Theory of General Minories

[Annie]

Minories WIP.

 

 

 

 

[Jeremy Cumberland]

8 hours ago, roythebus1 said:

As I mentioned in a much earlier comment, I spoke with Cyril Freezer about this layout in the 1980s  and asked him about the kick-back loco spur. As he based this layout on Moorgate Widened lines , as rebuilt in 1967 this had a loco spur from each platform. These spurs were accessible directly from the 2 platforms to save time and movements. Cyril said he done his as a kick-back to make working such a layout a bit more interesting. The original Moorgate Widened Lines station also had 2 separate loco spurs, one for the Eastern and one for the Midland. another terminal platform had a loco spur for the Metropolitan electric locos.

 

It might have been discussed earlier, in which case I apologise for going back over old ground, but I always understood that Cyril Freezer got the inspiration from Liverpool Street (which is geographically closer to Minories than Moorgate, although of course Aldgate is closer still). The platform layout is a mirror image of Liverpool Street, although the track plan is very different, since Liverpool Street only had one terminating platform and used a single slip. The terminating platform did have a loco spur, though.

 

Minories was first published in the 1950s, when Moorgate Widened Lines was still just two roads with platform faces on both sides of each, and separate loco spurs - one for each platform - between the two lines. About the only similarity with Minories I can see is the pair of crossovers, but these could be found at any number of double track terminii, and Moorgate's crossovers were the opposite way round to Minories.

 

However, I'd be very interested in seeing a plan for the 1960s rebuild of Moorgate, if you have one.

 

Incidentally, are you sure that Moorgate Metropolitan had a loco spur? Aldgate did, although it was horribly sited and had nothing of the elegance of Liverpool Street or Moorgate Widened Lines (even the southernmost platform at Moorgate with its kickback spur didn't encroach at all on the other railway's line), but none of my post-electrification plans of Moorgate have a loco spur on the electrified lines. Most Metropolitan trains terminating at Moorgate were multiple units, but in most of the period up to 1961 there were a small number of loco-hauled trains a day that terminated there, and I have often wondered how they were dealt with.

[Flying Pig]

1 hour ago, Jeremy Cumberland said:

However, I'd be very interested in seeing a plan for the 1960s rebuild of Moorgate, if you have one.

 

 

Try "Kings Cross to Aldgate 1958" on this site - it has an inset for Moorgate in 1965

 

https://www.harsig.org/Metropolitan.php

[Pacific231G]

On 25/06/2023 at 09:51, Gatesheadgeek said:

 

Thanks for this. I received some TT120 track last week and tried it out with a Minories style layout and it’s a tight fit but does work, albeit without the width to accommodate a run round loop. The track spacing and geometry adds to the constraints. The operational limitations of what can be achieved suggest a re-think is needed before I invest too much. There’s no real rush at the moment.

I've operated a couple of "basic" (passenger only) Minories layouts- both very close to the original plan  and, though with turnover locos it was quite a challenge to avoid getting snarled up, I  did find that operation became a bit repetitive. I'd want a simple goods yard or something to add some variety to the range of operation.  

It's worth looking at Birmingham Hope St. This was Danstercivicman's version of Minories from 2016-2018 (before he moved on to Stranraer). It had a two road milk depot  kicking back from platform three without a separate goods headshunt and it does work. Dan said he'd found it great fun to operate and had a complete timetable for it.

It was an imagined GCR secondary terminus in Birmingham  opearating semi-fasts and locals. It's well worth reading the thread and most of the images seem to have survived the mass loss.

https://www.rmweb.co.uk/topic/117470-birmingham-hope-st-br-ex-gcr-minories-style-urban-layout-1965/

Dan's baseboards were 40cm wide but that included some low relief buildings. Cyril Freezer's original plan with a retaining wall behind platform 1 was 9 inches wide for TT-3  with rather narrow platforms so this should fit into a couple of 77L Really Useful Boxes (especially if you store the baseboards backscene down)

Edited June 27, 2023 by Pacific231G

[Schooner]

In case of interest re. operating variety, goods facilities and trailing/facing crossovers, this is where I've got to with my potential shed-filler version:

 

'Unusual' additions:

• Platform 1 - Parcels, Milk, Carriage storage; turnover loco facilities
• Platform 5 - long haul pax and goods; loop for dock traffic reception/departure road/depot headshunt
• Small sorting yard for goods traffic to marshall local, depot and docks services.

[RobinofLoxley]

On 25/06/2023 at 20:21, Annie said:

Minories WIP.

 

 

 

 

How were these imgaes created if you dont mind me asking....

[RobinofLoxley]

6 hours ago, Schooner said:

In case of interest re. operating variety, goods facilities and trailing/facing crossovers, this is where I've got to with my potential shed-filler version:

 

'Unusual' additions:

• Platform 1 - Parcels, Milk, Carriage storage; turnover loco facilities
• Platform 5 - long haul pax and goods; loop for dock traffic reception/departure road/depot headshunt
• Small sorting yard for goods traffic to marshall local, depot and docks services.

Work in progress.. I think that extending the loco shunt to be a long multipurpose line, the longest in the plan in fact, doesnt work for me. Better to retain the coaling point as a short spur but have P1 accessed via a turnout. Then do you really want the yard activities in front of the station?

Then the biggie - what are you doing offscene? Large fiddleyard?

[Schooner]

54 minutes ago, RobinofLoxley said:

Work in progress..

Always!

 

As was:

As is:

 

57 minutes ago, RobinofLoxley said:

Better...

Would you mind unpacking 'better' - the pros and cons - to make sure I've picked up everything I should?

 

57 minutes ago, RobinofLoxley said:

Then do you really want the yard activities in front of the station?

Short answer - yes :) 

 

58 minutes ago, RobinofLoxley said:

Then the biggie - what are you doing offscene? Large fiddleyard?

Good question. Some scenic dockside, and as much storage as I can fit...possibly also with some scenic treatment by way of excuse/disguise... Even more WIP than the Minories-esque!

[RobinofLoxley]

Well @Schooner how long have you got?

 

Firstly then, how do you envisage the goods depot operating? Without the room to swing a cat between the lines, how does anything get unloaded, and then, where does it go?  I also cant devine your intentions to the right of the the Goods Yard where 4 lines run across it. I also dont know what is happening at point A, and may well not need to.

 

On the previous page of the thread, there was some discussion about the orientation of the turnouts at the left end of platform 5. Like @Flying Pig I think they should be the other way around.

 

As a general observation, making a version with two fully operational platforms would definitely alter the balance between the original fast turnround urban terminus concept with no frills, and your more diverse idea which is more of a generalist terminus. You will keep more operations on-scene and have fewer fiddle yard transitions, perhaps.

[Guest]

On 26/06/2023 at 00:48, Pacific231G said:

I've operated a couple of "basic" (passenger only) Minories layouts- both very close to the original plan  and, though with turnover locos it was quite a challenge to avoid getting snarled up, I  did find that operation became a bit repetitive. I'd want a simple goods yard or something to add some variety to the range of operation.  

It's worth looking at Birmingham Hope St. This was Danstercivicman's version of Minories from 2016-2018 (before he moved on to Stranraer). It had a two road milk depot  kicking back from platform three without a separate goods headshunt and it does work. Dan said he'd found it great fun to operate and had a complete timetable for it.

It was an imagined GCR secondary terminus in Birmingham  opearating semi-fasts and locals. It's well worth reading the thread and most of the images seem to have survived the mass loss.

https://www.rmweb.co.uk/topic/117470-birmingham-hope-st-br-ex-gcr-minories-style-urban-layout-1965/

Dan's baseboards were 40cm wide but that included some low relief buildings. Cyril Freezer's original plan with a retaining wall behind platform 1 was 9 inches wide for TT-3  with rather narrow platforms so this should fit into a couple of 77L Really Useful Boxes (especially if you store the baseboards backscene down)

Thanks. Really helpful.
 

Having just reactivated a 15 year old Windows laptop (only 73 updates to Win7 after 11 years of dormancy!) I had a go at a Minories-esque layout with Hornby TT track using Scarm on three SMS baseboards. It’s tight but it works.

 

Point taken about operational interest. As I’m going for modern(ish) image, a run round loop in front of the throat & fiddle yard, served from the kick back/platform 3 might work. More thought needed on that. 

[Nearholmer]

1 hour ago, RobinofLoxley said:

Firstly then, how do you envisage the goods depot operating? Without the room to swing a cat between the lines, how does anything get unloaded, and then, where does it go? 

If you look at big, inner city goods depots, most of them were multi-storey efforts, built in terribly constricted places, with “track level” at many being not much more that a receiving and dispatching area for wagons, and all the handling of goods going on on other floors, accessed by wagon lifts, while others there was a platform at “track level”, and lifts for the goods, rather than the wagons.
 

Places like the MR one at Whitecross Street, Smithfield Market, the Met at Vine Street, and the agglomeration of depots very close to Minories along route into Fenchurch Street all repay study, and all would have been within CJF’s field of view. In fact, one of the Royal Mint Street Depts actually incorporated parts of the original, real Minories station of the London & Blackwall Railway.

 

Here is “track level” at Whitecross Street, where even kittens couldn’t be swung.

 

 

This is upstairs in the goods handling area:

 

https://www.scienceandsociety.co.uk/results.asp?image=10700134&itemw=4&itemf=0001&itemstep=1&itemx=1

 

And, here is one of the street entrances:

 

 

 

Edited June 27, 2023 by Nearholmer

[Nearholmer]

Fuzzy picture, because it’s a zoom on an aerial photo, but it does illustrate how massive and three dimensional urban goods depots were.

 

Commercial Road depot of the LT&SR:

 

 

I can see four levels above track, and it went downwards too.

 

Track level view:

The cabins on top are, I would guess, hoist rooms for wagon lifts.

Edited June 27, 2023 by Nearholmer

[Annie]

9 hours ago, RobinofLoxley said:

How were these images created if you don't mind me asking....

It's my GER Minories layout created in the Trainz simulator using their Trainz Model Railway format.  Due to illness i can't really do physical model making anymore so I do my modelling these days in a digital environment.

[Schooner]

12 hours ago, RobinofLoxley said:

...how long have you got?

At current rates, about 20 years - don't hold back!

 

12 hours ago, RobinofLoxley said:

Firstly then...

Why the second version (independent loco spur, turnout access to utility platform) is better - the pros and cons of that - please :)

 

12 hours ago, RobinofLoxley said:

...how do you envisage the goods depot operating?

Mr @Nearholmer has, as per, nailed it and picked up some of the exact inspirations.

 

FWIW, there's c.75mm between the Depot lines 1 (upper) and 2, and the same between lines 3 and 4 (lower); a little further width can be unlocked by amending the turnouts to give scale, rather than PECO, space between lines 2 and 3, too. Enough for platforms.

 

The depot covers canal access in the 'basement', above which the rail level, above which 2+ stories for road access and warehousing. The station is seen as being in a shallow cut-and-cover-esque trench with the road overbridge to the depot providing the scenic break for the tracks to run off-scene RHS, although I haven't got as far as implementing this in SCARM. I'm learning that vertical space is as important to use effectively as our 'normal' horizontal plane, as @Annie's glorious rendition shows, and having the railway as the middle of three levels (canal below, road above) is an attempt to work with this.

 

12 hours ago, RobinofLoxley said:

I also cant devine your intentions to the right of the the Goods Yard where 4 lines run across it.

Sorry, where? Outside the Depot, right of the engine shed? Just planned as Depot roads, in and out (and shake it all about).

 

Left of the shed, bottom to top, are two sidings for stock management, reception/departure line for traffic to the docks, 'specials' platform.

 

12 hours ago, RobinofLoxley said:

On the previous page of the thread, there was some discussion about the orientation of the turnouts at the left end of platform 5.

Indeed, I only changed it to the be way round it is in the above after reading those comments! The aim was to reinforce the importance of docks traffic - it's not just another platform and loop. What's the point of a convenient run-round for passenger stock on a trackplan explicitly designed for rapid commuter traffic using turnover locos after all?!

 

12 hours ago, RobinofLoxley said:

I also dont know what is happening at point A, and may well not need to.

Bridge abutment over canal (?) as cassette connection to represent un-modelled coal yard.

 

12 hours ago, RobinofLoxley said:

As a general observation, making a version with two fully operational platforms would definitely alter the balance between the original fast turnround urban terminus concept with no frills, and your more diverse idea which is more of a generalist terminus. You will keep more operations on-scene and have fewer fiddle yard transitions, perhaps.

Hoping for exactly this :) The aim is not to have A Minories Layout but, recognising that CJF came up with a blinder of a throat to accommodate heavy traffic in a small space, use the 'Minories' formation as one would use an interesting bit of prototype trackwork. Steal it :)

 

My setting would be mid-Victorian East London, with the operator mostly playing station pilot for shunting and local trip workings. Tasks to be split between two fixed (seated) operating positions, roughly here

and here

 

Showing another slight variation:

 

Passenger traffic to be largely automated I reckon - dynamic scenery - but would cover 2 companies (NLR + GER?) for regular/commuter services. More (MR, LNWR, GWR?) on the passenger and goods 'specials' - long-haul and/or tank engines on docks-to-Company-Depot/Yard trips - into Platform 5. Hence the fun/fuss of having regular moves between platforms 1 and 5 :)

 

[Flying Pig]

1 hour ago, Schooner said:

My setting would be mid-Victorian East London,

 

 

I don't know anything about mid-Victorian track layouts, but I would not be surprised if they looked quite different from the somewhat later ones we are used to seeing.  If you're serious about this and really looking at a long term project, more research would pay dividends.  You may well find that rtl track systems don't represent the period well, in which case Templot might be a better planning tool.  Yes that means hand built track, but the technological support for that is advancing all the time (and you're going to be building practically all the locos and stock anyway).

[Nearholmer]

Picking up on something that Schooner said, thinking about Annie’s virtual version, and about the coarse-0 tiny urban terminus that I built, I’m wondering whether there might be an ideal height-width-length relationship for these “railway in a trough” layouts.

 

My instinct is that Minories, which has platforms that are, whisper it quietly, ridiculously short, looks better with retaining walls and any representation of street-level buildings, at “ordinary over-bridge” height. I’m not totally sure I like the visual balance of the MRC version, which is deeper, more like the real Widened Lines in the Farringdon area. It looks really good in photos from track level, but a bit odd to me when seen in reality.

 

What do others think?

Edited June 28, 2023 by Nearholmer

[woodenhead]

4 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

Picking up on something that Schooner said, thinking about Annie’s virtual version, and about the coarse-0 tiny urban terminus that I built, I’m wondering whether there might be an ideal height-width-length relationship for these “railway in a trough” layouts.

 

My instinct is that Minories, which has platforms that are, whisper it quietly, ridiculously short, looks better with retaining walls and any representation of street-level buildings, at “ordinary over-bridge” height. I’m not totally sure I like the visual balance of the MRC version, which is deeper, more like the real Widened Lines in the Farringdon area. It looks really good in photos from track level, but a bit odd to me when seen in reality.

 

What do others think?

Short platforms to me cries urban and cramped, I would expect the station to be shoehorned into a tight space with buildings over.

 

Iain Rice did a version but the other end of the line, so the country end - it still had the station over at the end, but a more open vista to the sides.

[Flying Pig]

10 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

Picking up on something that Schooner said, thinking about Annie’s virtual version, and about the coarse-0 tiny urban terminus that I built, I’m wondering whether there might be an ideal height-width-length relationship for these “railway in a trough” layouts.

 

My instinct is that Minories, which has platforms that are, whisper it quietly, ridiculously short, looks better with retaining walls and any representation of street-level buildings, at “ordinary over-bridge” height. I’m not totally sure I like the visual balance of the MRC version, which is deeper, more like the real Widened Lines in the Farringdon area. It looks really good in photos from track level, but a bit odd to me when seen in reality.

 

What do others think?

 

I don't think the human brain creates scale models of things that are much bigger than it is.  They tend to be networks of interesting regions recalled quite accurately and connected by rather vaguely remembered stretches where nothing much of interest happens.  If the interesting regions are large enough, they can themselves be networks of detail and dull filler.  Large, extended items like platforms and retaining walls are mostly in the dull filler category and tend to get compressed in our imagination, so scale models can look unnatural. 

[Nearholmer]

1 hour ago, woodenhead said:

Short platforms to me cries urban and cramped, I would expect the station to be shoehorned into a tight space with buildings over.

 

Yes indeed, but my question is about what looks right , or not, in ‘picture composition’ terms, what proportions are pleasing to the eye. 
 

 

Edited June 28, 2023 by Nearholmer

[Compound2632]

There is just one point that has been troubling me in the original CJF plan. That's the point leading to the loco spur, which is a trailing point into the departure line. Whilst this is all well and good from the point of view of minimising facing point locks, etc., and an engine can get in or out of it to or from any of the three platform roads by running onto the departure line, it does seem to militate against rapid turn-over of arrivals and departures. A light engine movement not only blocks all departures, it also requires a reversal of the engine. How could Minories be most efficiently modified to provide a loco spur or spurs accessed directly?

 

Compare Moorgate in its prime, when each of the three bays was assigned to a different company's trains and each was provided with a loco spur:

 

 

Crop from a scan of Midland Railway line diagram of the London approaches from Silkstream Junction to St Pancras and Moorgate, Midland Railway Study Centre item 20628.]

[RobinofLoxley]

2 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

There is just one point that has been troubling me in the original CJF plan. That's the point leading to the loco spur, which is a trailing point into the departure line. Whilst this is all well and good from the point of view of minimising facing point locks, etc., and an engine can get in or out of it to or from any of the three platform roads by running onto the departure line, it does seem to militate against rapid turn-over of arrivals and departures. A light engine movement not only blocks all departures, it also requires a reversal of the engine. How could Minories be most efficiently modified to provide a loco spur or spurs accessed directly?

 

Compare Moorgate in its prime, when each of the three bays was assigned to a different company's trains and each was provided with a loco spur:

 

 

Crop from a scan of Midland Railway line diagram of the London approaches from Silkstream Junction to St Pancras and Moorgate, Midland Railway Study Centre item 20628.]

I would say that the spur is put on P1 so that it, and the associated facilities that are clearly shown on the original drawing of the plan posted on P123, are at the rear of the model from the viewers perspective. There's room off P3 but that would put the spur at the front of the model. Of course you can put in any number of spurs but it wouldnt be Minories then (ducks fearing incoming)

[RobinofLoxley]

OK @schooner this is getting complicated with having to make constant referrals to the many plan versions now littering the last 2 pages of the thread.

 

Firstly I completely understood the freight situation - its been mentioned here many times, I just wondered if you had a grip on how large a goods facility you were specifying by having 4 roads. Imagine that building, complete with classical greek embellishments, astride your layout.

 

On the orientation of turnouts, there are 2 areas we have mentioned, at P1, where I would prefer to have the loco spur separated for aesthetic reasons - that long line looks wrong to me, just a personal opinion, but it does call into question whether P1 is now a regular passenger platform (not in your script) or milk/parcels (which is).

 

For P5, you know how you want the scheme to work in terms of movements, but just looking at the plan as it is, goods arriving to p5 will need the loco to draw up past the turnout so isnt in a position to 'escape' until the rest of the train is moved. It might well be propelling goods into the dock line but if not it will be trapped in some situations. If it is released, its next move can be to shunt something  out of the goods depot, which seems a highly likely scenario to me.

[Satan's Goldfish]

This was my take on freight provision from a few pages ago. Goods trains arrive in a free platform then is shunted across to the goods shed by the station pilot. Seperate area for Express milk arrivals to be backed straight into too (imagine the main milk facility entrance is at a higher level in town to where the lower tracks are).

 

 

The point in the goods yard could be a double slip for further interest, would do away with the 2x trap points too.

 

Ref the query on where to have a loco spur for quick turn arounds, in my mind the milk platform in my design could be replaced with a couple of spurs and basic coal/watering facilities. With enough board width in front of the fiddleyard there could even by a turn table, but it is supposed to be a cramped urban environment. Released engines can go straight back to there from any platforms.

 

HTH

[Nearholmer]

Milk is a wonderful inbound traffic, because you really need no more than a concrete and drained apron, some pumps and pipes, and a bit of access for staff. The milk can disappear off-scene in a pipe. At Vauxhall it was unloaded from tankers standing at a through passenger platform, and the bottling plant was somewhere across the road outside the station.

[Flying Pig]

15 hours ago, Satan's Goldfish said:

This was my take on freight provision from a few pages ago. Goods trains arrive in a free platform then is shunted across to the goods shed by the station pilot. Seperate area for Express milk arrivals to be backed straight into too (imagine the main milk facility entrance is at a higher level in town to where the lower tracks are).

 

 

The point in the goods yard could be a double slip for further interest, would do away with the 2x trap points too.

 

Ref the query on where to have a loco spur for quick turn arounds, in my mind the milk platform in my design could be replaced with a couple of spurs and basic coal/watering facilities. With enough board width in front of the fiddleyard there could even by a turn table, but it is supposed to be a cramped urban environment. Released engines can go straight back to there from any platforms.

 

HTH

 

Putting the goods at the back is a neater solution imo than CJF's, though you do lose the sweeping reverse curve through the main platforms and hence the opportunity to annoy some onlookers.  I like the way you have added goods and milk without facing points, but I think I would prefer to see the goods shed arranged as below to avoid having to use a short Y on the main line as that is rather a tight radius.

 

If you moved the bridge to the left of the goods warehouse, you could have road access at street level and it would imo divide the station scene better between station throat and buffer ends.

 

Edited June 29, 2023 by Flying Pig