How much use does the Alloa to Dunfermline line get?

[Wharfe]

Wondering - does this line ever get any traffic? A look at RTT suggests nothing by way of freight, and it wouldn't appear to be any sort of a useful diversionary route, however wiser minds than mine might know differently?

 

[godfreycomplex]

It seems to have got quite a bit more use than usual lately. Mostly railtours, mind you, but still

 

[danielhogg2005]

If there was funding and rolling stock, making this line a passenger line would be great for connectivity.

 

[Stopper]

It has nothing scheduled or booked regularly anymore. It gets the odd railtour or engineering train but barely ever even get a diverted freight anymore.

The Longannet Signal Box is only opened when any services need to pass through and there was some damage to the signalling equipment in the area due to vandalism which led to pilot working. The line is very grassy and overgrown in parts around Kincardine and Low Valleyfield but seems to be very clear in places too.

 

[bleeder4]

I did it on a railtour and was amazed when I realised that it's not in normal passenger use. What happens when the Forth Rail Bridge needs to close (for high winds and the like)? Trains from Dunfermline to Edinburgh would have to be cancelled, whereas they could just go via Alloa and Stirling instead. I would have thought it would have been an incredibly useful diversionary route.

 

[godfreycomplex]

I did it on a railtour and was amazed when I realised that it's not in normal passenger use. What happens when the Forth Rail Bridge needs to close (for high winds and the like)? Trains from Dunfermline to Edinburgh would have to be cancelled, whereas they could just go via Alloa and Stirling instead. I would have thought it would have been an incredibly useful diversionary route.

If the winds are high enough for the Forth Rail bridge to close they’re probably high enough for everything else to close.

 

[The exile]

If the winds are high enough for the Forth Rail bridge to close they’re probably high enough for everything else to close.

I doubt the Rail Bridge (on its own) has ever been closed for high winds.

 

[godfreycomplex]

I doubt the Rail Bridge (on its own) has ever been closed for high winds.

Precisely

 

[Class 170101]

I doubt the Rail Bridge (on its own) has ever been closed for high winds.

I would argue thats more by the skill and 'lucky' foresight of the designers that the Forth Rail Bridge is well built. They wouldn't have thought about climate change as we now understand it.

The road version (the original) Forth Bridge has been closed several times for high winds as has the M48 Original Severn Bridge and the more recent QE2 Bridge at Dartford Tunnel. All three of these are more recent structures you would think with better understanding of winds then compared to 19th Century engineers.

 

[The exile]

I would argue thats more by the skill and 'lucky' foresight of the designers that the Forth Rail Bridge is well built. They wouldn't have thought about climate change as we now understand it.

The road version (the original) Forth Bridge has been closed several times for high winds as has the M48 Original Severn Bridge and the more recent QE2 Bridge at Dartford Tunnel. All three of these are more recent structures you would think with better understanding of winds then compared to 19th Century engineers.

Closures of the road bridges are usually due to the dangers caused by the wind to the vehicles on the bridge and not to the bridge itself. Rail vehicles are inherently more stable - above all they do not swerve in gusty winds. One might well find liner trains (particularly with empty containers) being prevented from crossing but it would take a phenomenal wind to topple a modern train (as opposed to what may have happened in December 1879 over the Tay)

 

[gingertom]

I've read some historical design document somewhere that the bridge is designed to withstand worst case twisting forces of 90mph at one end and 90mph in the opposite direction at the other. That would need to be full on tornado.

 

[vic-rijrode]

I've read some historical design document somewhere that the bridge is designed to withstand worst case twisting forces of 90mph at one end and 90mph in the opposite direction at the other. That would need to be full on tornado.

One of the reasons that the Forth Bridge appears to be well overengineered is the fall of the Tay Bridge a few years before. I believe that Thomas Bouch was designing a suspension bridge over the Forth, but for obvious (if over cautious) reasons after his Tay Bridge fell in high winds, he was replaced by Fowler and Baker and their cantilever design.

The current Dunfermline to Alloa line would be rather a long way round in any case for any diversion. I do remember travelling on the direct Dunfermline Upper to Alloa Line (and on to Stirling) in 1968. I was amazed when it was closed.

 

[Macwomble]

I do remember travelling on the direct Dunfermline Upper to Alloa Line (and on to Stirling) in 1968. I was amazed when it was closed.

I remember that line too......lived in Alloa at the time.

You got a crackin' view going across the Forth Bridge from the front of a DMU.

 

[ian1944]

I'm always a bit surprised that the Kincardine Bridge wasn't built road and rail to provide a direct link between Glasgow and Fife. The area round the appropriately named Skinflats wouldn't have made any difficulty for a line south west of the bridge.

 

[reb0118]

I'm always a bit surprised that the Kincardine Bridge wasn't built road and rail to provide a direct link between Glasgow and Fife.

There was also the Alloa Swing Bridge further upstream.

 

[Mcr Warrior]

There was also the Alloa Swing Bridge further upstream.

Which was apparently damaged/closed by a German warship in 1920, almost two years after the First World war had ended! The single track bridge/viaduct, which was subsequently repaired, was from Larbert to Alloa (via Throsk) lasted until the late 1960s.

 

[The exile]

Which was apparently damaged/closed by a German warship in 1920, almost two years after the First World war had ended! The single track bridge/viaduct, which was subsequently repaired, was from Larbert to Alloa (via Throsk) lasted until the late 1960s.

Quite a bit of the High Seas Fleet was brought into the Forth estuary on surrender. Not sure whether it included the ones that were then scuttled by their crews at Scapa Flow.

 

[Wharfe]

Thanks all, firstly for answering my question and secondly for the wider historical perspective!

 

[matchmaker]

I'm always a bit surprised that the Kincardine Bridge wasn't built road and rail to provide a direct link between Glasgow and Fife. The area round the appropriately named Skinflats wouldn't have made any difficulty for a line south west of the bridge.

You have to remember that a route did exist - from Stirling the Stirling & Dunfermline Railway (S&D) went from Stirling via Alloa, Bogside, Oakley and Dunfermline Upper to Touch North Junction. It was double track (until singled in the early 1970s and subsequently closed). The current line from Alloa through Kincardine and Culross to Charlestown Junction was single track and lost its passenger srvice in the 1930s.

Even when the line from Stirling to Alloa was mothballed, the diagram in Stirling Middle signal box referred to the lines through the former platforms as "S&D lines".

Photo of diagram from The Signal Box . www.signalbox.org

 

[Bonbonbalinski]

It would have been part of the route for SRPS's August Steam Specials railtour if it hadnt been cancelled

 

[Wyrleybart]

You have to remember that a route did exist - from Stirling the Stirling & Dunfermline Railway (S&D) went from Stirling via Alloa, Bogside, Oakley and Dunfermline Upper to Touch North Junction. It was double track (until singled in the early 1970s and subsequently closed).

So that was where Bogside was ! We used to send commercial explosives there from Cookes at Penrhyndeudraeth, until Barmouth bridge was banned to locomotives in 1979.

 

[cadder toad]

So that was where Bogside was ! We used to send commercial explosives there from Cookes at Penrhyndeudraeth, until Barmouth bridge was banned to locomotives in 1979.

Probably not. Your Bogside was likely to be Ardeer Nobel ICI plant near Irvine on the other side of Scotland

 

[Wyrleybart]

Probably not. Your Bogside was likely to be Ardeer Nobel ICI plant near Irvine on the other side of Scotland

Aahh. Yes. You are right. More than one Bogside !!!!

 

[Millisle]

So that was where Bogside was ! We used to send commercial explosives there from Cookes at Penrhyndeudraeth, until Barmouth bridge was banned to locomotives in 1979.

Indeed. For Bogside pit incorporated into the Longannet complex. In the '60s when I was a child living in Dunfermline I was driven frequently to Alloa where my father had a shop. I have always remembered that where the road crossed the railway at Bogside I saw in a siding a wagon labelled explosives. More innocent times.
In fact raking my memory, I think they were more quaintly marked gunpowder vans.

 

[matchmaker]

Probably not. Your Bogside was likely to be Ardeer Nobel ICI plant near Irvine on the other side of Scotland

Bogside Racecourse, when there was a signal box there. Now simply Bogside, junction for the quaintly named Snodgrass branch! From Railscot:

Bogside