• Our booking engine at tickets.railforums.co.uk (powered by TrainSplit) helps support the running of the forum with every ticket purchase! Find out more and ask any questions/give us feedback in this thread!

Mark 1 coaches - how many people

Status
Not open for further replies.

randyrippley

Established Member
Joined
21 Feb 2016
Messages
5,081
Just to clarify, the industrial sites on both sides of Simonstone Lane were part of the Mullard factory
Looking at the Google maps link Taunton posted, that on the left (east) side had a back entrance adjacent to the station bridge. That on the right (west) also had an entrance onto Simonstone Lane, around 200 yards from the station. So not so much of a walk

FWIW Philips sold the eastern site to Time Computers some time in the 1980s, it became their HQ and production site.
When CRT production finally stopped in the western site in the 1990's, it was completely cleared and a new factory built to make TFT screens for a Philips/ LG joint venture. That never went into production and was demolished after 3-4 years, it's now a storage site.

In reality the railway was pretty pointless - there was a pub and a couple of houses near the station, but the "village" was a thin ribbon development along the Blackburn-Burnley road. Potentially more traffic from the village of Read at the top of Simonstone Lane, but the Clitheroe-Burnley bus route would have captured that. As for the factory, there were direct buses from Blackburn, Burnley, Accrington, Clitheroe (if you walked from Read). Far better than the rail options
 
Sponsor Post - registered members do not see these adverts; click here to register, or click here to log in
R

RailUK Forums

Andy873

Member
Joined
23 Mar 2017
Messages
932
Just to clarify, the industrial sites on both sides of Simonstone Lane were part of the Mullard factory
Looking at the Google maps link Taunton posted, that on the left (east) side had a back entrance adjacent to the station bridge. That on the right (west) also had an entrance onto Simonstone Lane, around 200 yards from the station. So not so much of a walk

FWIW Philips sold the eastern site to Time Computers some time in the 1980s, it became their HQ and production site.
When CRT production finally stopped in the western site in the 1990's, it was completely cleared and a new factory built to make TFT screens for a Philips/ LG joint venture. That never went into production and was demolished after 3-4 years, it's now a storage site.

In reality the railway was pretty pointless - there was a pub and a couple of houses near the station, but the "village" was a thin ribbon development along the Blackburn-Burnley road. Potentially more traffic from the village of Read at the top of Simonstone Lane, but the Clitheroe-Burnley bus route would have captured that. As for the factory, there were direct buses from Blackburn, Burnley, Accrington, Clitheroe (if you walked from Read). Far better than the rail options
My original question about the carriages was really about would have it been possible for BR to accommodate X number of possible extra passengers.

The simple answer to it is yes.

All the points made are valid, I couldn't see how you would have got back home by train without a long wait - and no one wants that.

Thanks everyone,
Andy.
 

AY1975

Established Member
Joined
14 Dec 2016
Messages
1,748
Most of the mk1 corridor seconds (actually third class until renamed second) had 6 seats per compartment, but when busy the guard would come round and shout (no PA then) to put the armrests up, so could get 8 in.

As previously stated, those for Southern and Western omitted the intermediate armrests so sat 8 per compartment by default.
Yes, and some Mark 1 Third/Second/Standard Class compartments had armrests but still had the seats numbered for 4-a-side rather than 3-a-side.
 

yorksrob

Veteran Member
Joined
6 Aug 2009
Messages
38,818
Location
Yorks
Minor point - the company name was 'Mullard' and it was primarily an electronics component manufacturing company (and a subsidiary of Philips since 1929). Simonstone specialised in TV display tube (CRT) manufacture, eventually closing when the TV market moved to LCD displays in the early 2000's.
My first record player was a Philips.

Wonderful machine.
 
Last edited:

greyman42

Established Member
Joined
14 Aug 2017
Messages
4,894
Yes, and some Mark 1 Third/Second/Standard Class compartments had armrests but still had the seats numbered for 4-a-side rather than 3-a-side.
The armrests were sometimes sewn into the seat back and as such were unusable.
 

Gloster

Established Member
Joined
4 Sep 2020
Messages
8,289
Location
Up the creek
Having commuted for a period on one of SR sets with sewn up armrests, it was common to find rests that had ‘come down’. This was sometimes due to passengers cutting through the threads that held them in the slots. Personally, I shoved any I found back into the slot as the sides were often quite gungey.
 

AY1975

Established Member
Joined
14 Dec 2016
Messages
1,748
What about buffet, restaurant and sleeping cars? They haven't been mentioned yet.
 

hexagon789

Veteran Member
Joined
2 Sep 2016
Messages
15,715
Location
Glasgow
What about buffet, restaurant and sleeping cars? They haven't been mentioned yet.
Catering vehicles in particular had a lot of variants, even just RMB (Miniature Buffet cars) had two basic variations a 44 and a 48 seat version depending on whether an additional store cupboard was present or not.

Sleeping cars came in 4 varieties, the original 3 being First (11 berths), Composite (5 & 12 berths), Second (22 berths). There were also some late conversions to convertible SLEP type, essentially a prelude to the situation with the Mk3s.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Top