The Sorry Tale
Page 46
Page 47
Page 48
If you've noticed an error in this article please click here to report it so we can fix it.
Railway
By C. S. Dunbar,
M.Inst.T. MANY years ago, idly turning over the pages of Bradshaw, 1 noticed ,a line on which there were stations with the curious names of Twenty and Counterdrain; it also had a branch on which another station was tersely named Ferry. A map showed all these in the Fens and, apparently, isolated from human habitation. I thought it would be interesting to travel over the line which served them, but it was only recently that I had the opportunity of doing so. Then it was through the courtesy of British Railways (Eastern Region) and for the purpose of seeing the line before it disappears from the railway map on February 28. These stations are on the Midland and Great Northern Joint Line and the closure of the major portion of this undertaking will be the biggest railway abandonment 'ever known in this
country. .
. It . was not until: I travelled on the line that I realized its length and how little it is patronized by passengers on normal . weekdays. British Railways estimate that the closure will save at least £640,000 a year and they will avoid heavy capital, expenditure which would be necessary if the line remained open. According, to. the Transport Users' Consultative .Committees there will be immediate and short-term savings, of working .expenses of £826,000 and a further saving of £183,000 in provision for renewals. Against the total of £1.009,900 has to be set deductions of 069,000, consisting. of £265,000 as the estimated loss of gross receipts 'through thc diversion of traffic and E104,000 as the .estimated cost Of providing alterna
tive services.
• Vicioriap Survival .
The Joint .Line is. an .interesting survival. of, the Victorian'era. The two oldcompanies whose. names itperpetuated entered, what was otherwise solid Great Eastern. territory, by buying up a• number of small companies whose systems fitted "naturally together and provided junctions with the Great Northern at Peterborough and with the Midland at Little Bythairi, Lines, 4.1miles west of Bourne. The' latter connection gave access to Melton Mowbray. Nottingham and Leicester. For operating .purposes. the Joint Line is considered as ending at Saxby Junction, where it joins the main line of the Midland. The main line of the joint undertaking is, therefore, regarded as running from Saxby to Great Yarmouth (Beach). via Bourne, Spalding, South. Lynn (with a branch to King's Lynn), Fakenham, Melton Constable and North Walsham.
The line from Peterborough comes in' at Sutton Bridge and there are branches • from Melton Constable to Norwich and to Cromer, sO that at its triaXimurn, the M. and' GNIowned and-oPerated abou: B12
183 miles of route. They also owned jointly with the Great Eastern some 22 miles, represented by lines from North Walsham to Mundesley and Cromer and from Yarmouth to Lowestoft. The Joint Line came under L.N.E.R. control in 1936.
The Mundesley and Lowestoft lines are not involved in the forthcoming closure, but the section from Mundesley to Cromer was closed completely on April 7. 1953. On the M. and G.N. itself, the whole system will cease to carry passengers, except that the Melton ConstableCromer service will continue for an experimental period, • Of the remainder, five sections will remain open for freight: (a) SaxbySouth Witham, tb) Spalding-Sutton. Bridge, (c) King's Lynn-South LynnGayton Road, (d) Melton Constable-Norwich and (e) Pete r boro ugh-Wisbech North.
South Witham spur is to handle brick and ironore traffic; it is just possible that there may be a big increase in iron mining in South Kesteven. The Gayton Road portion serves large sand quarries and the other fragments will be mainly concerned with agricultural products, including sugar-beet at South Lynn. Peterborough Wisbech section will continue to handle dock traffic from
Wisbech and bricks from Eye Creen and Dogsthorpe. It is difficult, however, to see what future there can be for the Melton Constable-Norwich branch, as it will have lost its westward connection and is not physically connected at the Norwich end with other railways. The net effect is that 116 route-miles will be completely scrapped and a further 68 miles will be open only for goods traffic.
Strong opposition to the proposals has been aroused, but the opponents of closure have been unable to convince the Transport Users' Consultative Committees. The effect on the Norfolk seaside resorts is one matter which railway spokesmen claim can be dealt with by alternative routeing.
Objection has been taken to the longer journey times which replacement services by bus will entail; from Melton Constable to Norwich will take 80 minutes by bus against 40 minutes by diesel train. The villagers of Melton Constable are worried about the future, as out of a total population of 1,100, 250 are railwaV employees. • The East Anglian Grain Co., East Rudham, • told the Consultative Committees that they had spent £40,000 on bulk loading equipment for corn at East Rudharn Station. Breweries will not take . in grain in bulk except by rail, so that the company will first have to send their grain by road to Swaffham, a distance of about 13 miles, at an additional cost of about 15s. a ton. When the Transport Users' Consultative Committees sat at Norwich the general manager of the Eastern Region said that some help might be given in meeting such haulage costs'.
Dearer Coal
Coal merchants from Catfield and Stalham (between North Walsham and Yarmouth) and from Massingham, in the west of the county, have estimated that the cost of coal there will be increased by 7s. to 12s. a ton. Cromer and Sheringham were concerned about their crab traffic, but the railway spokesmen contend that the re-routed service to Lynn and Boston will be better than the present one.
At the T.U.C.C. hearing at Bourne, objectors drew attention to the great amount of track relaying which has been done in recent years. One farmer spoke of paying £185 to the railway for a siding and then spending £1,000 on a loading dock which would be unused when the railway closed.
Other. speakers said that Bourne Station, which will cease to function completely, had been handling 25,000 tons of traffic a year. Into South Kesteven went 10,000 tons of seed potatoes a year. nearly all railborne, as was much of the 250,000 tons of potatoes produced there annually.
I know from my own experience that for many years there have been complaints of poor rail transits between the Midlands and East Anglia. It is, at first glance, surprising that this should be so, because the map shows that the M. and G.N. takes just about the shortest possible line from the west as far as King's Lynn, but even this advantage was largely lost in the long overall transit time imposed by the great lengths of single track. Of the total route-mileage, 109 miles (about 60 per cent.) is single.
Not only are there few loops on the long stretches of single track, such as that from Spalding to Sutton Bridge, but the bridges at Sutton and Lynn, with their single tracks, necessitate severe speed restrictions.
On the whole, the M. and G.N. timetables show little change in half a century, and-it is. obvious that even in the days of a railway monopoly the line was only lightly loaded, There has never apparently been any Sunday service.
The long journey time and inconvenient timings have discouraged through travellers and most people .wanting to go from, say, Birmingham to Norwich or Yarmouth go via London, despite the much greater distance.
Advantage to Road Transport
In Norfolk the layout of the Joint Line has played into the hands of the road operators. The main-road distance between King's Lynn and Norwich is about 43 miles and this road passes through the important centres of Swaffham and East Dereham.
The M. and G.N. distance is 55 miles; goods trains have to reverse at South Lynn and most passengers have to change there. Passengers have to change again at Melton Constable and the only town of any size en route is Fakenham. Incidentally, even the old Great Eastern route between Dereham and Norwich compares unfavourably with the main road-211 miles against 16.
As a route from King's Lynn to Yarmouth, the M. and G.N. is right out, with its 75 miles against 61. Diesels have been working from Melton Constable to Cromer and to Norwich, but although they have produced increased revenue it has not been sufficient to outweigh the losses on other parts of the line, nor, indeed, even to justify the continuance of the passenger service between Melton Constable and Norwich The so-called City Station at Norwich, a dead,end terminus, is inconveniently situated and passengers arriving there • either have a long walk, mainly uphill, or have to take a bus into the city centre. Melton . Constable is of no importance except as a railway junction and the original site of the motive power headquarter; when the M. and G.N. was in effect an independent railway.
At present-the Eastern Counties Omnibus Co., Ltd., run an hourly service to Drayton, 41 miles out from Norwich, whilstCostessy (for which Drayton is also the railway station). is served frequently by two other routes. Beyond Drayton the service consists of only a few buses a day on five days a week and these are on the Fakenham route, which gradually diverges farther and farthei from the railway. •
Service 70 cuts the line at right angles as it runs between Dereham and Aylsham, giving four journeys on Saturdays and three on other days.. This service replaced the Dereham-Wroxharn railway service which was suspended on September 15, 1952; buses originally ran through to Wroxham, but the section thence from Aylsham has had to be withdrawn.
Service 10b (Norwich-Aylsham) was also put on in connection with this closure. It will be noticed from the map that parts of this line. are still open for goods traffic, but that there is a gap between Foulsham and Reepham.
Buses a Rarity Melton Constable rarely sees a bus. On Sundays Eastern Counties work _foul journeys through the .village as a diversion on their Norwich-131akeney service. Mr. J. W. A. Smith, of Wood Norton, provides a Friday market service to Dereham and a cinema service to Holt three times a week in winter and twice a week in summer.
Eastern Counties now propose to run seven journeys a day each way between Norwich and Melton Constable, but because of the topography some 10 miles of the new route (mostly along the Fakenham road) will not be serving the catchment area of the railway at all Although service 70 runs on the same roads for a short distance between Foulsham and Bintree, it has not been practicable to do much in the way of connections.
People at Reepham, the largest village in the district, have, however, been r el yin g on the daily service into Norwich of R. R. Allen (Reepham), Ltd. This, which at present continues northward to Wood Dalling twice a week, will be extended to Guestwick. From two to six journeys a day will be given between Reepham and Norwich and from two to four (Sundays excepted) through from Guestwick. There will also be a diversion to take in Whitwell Commoh.
The main problem on the passenger side has, of course, been to provide a service between King's Lynn and Yarmouth. 1 have already mentioned the isolation of Melton Constable and over considerable lengths of the road between the two terminal points there has either been no service at all or only market-day facilities.
It is only at its eastern end that the new through service. 401, will duplicate existing facilities. At Ormesby the new service will not pass through the village as service 6 does, but will use the B 1159 road.
Some of the gaps are surprising._ One would have • thought, for instance, that there would have been a 'daily ,service between Lynn and the market town of
• Fakenham, but there are only three through journeys a. week, plus five on other routes tvhich make connections. These journeys are worked via _South Wootton and Weasenham. The new timetable offers seven journeys a day via Gayton, crossing the -existing route at
Massingham. , •
Mr. L. L.Parnell; of East Rudharn, who runs market-day services thence to Fakenham and to Lynn, has not applied for additional journeys.
Lynn-Yarmouth Direct
Eastern Counties will give three journeys a day right through from Lynn to Yarmouth and four in the reverse direction, the journey time being 3 hours 57 minutes, compared with from 2 hours 25 minutes to 2 hours 55 minutes by rail. The seven journeys from Lynn to Fakenham mentioned above will run through to, Melton Constable; there will be Six journeys from Melton to Aylsham, seven from Aylsham to North Walsham and nine from Walsham to Yarmouth, these figures including the through journeys'. . , . •
Certain connections will be made with the Norwich service at Melton Con-, stable ,,but it will not be possible to do
this in every case. There will' be a number of shorts, mainly for schools..
In general, single-deckers. will be used, but sOrne of the shorts may be worked by double-deckers: Buses are already garaged. at Massinghatn, Fakenham. Aylshafti and North Walsham, as well as at the termini, .but it will be necessary to station one or two also at Melton Constable.
The railway from Peterborough to King's Lynn does not go direct, but runs almost straight north from Wisbech to join the main line at Sutton Bridge. The road services paralleling this line are those of H. Pooley (Holbeach), Ltd., and of Cook and Tibbs. Ltd., Bell's Bridge, Hol beach St. John's. Pooley's. run daily between Long Sutton and Wisbech, and Cook and Tibbs on Saturdays only from the operator's base, striking the main road at Tydd St. Mary. Pooley's also runmarket-day services from Long Sutton to Holbeach and to Lynn.
Eastern Counties have paralleled the line from Peterborough to Wisbech for many years, and run every hour (halfhourly some days) between Wisbech and King's Lynn. These two services are being combined, but the regular hourly headway will apply only to the WisbechKing's Lynn portion.
Between Peterborough and Wisbech there will be two or three extra journeys on week-days, but on the portion between Peterborough and Thorney Toll the number will be much the same as now. although timings will be different because of the presence of two independents.
BI4
Mr. J. L. 6reen, of Thorney, runs between there and Peterborough on Wednesdays, Saturdays and Sundays, having as many as 17 journeys on Saturdays. Longlands (Crowland), Ltd., join the main road at Eye on their Crowland-Peterborough service. Both these operators are revising their time-tables so as not to clash with Eastern Counties.
Mr. A. Brown, of Guyhirn (Marquis Bus Service), is not applying for any alteration to • his Gnyhirn-Wisbech service, which covers the same road as Eastern Counties, but he proposes to run two round trips on Tuesdays and Thursdays on his Murrow-Wisbech service, which at present works only on Saturdays. Eastern Counties. estimate that athey will be running some 550,000 extra miles a year all told.
West of King's Lynn is the territory of the Lincolnshire Road Car -Co., Ltd., already well served by the old-established service 65, which works every hour between Spalding and King's Lynn and every half-hour on certain days between Spalding and Holbeach. Some duplication may be required.
West of Spalding, service 20 (SpaldingGrantham) roughly parallels the railway as far as Bourne. and from four to seven journeys a day are given. On top of this will be a new service, 70, from Spalding to Melton Mowbray, keeping as close to the railway line as the road layout will allow. Two journeys a day in each direction will be worked, with an extra return trip on Thursdays only between Spalding and Bourne.
The one journey a week on service 25B between South Witham and Melton will apparently continue, as will also the three or four daily journeys into Melton from Wymondham on 25A. Mr. R. H. Bland, of Cottesmore, covers this section four days a week and runs a market
service to Bourne. _ Service Loses Heavily
Spalding-Bourne is also served on Tuesdays by Delaine Coaches, Ltd., Bourne, with one round trip. This service, which earns only about 25 per cent. of its expenses, necessitates a bus lying-over in Spalding from 10.25 a.m. until 3.15 p.m., and as the latter time is the same as that chosen by Lincolnshire Road Car for their daily departure, Delaine suggest taking their bus back to Bourne at 10.30 a.m. Part of this road is covered on Saturdays by Eastern Counties..
Delaine also run a Bourne-Stamford daily service, which as far as Withamon-the-Hill (about 41 miles) uses the same roads as the new service. The Road Car Co. have offered a protective fare over this portion.
Delaine have already had experience of a railway replacement 'service. When the railway was closed between Bourne and Essendine on June 18, 1951, they put on a daily service between these places via Thurlby and Braeeborough, but it incurred such losses that it was soon cut down to two round trips on Thursdays and Saturdays only, and then only between Bourne and Braceborouath Figures quoted by the railways show very few passengers boarding or alighting west of Spalding. At Bourne, for instance, only about 30-40 people a day joined trains and the same number alighted, except on Saturdays, when there might be 80 to 150.
Lincolnshire Road Car propose to allocate only two extra vehicles for the additional work, one for service 70 and one for duplicating on 65. Both will be garaged at Holbeach.
I am sorry that 1 cannot be as informative about freight traffic. One of my difficulties in writing this article has been that, except in the case of passenger loadings, the railways have refused to publish the detailed statistics on which the closure decision was based. Although the Consultative Committees met in public the revenue figures and details of goods loadings were divulged only in sessions closed to the Press.
The Great Eastern section of the Eastern Region have told me that in Norfolk they have zonal road services based on Norwich, YarmoUth, North Walsham, Fakenham, Derehara. Swaffham and King's Lynn.These, it is stated, should be able to handle the sundries traffic which has hitherto travelled by the Joint Line and will now be routed to other stations, especially as in the market -centres there will be stations still open.
.Railway Secrecy •
The Great Northern section have not been willing to divulge even where their vehicles' are based. but 1 assume that there are some at Bourne, Spa1ding. Hothead], WiSbe.ch. and perhaps Long Sutton. Neither of the Licensing Authorities concerned had received applications for variations at the time of my writing, but I am wondering what will happen at Bourne.
This place, which has been the junction of four railway lines, will now have no train service of any kind and it would be interesting to know whether railway lorries are to be based there in future and. if so, where they will work. Here, it seems, is a chance for some co-ordination between British Railways and British Road Services.
The allocation of B.R.S. vehicles in the M. and G.N. area is: Bourne, 13 general haulage; King's Lynn, 48 general haulage and four parcels; Norwich, 70 general haulage, 21 contract and 51 parcels; Wished]. 50 general haulage and seven contract; Peterborough. 57 genera' haulage.
At present no alteration is proposed. but so far as I know, the Bourne district is a gap in the nation-wide parcels services offered by B.R.S. and by the express carriers' group of the Road Haulage Association. It is surprising that there are no B.R.S. parcels vehicles even at Peterborough.
Instead of increasing the railway road fleets or leaving railway vehicles at Bourne unattached to a station, would it not be useful to allocate some B.R.S. parcels vehicles to either Bourne or Peterborough to take over the ex-M. and G.N. sundries?