LarryG's general album

[LarryG]

Final shots to wrap up Chinley. Displaying three generations of liveries, Cclass 31 No. 31407 in InterCity colours hauls 1960's green liveried 31165 (ex. Stratford Major Depot) and Class 37 No. 36057 in Large logo blue passes through Chinley en route to Toton on 19th October 1994. Track rationalization was obvious from previous photos at this location. I had painted a Class 31 model in InterCity livery for 'Rail' to show what a real loco could look like...


Class 45 No. 45003 heads the 15.15 Manchester-Harwich express through Chinley station on a really hot 1st August 1977...


Taken from the signal box, this train had been brought to a stand on the 1-in-90 climb to Chinley and 40113 was making a stupendous noise as it passed the box with a Manchester Hope Street to Staveley Lime Quarries working on 1st August 1977....

 

[LarryG]

Nice set of photos from the 'Chinley Album'.

This is one cross country route I've never had cause to travel over and your photos show how rugged it appears. More so than the Standedge route which has more lineside domestic and industrial architecture.

The Standedge route will follow commencing at Manchester Exchange...

 

[Dave Holt]

Looking forward to that, Larry.
Manchester Exchange (and Victoria) was a regular haunt. Indeed, I saw my last BR service steam loco in the horse dock - a Patricroft Caprotti Standard 5. Cabbed it whilst waiting for my Peak hauled train to Darlington.
Dave.

 

[LarryG]

The closed ex.LNWR Manchester Exchange station in 1977, from where trains once departed eastbound over the Standedge route to Leeds and westbound to Liverpool and North Wales etc...



Passing on the through lines past Exchange is 25119 on old track from Ordsall Lane on 4th September 1981...


Split=headcode Class 40's Nos. 40138 and 40130 are seen taking the though road at Victoria West Junction signal box while returning from engineering work at Ordsall Lane on 4th October 1981...

 

[LarryG]

Class 25 No. 25219 passes through Manchester Victoria with a Heaton to Red Bank empty van train on tracks leading to Exchange Station (closed 1969) on 4th October 1981. The imposing façade of Victoria station can be seen. Completed in 1909, it was restored to its former glory as part of a Greater Manchester Council refurbishment scheme in 1979...


25302 was one of just thirteen vacuum=braked Class 25's left in traffic at the end of 1983. It is seen heading a train of long-welded rails past Manchester Victoria and Exchange on 19th January 1984...


Class 40 No. 40076 is departing the well-known long platform 11 between Victoria and Exchange with a Holyhead-bound train which was diverted via Wigan becasue of Sunday engineering work on 4th October 1981. In the background can be seen the short canopied platform serving Victoria Parcels Office where I worked in 1959 and regularly eat my noon sandwiches while watching the all-steam proceedings of the time....

 

[Focalplane]

For some strange reason I have never, in 75 years, visited Manchester! Liverpool, Leeds, Sheffield etc. were all visited but I always missed Manchester on my way to and from Westmorland in the 1960s. Thank the M6 for that! It’s the largest city in the UK I have never seen, so I will enjoy your photos!

 

[LarryG]

Green liveried 40106 stand in platform 11 waiting to leave for Holyhead on 19th august 1982...



40 162 is towing 87016 Sir Francis Drake westbound through Manchester victoria with a diverted Euston-Glasgow express on Sunday 29th august 1982. 40 162 was withdrawn 14th December 1982. The nearest crossover allowed a second train to occupy Platform 11....


Vistorial was often host to sunday diversions from the West Coast Mainline. Class 40 no. 40168 stands in the middle road with Class 87 AC electric loco no. 87026 Redgauntlet on the 08.05 Glasgow-Euston before attacking the climb ot Miles Platting on 3rd October 1981. The buffet on platform 12 was always a welcoming place on a cold winters night...

 

[LarryG]

In Manchester Victoria, 40049 draws a Newcastle-Rhyl special train down Miles Platting Bank through the station on 2nd august 1977. 25089 was acting Wallside Pilot awaiting pushing something up the bank...



25198 was working a short freight through Victoria on the through lines past 25089 and a 1957-built BRC&W Co. DMU on a service to Blackpool on 2nd August 1977. It seemed at the time that the white stripe was given to Units that regularly worked this seaside service...


Class 124 Motorised Parcels Van No. M55993 drones through Manchester Victoria on 19th January 1984...

 

[LarryG]

47518 is departing platform 12 for the journey over the Standedge route with the 08.40 Liverpool-Newcastle on 4th October 1981...



In the opposite direction, 45042 is dropping down the 1 in 47 Miles Platting Bank into Manchester Victoria with the 08.50 York-Liverpool on 3rd October 1981. Tracks to the left provided an alternative route to Newton Heath...


Having reach Miles Platting station, Standedge route trains branched off to the right towards Park, Droylsden, Ashton-Under-Lyne and Stalybridge etc. Class 46 No. 46043 is on the short but steep climb after negotiating the junction at Miles Platting on 4th August 1977.....

 

[jonte]

Quality.

 

[LarryG]

Just a reminder that I don't have a negative scanner and so I'm relying on my boxes of prints to make up these route albums. I never printed my photos taken around Ashton-U-Lyne and Stalybridge, so we have had to jump from Miles Platting to Mossley I'm afraid.

Class 46 No. 46036 is climbing past the once familiar cooling towers at Tame Valley Power Station, Black Rock, with the 15.10 Liverpool-Leeds on 3rd August 1977...


The railway was cramped in between the old houses at Lower Mossley and a hillside, and it shows here. A Class 47 rolls past this 'Last of the Summer Wine' scene with a TransPennine express in 1980's.


With no control of the weather (it were chuckin' it down), I was here at Mossley miles away from home and so made the most of it. A Class 40 rolls downgrade through the station on a Day Excursion (ADEX) in the early 1980's. Mossley didn't suffer the indignity of demolition in exchange for bus shelters like most intermediate stations on this route. That said, the facade on the right is a blank, so there is a bus shelter after all...


A Swindon InterCity Unit speeds through Mossley en route to Leeds on a drier, but dull day in the 1980's. A tramcar ran away down Stamford Road on the right of this picture and dived through the bridge wall and onto the railway tracks on 20th October 1911 killing five people...

 

[LarryG]

40139 labours up the 1-in-125 gradient between Mossley and Scout Tunnel with the Saturdays-Only 08.53 Blackpool to Newcastle on 18th July 1981. Railway builders efforts in the 1840's to retain public and private right of way severed by the railway are to be seen by the variety of bridges which cross or dive under the line at intervals along this section of the route...



47408 coasts downgrade through the outskirts of Mossley with the 12.20 Newcastle to Liverpool Lime Street express on Sunday 22nd March 1981...


40196 was working hard at Midge Hill Bridge with an eastbound freight composed entirely of traditional 4-wheel wagons on the evening of 1st July 1981 The formation of the Micklehurst Loop Line, built to ease congenstion on the Standedge line through Greenfield, can be made out on the left of the factory on the eastern side of the valley. That line closed in the 1960's...

 

[Yorkshire Dave]

Excellent photos of the Standedge route, Larry.

A Swindon InterCity Unit speeds through Mossley en route to Leeds on a drier, but dull day in the 1980's.

Not much different today apart from the rolling stock.

Our paths may well have crossed at Man Victoria in 1981/2 as I was photgraphing trains there in my student days. They are in my Singing (or Reminiscing) the Blues thread. Post #13. Also includes 40 106 taken at Crewe open day.

 

[LarryG]

Visually, Greenfield always brings to mind the scenes in the Rupert Bear Annuals of my childhood. 45144 'The Royal signals' drifts downgrade with the 17.53 york-Liverpool on 1st July 1981. The mill behind the train was the Royal George, which gave its name to the local area...


I dont think I ever did find out what this train was! The shadows were lengthening and I was about to walk back to the car wen this class 40 turned up. The square chimney is a familiar landmark to rail travellers and belonged to the demolished Lower Grove Mill...


We had driven over from Wales to stay with the in-laws, as we did every Christmas, and I popped out for an hour to "shoot something in the snow". No sooner had I climbed the hillside than Deltic Class 55 No. 55009 'Alicidon' turned up with the 13.05 Liverpool-York. Christmas Eve 24th December 1981...

 

[LarryG]

Taken from Greenfield Junction sgnalbox, 40131 was climbing through Greenfield with the 10.10 Liverpool Lime Street to Newcastle express on 4th August 1977. Halfway up the embankment is the formation of the Oldham - Greenfield Branch which lost its passenger service to Delph in 1955 and closed completely along with Lees MPD 26E in 1964...


Greenfield Junction signal box an be seen as 40088 roars through the station with a 42-wagon freight train on10th September 1979. The construction of the railway at this point involved a large scale excavation round the foot of Wharmton Hill thereby bearing the railway around its eastern flank, hence the heavy stone wall on the right...


40 183 climbs through Greenfield with the 10.10 Liverpool-York on 3rd August 1977. The roof of the subway is visible between the tracks. When the station lost its canopies, rain would enter the open entrances and flood the subway. Expresses like the one below were almost always double-headed in steam days, consequently I spent much time at this station and Greenfield in general in my schooldays. Working on the footplate brought me here regular as did working on Oldham corporation buses covering the Greenfield and Uppermill-Manchester Limited Stop services...

 

[LarryG]

It was innevitable that the last Class 40 to retain steam-era green livery would become a celebrity, although in reality it looked rather shabby! 40106 rolls through Greenfield with an empty parcel train bound for Manchester Red Bank sidings on 31st July 1977. After demolition of the buildings, the station settled down to an open plan existence with a portacabin (far right) acting as a part-day ticket office...


It is not often one sees a historica footbridge being built! It is a genuine LNWR structure with a number of fibreglass replacement 'castings'. The old subway in the foreground had been left open to the elements when the canopies and the remainder of the Up building was demolished and so it kept on flooding. A Trans-Pennine Unit is working the 14.02 Leeds -Manchester on 25th September 1977...


A better view of one of the Trans-Pennine Units built for this route around 1961 passing Greenfield at 15.20hrs on 24th March 1979. Snow is no stranger to the Pennine hills and often hangs around for weeks at this altitude. This photo was taken from the end of the mainline platform, but behind me was the closed bay platform that once served trains on the Oldham Branch. Travellers not wishing to go through to Delph alighted here...

 

[Yorkshire Dave]

In my eyes the Trans-Pennine DMUs and the Clacton EMUs were the best looking of the BR multiple unit designs.

 

[LarryG]

Class 47 No. 47402 is climbing away from Greenfield towards Uppermill with the 10.05 Liverpool-Newcastle on 2nd July 1981. I had to remove some bushes to access with view, but it is not as tresspass shot...


The 1E86 14.00 Llandudno-York hauled by 40096 is climbing the 1-in-125 grade leading to Saddleworth viaduct on 4th July 1981.Trains at this point have reached Delph Junction as it was once called with a third track serving the Delph branch ...


Coming off Saddelworth viaduct is 45021 hauling the 15.27 Healey Mills-Northwich freight on 21st May 1980. The Delph Branch curved sharply to the left at this point until closure in 1963...

 

[LarryG]

Summer and winter views overlooking the lofty Saddelworth Viaduct spanning the vally of the Tame. 40156 rolls downgrade with a westbound fitted freight on a hot 3rd August 1977. The closed Saddleworth Station is visible at the end of the viaduct...



In contrast, this 31st January 1984 shows a landscape so typical of the Pennine winters. An unidentidied 'Peak' passes with a westbound express at 12.12hrs en route to Liverpool Lime Street. The assorted dates show how often I visited the North West in the 1970's and 80's...

 

[Yorkshire Dave]

In contrast, this 31st January 1984 shows a landscape so typical of the Pennine winters. An unidentidied 'Peak' passes with a westbound express at 12.12hrs en route to Liverpool Lime Street. The assorted dates show how often I visited the North West in the 1970's and 80's...

It's not until you see these 'trains in the landcape' photos you realise how circuitious this route is.

Are there any photos of Gods Own County side of t'Pennines?