Victoria Road

00, British Railways (Southern), 1 @ 6 feet

Victoria Road represents the terminus of a minor branch line on the south coast between Portsmouth and Brighton. The branch could have been part of the London Brighton and South Coast Railway or London South Western Railway till 1923, then Southern Railway till 1947, and finally British Railways, Southern Region. The layout is set in the steam to diesel change over period mid 1950s to mid 1960s. Broadly this was period when British Railways started to lose significant traffic to the roads and local traffic become unprofitable. The response was to modernise, close rural lines such as the Midland and Great Northern Joint Railway, and centralise goods facilities. For Victoria Road the impact has been the quay line has been closed, theoretically temporarily in practice for ever, the front siding that originally served a factory has also been cut back, and goods yard traffic is not what it was. Just Gravel's Victoria Quarry remains an important source of traffic - incidentally Just Gravel is named after an aggregate firm in Bognor.

Passenger    Gravel    Goods    Panoramas   

Passenger

The passenger train comes on scene

The parcels van is at the front to be conveniently located to load and unload

The train backs up to give clearance to run round

The loco puls forward to start running round

The loco back passed the train

Then pushes the coaches back to the platform

Passengers get on board

The passenger train returns to the junction

Gravel Train

The gravel train comes on scene

Stops with clearance to run round

The loco stops at the temporary buffers

The loco back through the point

runs round and picks up the break van

The break van is left by the gravel loader

Full wagons are pulled out from under the loader

The are coupled up to the break van and the train pushed clear of the gravel siding point

The loco collects the empty wagons

Empty wagons are pushed under the loader

The loco couples up to the out bound train

The full gravel train departs

Goods

The goods arrives

The loco uncouples and runs down to the buffers

The loco runs round

The loco collects the out bound wagons from the goods siding

Next the break van is collected

The out bound train is left on the loop

The loco couples up to the in bound wagons

The coal wagons are spotted (parked)

Then the vans are spotted

The goods train is off.

Quay Line


Cut back Front Siding

I accidently wacked the spike hard with a loco - it held


Panoramas