Where is this?

[Fazaar1889]

Looks pretty cool. I've seen this picture quite a few times but I've never known its location.

 

[sot]

It looks suspiciously similar to farringdon

 

[swt_passenger]

It looks suspiciously similar to farringdon

It is exactly that, just west of the Farringdon platforms, the structure the underground tracks are on is known as the ‘Ray Street Gridiron’. Nowadays you’d see Thameslink 700s at the low level, and LU s stock above.

Named for its original structure where all the girders were visible, a later rebuild used reinforced concrete.

 

[Mcr Warrior]

Would that then be looking towards the Clerkenwell tunnel(s)? Also, what approximate year does the image (posted by the OP) likely date to? Before or after WW2?

 

[Cowley]

Also, what approximate year does the image (posted by the OP) likely date to? Before or after WW2?

A Sulzer Type 2 (class 24) in original green livery with no yellow warning panels would put it in the 1958 to 1965 ish era I would guess?

 

[eastwestdivide]

A more current photo taken from above is at

Widened Lines - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Widened_Lines

and a view in the same direction, with an “under and over” at

BR Class 317 EMU 317332, Farringdon.

"Bedpan" EMU 317332 heads out of Farringdon on a down service (or possibly ecs) over the Widened Lines on 6th. May 1987.

www.flickr.com

 

[Magdalia]

A Sulzer Type 2 (class 24) in original green livery with no yellow warning panels would put it in the 1958 to 1965 ish era I would guess?

Cricklewood first had BR Type 2s in 1960 and Finsbury Park in 1961.

I think that Cricklewood had lost all of its 1160hp BR Type 2s by 1965, but it is a bit difficult to tell because of the loco allocations by division introduced by the LMR around that time.

The Finsbury Park locos were used on cross London transfer freights via the widened lines until 1966.

The absence of a small yellow panel makes it likely that the picture is nearer the beginning of that period than the end.

 

[Rescars]

I wonder what is the Type 2 hauling and where it might it be going. From what can be seen, the first vehicle looks in profile more like a 4 wheeled van than coaching stock, or is this just a trick of the light? Does the headcode give any clues? Were special headcodes used on the Widened Lines?

 

[Magdalia]

I wonder what is the Type 2 hauling and where it might it be going. From what can be seen, the first vehicle looks in profile more like a 4 wheeled van than coaching stock, or is this just a trick of the light?

It is a cross London transfer freight, if from the GN starting at Ferme Park. The destination is likely to be Norwood Junction or Hither Green.

Were special headcodes used on the Widened Lines?

The Southern Region didn't use standard disc codes, it isn't a disc set up that I recognise.

 

[30907]

I wonder what is the Type 2 hauling and where it might it be going. From what can be seen, the first vehicle looks in profile more like a 4 wheeled van than coaching stock, or is this just a trick of the light? Does the headcode give any clues? Were special headcodes used on the Widened Lines?

The 1960 SR(SE) Sectional Appendix gives the code as "ER to/from Lower Sydenham." Lower Sydenham was (principally) traffic for the Gasworks, so what the van behind the loco is doing I don't know - I don't think it's a goods brake.
I suppose the freight might have called at Blackfriars Goods en route?

 

[Magdalia]

I have found this at Crystal Palace on Rail Online.

Class 24 BR Sulzer Type 2 | D5065 1962-08-23 Crystal Palace

BR 24 Bo-Bo No D5065 with a Brent to Norwood Yard transfer freight passes Crystal Palace (low level) on 23 August 1962. Photo: Brian Stephenson

www.rail-online.co.uk

BR 24 Bo-Bo No D5065 with a Brent to Norwood Yard transfer freight passes Crystal Palace (low level) on 23 August 1962.

The headcode discs are the same as in the Farringdon picture.

But I suspect that the caption is incorrect. Either the loco is D5065 and the train is from Ferme Park or the train is from Brent but the loco is D5085.

The 1960 SR(SE) Sectional Appendix gives the code as "ER to/from Lower Sydenham.

Would a train to or from Brent/LMR have a different disc code?

 

[EyeKay]

@Fazaar1889 thanks for sharing that picture. It’s very interesting. Given the low headroom above the Sulzer, it’s amazing that they managed to do overhead electrification. I guess they lowered the track as the picture in post #6 shows slab track.

 

[Rescars]

The 1960 SR(SE) Sectional Appendix gives the code as "ER to/from Lower Sydenham." Lower Sydenham was (principally) traffic for the Gasworks, so what the van behind the loco is doing I don't know - I don't think it's a goods brake.
I suppose the freight might have called at Blackfriars Goods en route?

Would a train to or from Brent/LMR have a different disc code?

I wonder how precise these headcodes for cross London freights were - or needed to be. Presumably the original idea was for the headcode to help staff, especially signallers, identify the routes of specific trains. Particularly useful at junctions etc. Others will know more, but by the 1960s wouldn't most of the lines involved have been signalled from boxes equipped with illuminated track diagrams, making the need to physically observe trains from most boxes a dying practice?

 

[Magdalia]

Others will know more, but by the 1960s wouldn't most of the lines involved have been signalled from boxes equipped with illuminated track diagrams, making the need to physically observe trains from most boxes a dying practice?

On the GN traditional manual signalling was alive and well until the 1970s resignalling prior to suburban electrification. I think that the southern end of the Midland Main Line was the same.

 

[Rescars]

On the GN traditional manual signalling was alive and well until the 1970s resignalling prior to suburban electrification. I think that the southern end of the Midland Main Line was the same.

Good point. Too much of my youth spent south of the Thames where much had been resignalled in the 1950s!

 

[Gloster]

Even if it was track circuited, in those days the track-circuits only indicated where the train was, not its destination or reporting number: I think that a lot of the routing indicators south of Snow Hill were of the revolving indicator type, which had only a limited number of indications and could not show everything. Displaying the correct headcode is important for when you start, to get the routing codes started correctly, and through the journey as a check. Otherwise you get a goods stopped across the junction with the driver contacting the box and saying, “Excuse me, Mr Signalman, but this train is destined for Hither Green, not the Central Division”…or something like that. Headcodes do matter: I have seen the fun that can ensue if the numbers get confused or swapped.

 

[norbitonflyer]

Even if it was track circuited, in those days the track-circuits only indicated where the train was, not its destination or reporting number: I think that a lot of the routing indicators south of Snow Hill were of the revolving indicator type, which had only a limited number of indications and could not show everything. Displaying the correct headcode is important for when you start, to get the routing codes started correctly, and through the journey as a check. Otherwise you get a goods stopped across the junction with the driver contacting the box and saying, “Excuse me, Mr Signalman, but this train is destined for Hither Green, not the Central Division”…or something like that. Headcodes do matter: I have seen the fun that can ensue if the numbers get confused or swapped.

and was a contributory factor in the St Johns (Lewisham) collision in 1957, when a signalman tried to direct a Hastings train down the Hayes branch (both being simply described as "electric" - although the Hastings was in fact a new-fangled diesel, for which no code yet existed). By the time the confusion had been sorted out, a queue had built up in the fog, into the rear of which ran a steam-hauled Kent coast express.

 

[Big Jumby 74]

“Excuse me, Mr Signalman, but this train is destined for Hither Green, not the Central Division”…or something like that.

Oh yes, a very polite version of some conversations had via the SPT lines.......in fairness, most were amicable, but it's human nature 'one' remembers the not so polite ones!

and was a contributory factor in the St Johns (Lewisham) collision in 1957,

The only time I know of that the name 'Spitfire' is not remembered with fondness/reverence...etc..perhaps?

 

[John Webb]

On the GN traditional manual signalling was alive and well until the 1970s resignalling prior to suburban electrification. I think that the southern end of the Midland Main Line was the same.

Indeed - West Hampstead PSU took over completely on 2nd December 1979. But I think every manual box had some track circuits. At St Albans South we got our first TCs in December 1915, although they used electro-mechanical repeaters rather than lamps for some years. We think the 1915 TCs were part of the 2000+ locations the MR decided needed TCs following the 1910 Ais Gill accident.

 

[Rescars]

Very interesting points about headcodes and the limits of earlier systems for train identification. Presumably the Sectional Appendices would be the founts of all knowledge about the precise headcodes which would have applied to the various cross-London freight workings and whether or not they were the same northbound and southbound.

 

[Fazaar1889]

Thanks guys