

AndrewE

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an afterthought to this, the photos date from 1931. According to http://www.toffeetown.org.uk/tales/title/Rileys-Toffees/post/4696 the Riley Toffee factory was damaged in a major fire in 1918. I wonder if these were emergency wall supports after a section of roof had gone? Post-war, repairs may have taken a long time and when they finally did happen the timbers were taken by the locals for use as firewood?
Pure conjecture, but seems possible
Except that it's a bit of a coincidence that the screens mounted on the posts (and their shadows) map quite precisely onto some of the windows (and none are not associated with a window.) Also the positions of the shadows relative to the house wall and the windows show the spacing from the wall - all too far away to be anything structural I think.
p.s.and re some of the structures being in the lane - sorry, I missed this at first reading - I think you are seeing the shadows of the supports on the side of the house.
 

Trackman

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an afterthought to this, the photos date from 1931. According to http://www.toffeetown.org.uk/tales/title/Rileys-Toffees/post/4696 the Riley Toffee factory was damaged in a major fire in 1918. I wonder if these were emergency wall supports after a section of roof had gone? Post-war, repairs may have taken a long time and when they finally did happen the timbers were taken by the locals for use as firewood?
Pure conjecture, but seems possible

My first thought was wall-supports, common even 50 years ago, especially on gable-ends. They line up with the windows and in the bigger photo not all the row has the supports, so that threw my theory out.
 

randyrippley

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Except that it's a bit of a coincidence that the screens mounted on the posts (and their shadows) map quite precisely onto some of the windows (and none are not associated with a window.) Also the positions of the shadows relative to the house wall and the windows show the spacing from the wall - all too far away to be anything structural I think.
p.s.and re some of the structures being in the lane - sorry, I missed this at first reading - I think you are seeing the shadows of the supports on the side of the house.

You're misunderstanding what I'm saying. They're not structural supports for the terrace - they've simply been dumped behind it. I believe they were used to support something else - possibly the toffee factory across the road after the fire. (its cropped out of the original photo - see the others I linked to a few posts back, which I suspect you've missed.
If you enlarge the photo it clearly looks as if two of the right hand sets are in the track: you can't see the legs, and they have matching shadows
 

randyrippley

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a bit more.........you can see more of the terrace in this photo, and viewed like this you can see the structures are simply dumped close to the road junction. Riley's toffee factory - aka The Kingston Confectionery Works - is the factory across the main road, and is what had the fire in 1918, 13 years earlier
EPW036850.jpg
 

eastdyke

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I have found another picture of the goods yard from a different angle, stated circa 1927.
The picture is from the Pennine Heritage website and the rights holder is quoted as 'PHDA - Lancashire & Yorkshire Railway Society'.
http://old.pennineheritage.org.uk/document/17658
The basic edifices can just be seen in the background.
I cannot spot any obvious illumination sources in the goods yard.

upload_2018-1-22_22-20-1.jpeg
 
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randyrippley

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I have found another picture of the goods yard from a different angle, stated circa 1927.
The picture is from the Pennine Heritage website and the rights holder is quoted as 'PHDA - Lancashire & Yorkshire Railway Society'.
The basic edifices can just be seen in the background.
I cannot spot any obvious illumination sources in the goods yard.

So four years earlier, the buildings have windows. No structures, so they're not an attempt to restrict light access
 

randyrippley

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Looking at the maps again, I misidentified the toffee factory, but I still am certain they are some kind of support structures.
 

AndrewE

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So four years earlier, the buildings have windows. No structures, so they're not an attempt to restrict light access

Pretty sure I can make out at least one pole in that photo. Less sure about boards though.
I reckon 2 poles are visible, the right-hand one having the hint of a diagonal brace (plus what maybe a gutter downpipe between them) The blinding boards don't show up though, so perhaps they have rotted or dropped off by now?

Looking at the maps again, I misidentified the toffee factory, but I still am certain they are some kind of support structures.
I too think they are supports... but for the poles themselves, which were erected to hold the window shields up.
The water tower seems to have some things on its top, but I wouldn't really expect a floodlamp to be particularly recognisable at that distance. I don't see any structures dumped by a road junction...
 

DelW

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As AndrewE pointed out earlier, they are much too accurately aligned with house windows to have been dumped there after being used elsewhere. Plus if you were just dumping them out of the way, you'd put them in a group at the most convenient place, not space them apart over thirty yards or so and align them all the same way round.

Most suggestions have been based on screening the houses from lights on the railway, but might it be the other way round? Could they have been to screen house lights from railway activities, if they might have been a distraction for signalmen or shunters etc. relying on lamp signals? Though if so, it's strange that some windows didn't have the screens outside - perhaps the residents of those properties used dimmer lighting?
 

Ash Bridge

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This may be another daft suggestion, but looking at that last image which reveals there is a coal yard on the opposite side of the line with several piles of coal dumped there ready for bagging, surely during dry combined with breezy weather conditions there could be the potential for copious amounts of dust to be blowing around so could these structures be a rather crude sort of screening for this reason perhaps?
 

Committee man

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Interesting topic and EASTDYKE's comment reminded my of something I was told some years ago. I once interviewed an old retired station porter who told me that one day, some time in the 1920's he was told to call at a particular house (an end terrace whose gable end faced the line) that backed on to the station junction.
His job was to collect the 'light of day money' from the occupiers. He had never heard of such a thing and thought it was some sort of prank. However an official railway form/receipt was produced and the householder was not surprised by his visit, 'oh they have sent you have they'.
It was 1 shilling for the 12 months so the railway company was not exactly exploiting the arrangement.
I assume that although everyone has a right to light they don't necessarily have a right to some sort of view that could be blocked by later development although how this legal arrangement was achieved I do not know. The property did post date the railway.
Perhaps that, or a variation of it is whats going on in the picture in question?
 

SquireBev

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Light of day money? That's fascinating. I love these little insights into the way people used to live. Things that aren't on any official record.

Anyway, I've got in touch with the Halifax Courier and name-dropped Chris Helme, so we'll see what happens.
 

Committee man

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Forgot to say that the house in question is at a right angle to the fence and has two gable end windows facing the railway, the openings to which appear to be original. It was directly opposite (but not behind) the signal box so not certain if that had any bearing on things. There are other houses running parallel to the line here also with windows facing the railway but not right up to the boundary as they have rear yards and an alleyway.The old porter never mentioned any other houses, just this one. Was the railway charging for a view of the signal box! Probably quite a few on here that would willingly pay for that.
This is in Northwich, Cheshire by the way so no direct connection with the picture in the OP, just thought the information might help.
 

dubscottie

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I think that they are there to block natural light so the owner of the land could build on it in the future. The structures appear to be an attempt to get round the "Right to light" laws.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right_to_light

"In effect, the owner of a building with windows that have received natural daylight for 20 years or more is entitled to forbid any construction or other obstruction that would deprive him or her of that illumination. Neighbours cannot build anything that would block the light without permission."
 

Ianigsy

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The 1927 picture shows the houses at a higher level than those on the opposite side of the yard - given that it's an east facing wall, my guess would be that the screens are there to block out the sunlight at dawn in summer. If you're a factory worker who starts their shift between 7 and 8, you don't really want to be woken by daylight at 5am when it's difficult to get back to sleep.
 

eastdyke

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The 1927 picture shows the houses at a higher level than those on the opposite side of the yard - given that it's an east facing wall, my guess would be that the screens are there to block out the sunlight at dawn in summer. If you're a factory worker who starts their shift between 7 and 8, you don't really want to be woken by daylight at 5am when it's difficult to get back to sleep.
Surely either shutters or curtains would have been both less expensive and more straightforward to install? They would also be in the total control of the occupiers.
A further observation - the windows are actually rather small. Compare with those on the fronts of the houses on the other side of Vickerman Street (as can be seen in the picture in the OP).
 

AndrewE

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It seems someone has built a layout roughly based on St Paul's station, and has even included the row of houses in question!

https://www.scalefour.org/scalefournorth/2016/halifaxkingcross/Halifax-King-Cross-4.html

If we could track down this chap perhaps he might have come across an answer in planning the layout?
It would be a bit more reassuring if he had got the station name right (unless it is an admission that it is only loosely based on the station) A nice model, all the same...
 

SquireBev

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It would be a bit more reassuring if he had got the station name right (unless it is an admission that it is only loosely based on the station) A nice model, all the same...

I believe it's only loosely based on St Paul's rather than a slavishly accurate rendition. He's clearly put a lot of work into it though, so I assume he did a lot of research into the area.
 

eastdyke

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I believe it's only loosely based on St Paul's rather than a slavishly accurate rendition. He's clearly put a lot of work into it though, so I assume he did a lot of research into the area.
Indeed an awesome lot of work!
22 pictures here on a scalefour forum:
https://www.scalefour.org/scaleforum/2013/halifaxkingcross/
Presented by Steve Hall
Halifax King Cross is a first attempt at P4, and took ten years to build.
Based on the Halifax High Level Railway, it represents the terminus the line intended to have, rather than the one the line's cost of construction permitted in reality.
 

Cowley

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That’s an amazing model. He must have done a bit of research into that row to have captured it so well.
 

Committee man

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Yes an amazing model. Great atmosphere, especially liked the 16t mineral wagons in the coal yard. They really do look rusty, if you see what I mean.
 

AndrewE

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I once interviewed an old retired station porter who told me that one day, some time in the 1920's he was told to call at a particular house (an end terrace whose gable end faced the line) that backed on to the station junction.
His job was to collect the 'light of day money' from the occupiers. He had never heard of such a thing and thought it was some sort of prank. However an official railway form/receipt was produced and the householder was not surprised by his visit, 'oh they have sent you have they'.
It was 1 shilling for the 12 months so the railway company was not exactly exploiting the arrangement.
I assume that although everyone has a right to light they don't necessarily have a right to some sort of view that could be blocked by later development although how this legal arrangement was achieved I do not know. The property did post date the railway. Perhaps that, or a variation of it is whats going on in the picture in question?
This post has made me change my mind!
In the light of the fact that another railway was protecting its interests I now agree with people that it is probably the case here. The railway bought the oblong block of land for its lines and station, then realised that it might have a development or resale opportunity in the NW corner and was making sure that the houses (built later?) backing on to it couldn't object to a later development.
I guess that the house owners or landlords who paid up to keep their view were accepting that one day the railway (or whoever they sold the land to) had the right to deprive them of it. People who refused to pay had a token but legally valid obstruction put on railway land in their direct view outside the window, so that they couldn't claim they would lose anything if something was built immediately adjacent.
This explains the limited number of screens at seemingly random windows, and the strength and bracing is just to do with the wind loading on a big board 20 feet up in the air.
 

Cowley

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This does seem like the most obvious scenario now doesn’t it.
Especially going on the obvious strength of those structures which are heavily engineered.
 

AlterEgo

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This seems the most plausible explanation. Landowner sees windows being opened on neighbouring property and anticipates future problems. Goes to property owner(s) and says: "Either sign this paper permitting future development on my land or I'm putting up screening which will block your light". Or something similar.

Already been explained that the screen would block light for what, maybe half an hour in the very early morning and probably only in summer. Also the land being “protected” seems to be common land with common access.

Extremely unlikely in my view.
 
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