Waverley Route - Default timetable had it not closed?

[70014IronDuke]

(Please note, not yet another thread on whether the full Waverley route - or anything quite like it - could/should be reopened!)

In the distant past, I remember reading that BR thought it quite likely that the government would not allow the closure of the Waverley route and had drawn up a new, but presumably very limited, timetable designed to provide some sort of minimum service meant to pass the political needs at the lowest cost. It would have made the route a kind of "Heart of the Borders Line" in the modern vernacular, I suppose.

(Mind you, I don't actually know what the final timetable consisted of, except for the Edinbugh - St Pancras sleeper. I never went on the route, alas. ISTR photos of Cl 26s on four carriage locals, but perhaps that's my imagination.)

I presume it would have entailed long single-track sections, with something like a 1 train per 2 hour service - if that?

Does anyone know if this is true, ie a real default timetable was drawn up, and what if consisted of in its essentials? Or was it just Railway World speculation back in the day?

And if so, what would the chances have been of it surviving, or would it have been like the GC's Rugby - Nottingham rump that lasted a few years after the closure of the Aylesbury - Rugby section and lasted into the early 70s before the axe finally fell? (I suspect the latter.)

 

[Gloster]

I doubt that they would have single-tracked the line, even south of Hawick. That would have involved capital cost, so I expect they would just have reduced it to the minimum number of boxes: I have a feeling that Newcastleton may have been the only level-crossing between Hawick and Longtown. They might have kept Whitrope Siding as well because of the bank.

EDIT: The timetable for the last full year, i.e. up to 5 May 1968, has the sleepers, the Waverley and a few dated services. There were roughly three stoppers all the way, one south of Hawick and about four north of there. Everything called at Hawick, St Boswells, Melrose and Galashiels, but other than that only Newcastleton had more than two or three trains a day. It seems to have been designed to get you in to Edinburgh or Carlisle for the day, but other than than that it was fit your arrangements around the train, which was probably quite reasonable in a sparsely populated area.

 

[Bevan Price]

I don't have the final timetable for the Waverley route, but I don't think it changed much after my 1965/66 timetable, and it was rather sparse. Some intermediate stations were very poorly served:

Southbound:
From Edinburgh:
06:58 most stations to Carlisle (arr. 10:07)
08:45 to St. Pancras (first stop Galashiels)
09:50 (SO, Summer) Leeds
10:15 (Summer) St. Pancras "The Waverley"
13:00 (SO) Most stations to Hawick
14:45 (SX) or 14:50 (SO) Stow, then most stations to Carlisle
16:10 Most stations to Hawick
!7:11 Stations to Gorebridge
17:54 Eskbank, Stow then semi-fast to Carlisle
22:05 Sleeper to St. Pancras, first stop Galashiels
22:25 (SX) Eskbank, Stow, then most statons to Hawick
22:45 (SO) as above, but extended to Newcastleton
also
06:30 Hawick to Carlisle, most stations.

Northbound:
From Carlisle
04:45 Sleeper from St. Pancras
09:20 All stations to Galashiels then Edinburgh
13:45 Most stations to Galashiels, then Edinburgh
16:18 (09:15 from St. Pancras) The Waverley. Summer only
17:18 (10:15 from St. Pancras)
18:13 Most stations to Hawick
19:44 Most stations to Galashiels then Edinburgh.

From Hawick
05:25 Semi-fast to Edinburgh (supplement shows it as withdrawn.)
06:58 Most stations to Edinburgh
08:05 Most stations to Edinburgh
12:00 (SO) Most stations to Edinburgh
(this was the last Northbound train of the day for stations Gore to Eskbank)

Sundays:
The sleeper each way, plus 2 trains each way, Edinburgh & Hawick calling only at Galashiels, Melrose & St. Boswells.

 

[The exile]

I doubt that they would have single-tracked the line, even south of Hawick. That would have involved capital cost

Though wasn’t there a financial incentive from the government to eliminate “redundant” track (hence the singling of Salisbury - Exeter, which would have had a much stronger case for retention - even then - than Hawick- Carlisle)?

 

[Magdalia]

I doubt that they would have single-tracked the line, even south of Hawick.

Single-tracking happened in, for example, Salisbury-Exeter, Perth-Inverness and Ipswich-Lowestoft.

Why would the Waverley route be any different?

 

[Sir Felix Pole]

Barnstaple Jcn. to Ilfacombe was singled in 1968, even though it was closed 2 years later! Most of the signalling was eliminated and effectively worked as a self-contained branch.

 

[Gloster]

Though wasn’t there a financial incentive from the government to eliminate “redundant” track (hence the singling of Salisbury - Exeter, which would have had a much stronger case for retention - even then - than Hawick- Carlisle)?

Single-tracking happened in, for example, Salisbury-Exeter, Perth-Inverness and Ipswich-Lowestoft.

Why would the Waverley route be any different?

I have long felt that there were difference levels of enthusiasm for the policy from different regions, with the Western being keen to embrace it while others were less interested. It may be that the Scottish was also keen to follow the policy, but it might be that they would adopt a ‘do nothing’ one and then come back in a couple of years and say that maintenance costs are so high that it should be closed. Incidentally, I thought that Ipswich-Lowestoft was only singled in the 1980s, but it is well out of my area.

 

[Magdalia]

I have long felt that there were difference levels of enthusiasm for the policy from different regions, with the Western being keen to embrace it while others were less interested. It may be that the Scottish was also keen to follow the policy, but it might be that they would adopt a ‘do nothing’ one and then come back in a couple of years and say that maintenance costs are so high that it should be closed. Incidentally, I thought that Ipswich-Lowestoft was only singled in the 1980s, but it is well out of my area.

Perth-Inverness is a good Scottish precedent. I'm less familiar with what happened Inverness-Aberdeen, which is a complicated merger of two routes.

I think you're right about Ipswich-Lowestoft being singled later, I should have remembered that!

 

[Dr Hoo]

Judging by the keen-ness with which other lines in Scotland were either closed or rationalised (and the fact that the former Regional General Manager had been promoted to BRB Director of Planning) I don’t think that there was much of an appetite to ‘protect’ just the Waverley route.

(I know that the Planning Director left during the tenure of the next Chairman after Dr Beeching.)

It was very awkward to resource, with an end-to-end journey time for local trains of around three hours. It had four sets of resources in circuit at times, even excluding the long-distance expresses.

As I understand it, Barbara Castle’s Surplus Track Capacity Grants worked on a mileage basis. Getting rid of a two-track route gave BR twice as much as singling it and avoided all the re-signalling.

 

[Mcr Warrior]

This website has a link to the timetable from Winter 1968/69.

Closure of the Waverley Route

An report on the closure of the Waverley Route had a profound affect on me. The details were simply jaw-dropping. I compare this to a more modern approach.

www.railwayblogger.com

Looks like one of the smallest of intermediate stations, i.e. Tynehead, only got a token one train (each way) per day "service" and absolutely nothing on a Sunday.

 

[Taunton]

If only the Waverley had lasted just a year or so later it would have come into the design of the WCML electrification installation. This project closed the line from Gretna Junction to Motherwell in daytime for several years, completely cutting off the Edinburgh branch from Carstairs, it would never have been closed then, so it would have lasted into the mid-1970s, when a different approach prevailed. I can't remember when the Border parliamentary constituencies became marginal, which will have added weight to keeping it.

I don't think the surplus track grants extended to payment for complete route closures. They were more about minimising costs on the remaining network, where it was proving cheaper, short term, to just leave existing tracks, signalling and staff, rather than pay the one-time substantial costs of ripping it all up and rearranging the signalling etc. Doesn't apply to a complete closure where it all has to come up anyway and the staff are gone. Yes the Western were very active with it. I don't think the Southern claimed a single mile.

 

[Dr Hoo]

The Waverley Route was doomed to closure from the Network for Development in 1967, signed by both the BR Chairman and Barbara Castle. It wouldn’t have figured in planning for WCML Anglo-Scottish electrification.

I think that there were only three daytime, all-year Edinburgh-Carlisle links (by portion working or connection via Carstairs) in that era. It just wasn’t going to be a major (passenger) consideration. Sleepers and dated/seasonal services wouldn’t make the case for keeping the Waverley either.

(Edited to add, following checking):

The Surplus Track Capacity Grant provisions, under section 40 of the 1968 Act seem to me to have been very broadly drawn, basically a licence to, ahem, legitimise any scheme that the Minister and BRB decided to (hastily) devise. There was nothing to say that a grant would be inconsistent with subsequent closure.

"40 Grants pending elimination of surplus track and signalling equipment​

(1)Subject to the provisions of this section, the Minister may, for each of the five years beginning with 1969, make to the Railways Board a grant towards the expenditure of the Board in respect of track and signalling equipment which is in that year in the possession of the Board but which is in that year, or is likely within those five years to become, surplus to their requirements.

(2)The amount of any grant under this section shall be determined by the Minister after consultation with the Railways Board, and the amount of the grant for each of the said years shall be so determined before 1st January 1969 in such manner that—

(a)the amount for each year after the first is less than that for the preceding year ; and

(b)the aggregate amount of the grants does not exceed £50 million.

(3)Any grant under this section shall be made on such terms and conditions as the Minister may determine.

(4)The approval of the Treasury shall be required for the making of any grant under this section and for any determination of the Minister under subsection (2) or (3) thereof.

(5)The report of the Railways Board under section 27(8) of the Act of 1962 for any year in respect of which a grant is made to the Board under this section shall include a statement of the amount of that grant."

 

[Kingston Dan]

Suspect if it had survived it would have bumbled along with around the three through trains of the mid 60s timetable, with a strengthened service from Edinburgh to Hawick. The Hawick-Carlisle section would have still closed in the early 70s along with some of the tiny intermediate stations. The fact it survived would have meant when ECML electrification happened in the late 80s they wouldn't have singled the Calton tunnels and kept the Abbeyhill loop. And a few years after that hey would probably have introduced a clock face hourly all stops to Hawick service which would probably have gone half hourly as rail passenger numbers increased in the early 2000s. And it would probably be part of Scotland's rail decarbonisation programme with intermittent electrification. So about 16 miles more than what we have now.

 

[eldomtom2]

The Waverley Route was doomed to closure from the Network for Development in 1967, signed by both the BR Chairman and Barbara Castle.

Quite a few lines not included in the "Network for Development" survived...

 

[Dr Hoo]

Quite a few lines not included in the "Network for Development" survived...

Indeed, and quite a few shown to be ‘saved’ were closed anyway. Okehampton, Treherbert-Bridgend, Bewdley, Keswick, Fleetwood, Colne-Skipton, the Glenfarg line, Caernarfon…

Just goes to show that anything signed by a politician is of very little lasting value.

 

[Bevan Price]

Indeed, and quite a few shown to be ‘saved’ were closed anyway. Okehampton, Treherbert-Bridgend, Bewdley, Keswick, Fleetwood, Colne-Skipton, the Glenfarg line, Caernarfon…

Just goes to show that anything signed by a politician is of very little lasting value.

Treherbert - Bridgend was doomed once the long tunnel near Treherbert was declared unsafe; repair costs would have been horrendous. And passenger traffic was not high - my sole trip (one way) was on a lightly loaded single bubblecar.

And much as some of us might like it, we cannot always blame politicians. At time in the past, governments were "in hock" to the "money market" and had little choice but to follow their demands for spending cuts - however undesirable they were. Yes - mistakes were made, but put the blame at the real source, which isn't always the politicians.

 

[A S Leib]

Would there have been any London or Manchester – Carlisle – Edinburgh – Stirling / Dundee etc. services had the line remained open, or would the ECML have kept all of the Aberdeen services except the Sleeper?

 

[Cheshire Scot]

Perth-Inverness is a good Scottish precedent. I'm less familiar with what happened Inverness-Aberdeen, which is a complicated merger of two routes.

Inverness - Aberdeen was Highland Railway / LMS Inverness to Keith Jn and Great North of Scotland / LNER Keith Jn to Aberdeen. The latter was double track throughout and singled almost entirely with just the Kennethmont to Insch retained as double track due to the timetable of the day which required several instances each day of trains meeting on this double track section (enforcing a crossing at either Kennethmont or Insch would have thrown other parts of the timetable out of synch). All other crossing loops were at the remaining stations plus a loop at Dyce (where the station had closed), with the loop at Keith Jn just to the east of the single through platform (as it is today) whilst -rationalisation at Forres saw that station also reduced to a single platform and with a loop just to the east although replaced by a 'new' station with loop in recent years.
The Highland section was double track from Inverness to Dalcross (which was just over half a mile to the west of the 'new' Inverness Airport station) until singled in 1967 creating a single line section from Millburn Jn to Nairn.
The GNSR / LNER / and BR until 1968, also had parallel but longer routes from Elgin to Keith via Dufftown, and from Elgin to Cairnie Junction (between Keith and Huntly) via the coast.

 

[RT4038]

Inverness - Aberdeen was Highland Railway / LMS Inverness to Keith Jn and Great North of Scotland / LNER Keith Jn to Aberdeen. The latter was double track throughout and singled almost entirely with just the Kennethmont to Insch retained as double track due to the timetable of the day which required several instances each day of trains meeting on this double track section (enforcing a crossing at either Kennethmont or Insch would have thrown other parts of the timetable out of synch). All other crossing loops were at the remaining stations plus a loop at Dyce (where the station had closed), with the loop at Keith Jn just to the east of the single through platform (as it is today) whilst -rationalisation at Forres saw that station also reduced to a single platform and with a loop just to the east although replaced by a 'new' station with loop in recent years.
The Highland section was double track from Inverness to Dalcross (which was just over half a mile to the west of the 'new' Inverness Airport station) until singled in 1967 creating a single line section from Millburn Jn to Nairn.
The GNSR / LNER / and BR until 1968, also had parallel but longer routes from Elgin to Keith via Dufftown, and from Elgin to Cairnie Junction (between Keith and Huntly) via the coast.

I don't think Keith Jct-Elgin by any route, direct or via either longer route ever double track? (except the Buckie-Portessie section of the coast line). It certainly wasn't in 1950. Was Elgin-Forres either? The original Highland main line (single track) went south from Forres to Aviemore.

 

[Cheshire Scot]

Inverness - Aberdeen was Highland Railway / LMS Inverness to Keith Jn and Great North of Scotland / LNER Keith Jn to Aberdeen. The latter was double track throughout and singled almost entirely with just the Kennethmont to Insch retained as double track due to the timetable of the day which required several instances each day of trains meeting on this double track section (enforcing a crossing at either Kennethmont or Insch would have thrown other parts of the timetable out of synch). All other crossing loops were at the remaining stations plus a loop at Dyce (where the station had closed), with the loop at Keith Jn just to the east of the single through platform (as it is today) whilst -rationalisation at Forres saw that station also reduced to a single platform and with a loop just to the east although replaced by a 'new' station with loop in recent years.
The Highland section was double track from Inverness to Dalcross (which was just over half a mile to the west of the 'new' Inverness Airport station) until singled in 1967 creating a single line section from Millburn Jn to Nairn.
The GNSR / LNER / and BR until 1968, also had parallel but longer routes from Elgin to Keith via Dufftown, and from Elgin to Cairnie Junction (between Keith and Huntly) via the coast.

I don't think Keith Jct-Elgin by any route, direct or via either longer route ever double track? (except the Buckie-Portessie section of the coast line). It certainly wasn't in 1950. Was Elgin-Forres either? The original Highland main line (single track) went south from Forres to Aviemore.

Whilst I did not actually state the Highland Inverness to Keith Jn was single track (except Inverness to Dalcross) I made no claim about double track other than to Dalcross.
All Keith to Elgin routes were single track except as you state Buckie to Portessie.

And yes, Inverness to Forres was part of the original mainline to Perth but I was responding to the Inverness to Aberdeen question in post 8.

 

[Taunton]

The other thing about the Waverley was expected freight traffic levels. It linked directly two of the Modernisation Plan's new freight marshalling yards, Carlisle Kingmoor and Millerhill; the latter actually on the line itself and which ended up after the closure on a somewhat irrelevant stub. Must have been plans for long distance freight to go this way.

 

[Dr Hoo]

The other thing about the Waverley was expected freight traffic levels. It linked directly two of the Modernisation Plan's new freight marshalling yards, Carlisle Kingmoor and Millerhill; the latter actually on the line itself and which ended up after the closure on a somewhat irrelevant stub. Must have been plans for long distance freight to go this way.

I’m not sure that the 1955 Modernisation Plan marshalling yards were a very significant consideration after the Reshaping Report, Merry-go-round coal, liner trains, the Trunk Routes report (drafted by a former Scottish Region GM) and the Network for Development map.

 

[Razorblades]

I doubt that they would have single-tracked the line, even south of Hawick. That would have involved capital cost, so I expect they would just have reduced it to the minimum number of boxes: I have a feeling that Newcastleton may have been the only level-crossing between Hawick and Longtown. They might have kept Whitrope Siding as well because of the bank.

Between Hawick and Longtown there were also level crossings at the former station sites of Kershopefoot (Anglo-Scottish border) and Scots Dyke, 2 miles north of Longtown, but the latter had long since been abolished (in 1954) by the time the line closed. Block sections had been progressively extended during the sixties, with intermediate boxes closing to suit the sparse booked traffic on offer.

 

[30907]

I would hazard a guess that south of Hawick there would have been 3tpd.

I'm basing that arbitrarily on the Settle-Carlisle line after local trains were withdrawn, which for several years was 2tpd (the morning Carlisle-Leeds was a mid-70s addition). I very much doubt the service would have been as much as 2-hourly.

 

[Gloster]

You could logically cut the boxes to Whitrope Siding, Newcastleton, Kershopefoot and Longtown, and then send everything across to Mossband Junction. If it was singled you could close Whitrope and leave 3 1/2 miles of double track between Newcastleton and Kershopefoot as a long loop.

 

[MadMac]

Supposed it had survived “as-is”, would it have been a better diversion than via Carstairs during the Penmanshiel closure?

 

[Razorblades]

It had been used as an ECML diversionary route on many occasions, so in theory, yes.

 

[70014IronDuke]

This website has a link to the timetable from Winter 1968/69.

Closure of the Waverley Route

An report on the closure of the Waverley Route had a profound affect on me. The details were simply jaw-dropping. I compare this to a more modern approach.

www.railwayblogger.com

Looks like one of the smallest of intermediate stations, i.e. Tynehead, only got a token one train (each way) per day "service" and absolutely nothing on a Sunday.

Gosh, that timetable shows how slow the route was.

I mean "The Waverley" took 2 hr 27 minutes for the 98 miles.

That's an average speed of 40 mph. OK, it had 5 stops, but it was also Cl 45 hauled by then. The line speed can only have been, what, 70 mph max?

 

[InkyScrolls]

Gosh, that timetable shows how slow the route was.

I mean "The Waverley" took 2 hr 27 minutes for the 98 miles.

That's an average speed of 40 mph. OK, it had 5 stops, but it was also Cl 45 hauled by then. The line speed can only have been, what, 70 mph max?

That's the same as the S&C today, near enough!

 

[Razorblades]

Timings were very typical of a Scottish secondary main line during the sixties.