One for me I guess. Trenchard Way, the new inner bypass road from Staplegrove Bridge (left on the map) to Firepool (right on the map, all along the former avoiding line, is named after Hugh Trenchard, founder of the RAF at the end of WW1, who came from Taunton. Firepool has recently been redeveloped on old railway land with a ghastly set of post-modern, architect ego-trip apartment blocks, which should never have been given planning permission in such a fine old country town
https://www.google.com/maps/@51.022...4!1s7uA53RwAEo-haebICO65rQ!2e0!7i16384!8i8192
But I digress. There were no freight running sidings on the north side, they were all on the south. On the map above the yellow area was the GWR's concrete works, a large factory, anything precast in concrete was made there and shipped out. It had its own old Ruston shunter, DS1169, which was a rare sight outside the fence.
The turquoise area east of the station, Taunton Goods, was the main freight area, any remarshalling of freights happened here, detaching wagons for the various branch lines, and this is where the branch freights departed from. Also there was a huge brick-built freight shed, and the railway delivery lorries worked from here. In the early 1960s the pannier tank duty for shunting changed over to a new Class 08.
The green area is under the good old Fortysteps long footbridge (note spelling please Network Rail, NOT "40 Steps" as on your sign, the town has always spelt it this way, one word), lair of most Taunton spotters and photographers, self included. This substantial footbridge dated from the 1930s widening to four tracks through Taunton. It crossed the main lines, a few carriage sidings, the Avoiding Line, and then a substantial set of sidings, the Chip Lane Sidings, up to the boundary. This was the spare wagon store for the Western District, all types not immediately required were stored here. A couple of the tracks were laid in concrete for hosing out cattle wagons. It, too, had a pilot on weekday mornings, another Pannier/Class 08 changeover, which worked back and forth under Staplegrove bridge sorting out recent arrivals and what was now required. These wagons were then tripped at the end of the operation to Taunton Goods, and occasionally a through freight on the Avoiding Lines would stop to attach a number of them. When the sidings were closed the Royal Mail area sorting office was built on the site.
Beyond the Staplegrove Road bridge on the left, and beyond the map above, again on the south side, was Fairwater Yard, built in WW2, which stretched all the way to Silk Mills level crossing box. This was adapted for the civil engineer's track assembly depot for the Western District, with its own shunter PWM652, which occasionally waddled back to the loco shed at the station for fuel.
. The freight line, known as the "avoiding line", passed south of the station, probably over a mile long from East Junction to West Junction. Built about 1900 along the line of an old canal. By the 1960s it was closed in the day but open at night, when most of the through freight passed by. Multiple yards along the line. A new road has been built along the alignment in the last few years.
