Eastgate Station, Weardale Railway - Public Delivery Siding

[Angusbswheeler]

Last weekend I had a trip on the Weardale Railway. Afterwards I browsed the history of the various stations along the route and was surprised to learn that Eastgate Station was a "public delivery siding" between 1970 and 1980. This use appears separate from the cement trains that ran from the works slightly further up the line, which carried on until 1993.

Does anybody know what the primary commodity carried was (bearing in mind Eastgate is a very small village)? Possibly quarry products? Wiki suggests a separate train but were waggons just attached to the cement trains?

As an aside a friend lives in one of the houses associated with the now demolished works and until only a few years ago one of the cement wagons was still on an overgrown siding just beyond the bottom of his garden.

 

[Gloster]

I can’t find anything, but it is quite possible that the traffic was incoming domestic coal. Small rural coal depots survived in a number of areas including the North-East until a surprisingly late date.

 

[Mcr Warrior]

I can’t find anything, but it is quite possible that the traffic was incoming domestic coal. Small rural coal depots survived in a number of areas including the North-East until a surprisingly late date.

Indeed. Public delivery sidings were essentially downgraded former freight depots. Under such arrangements, local coal merchants could still unload their own coal in the otherwise now unmanned former goods yard. Other types of goods/freight were always possible, but coal was the more usual.

 

[Angusbswheeler]

Possibly, but Eastgate is maybe 20 houses maximum so I wouldn't have thought there would be sufficient demand. Possibly it was a railhead for the upper dale though.

 

[thedbdiboy]

A railhead indeed. After the mass closure of goods facilities up to the early 1970s it is interesting that some survived into the 1980s, not just in the north east, either. Barnstaple retained a goods yard well into the 1980s; Rochester Goods didn't close until the late 80s either.

 

[Gloster]

A railhead indeed. After the mass closure of goods facilities up to the early 1970s it is interesting that some survived into the 1980s, not just in the north east, either. Barnstaple retained a goods yard well into the 1980s; Rochester Goods didn't close until the late 80s either.

There was a difference between goods depots and public delivery sidings; I think that these two were both examples of the former. I think it was that goods depots had some sort of staff presence and could handle any traffic for which it was equipped. Public delivery sidings were just that: sidings into which BR shunted wagons and left the the customer to load or unload them; customers usually being regular ones and casual traffic was not normally catered for.

There were a number of other small public delivery sidings lasting into the 1980s in the old North Eastern Region: I am fairly sure that Castleton Moor, Guiseley and Menston all fell into this category. Weaverthorpe may have been another.

 

[Angusbswheeler]

Thanks all for you suggestions and examples of smilar sites.

For interest I had a play round with ChatGPT. With a high degree of confidence it reckons in the 60's there would have been coal & domestic fuel, agricultural supplies and building materials delivered. It had a moderate degree of confidence, by reasoned inference, that simlar commodities were worked in decreasing quantities in the 70's. From Weardale Railway Trust historical material it stated that the yard was worked by a twice daily train from Bishop Auckland Yard which also served the cement works, though noting that it couldn't access BR freight working instructions from the 70's.

I'm really surprised that such an operation lasted so late in such a rural area, especially as Stanhope had ceased taking goods in the 1960s, but it must have survived on the back of the cement trains. It's interesting to note that there is still a builders merchant in the station yard, presumably also serving the upper dale - I wonder if it's a direct decendent of the operations that worked there in the 70's?

 

[Big Jumby 74]

Does anybody know what the primary commodity carried was (bearing in mind Eastgate is a very small village)?

Eastgate was a loading point for lead ore, brought down from Rookhope by road apparently. Ref: The Railways of Weardale (P14), Rounthwaite/RCTS/1965.

 

[Gloster]

It is quite possible that the incoming coal, agricultural supplies and building supplies were all handled by the same business, which might be the one still based there or its predecessor. I did some research into coal merchants a few years ago and it was quite common even into the 1970s for a merchant to deal in several different categories of commodities as there might not be enough trade for a full-time business with one, but several combined to provide enough. There was also the way that seasonal peaks did not align, so the trader’s main business in the autumn and early winter might be supplying people getting their winter coal in, then there would be agricultural supplies in the late winter and spring before the building contractors got going in the summer. It was also common for people such as farmers and builders to trade in coal as a useful second income.

 

[Angusbswheeler]

It is quite possible that the incoming coal, agricultural supplies and building supplies were all handled by the same business, which might be the one still based there or its predecessor. I did some research into coal merchants a few years ago and it was quite common even into the 1970s for a merchant to deal in several different categories of commodities as there might not be enough trade for a full-time business with one, but several combined to provide enough. There was also the way that seasonal peaks did not align, so the trader’s main business in the autumn and early winter might be supplying people getting their winter coal in, then there would be agricultural supplies in the late winter and spring before the building contractors got going in the summer. It was also common for people such as farmers and builders to trade in coal as a useful second income.

That makes sesnse. It hadn't really occurred to me about the seasonality of these merchants.

This "blog" on the Dised Stations site is interesting: http://disused-stations.org.uk/features/roy_lambeth_memories.shtml It mentions a Ken Fairless who worked at Westgate Station and, at the time of writing, lived at Eastgate Station and owned the nearby caravan parks. The building merchants on the site now are Fairless Building Supplies so presumably the same family who would have the railway knowledge to have their supplies delivered by rail in the 70's.

 

[Angusbswheeler]

Eastgate was a loading point for lead ore, brought down from Rookhope by road apparently. Ref: The Railways of Weardale (P14), Rounthwaite/RCTS/1965.

Thanks but lead mining in the area had died out at the end of the 19th/beginning of 20th century and it's the 1970's that I was curious about. There may have been some deliveries/outgoings from the reuse of the mines for barytes though. This lasted until the 1990s in the arae.

 

[Gloster]

Thanks but lead mining in the area had died out at the end of the 19th/beginning of 20th century and it's the 1970's that I was curious about. There may have been some deliveries/outgoings from the reuse of the mines for barytes though. This lasted until the 1990s in the arae.

I am very doubtful about the siding being used for lead traffic in later years as lead mining seems to have been in decline in the late nineteenth century and almost dead by the end of The Great War, with a few flickers remaining until the Second War War. Fluorspar also appears unlikely as it looks as though not enough of the product was despatched to justify keeping a siding open; additionally, the processing of the raw extract from the head of the valley seems to have been done at Frosterley. Barytes seems to be have been of even less importance to the area.

 

[Big Jumby 74]

it's the 1970's that I was curious about

Apologies. Missed that...

 

[Gloster]

I had a look at Flickr using Eastgate station weardale as a search term and before it shut me out I found a couple of photos from the 1970s. It looks as though the single siding was at some time connected into the running line at the Stanhope end. Another siding, trailing to trains going towards the cement works, diverged from the siding into the yard to the south; this latter, based on photos on .disused-stations., probably dates from between 1960 and 1965, and the other connection may also be from the same period. This does suggest that at some time the traffic was fairly substantial.

 

[Angusbswheeler]

Thanks @Gloster - interesting photos.

 

[Bradshaw]

Thanks @Gloster - interesting photos.

Eastgate became a public delivery siding on 14.9.1970 and goods traffic was withdrawn from 14.9.1980.

Disused Stations: Eastgate Station

 

[Killingworth]

Overgrown track still exists beyond Stanhope to Eastgate and I think the Weardale Railway may have aspirations to go that far. The proposed Eastgate eco-village (see; https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-wear-19248471 ) on the former Lafarge cement works site could have made a new terminus.

The track looks to be in good condition if the line has been unused for over 40 years - this is it by Crag Nook over a mile west of Stanhope yesterday.