The 50th anniversary of the Lakeside and Haverthwaite railway 2023 The former Furness railway Lakeside branch in Cumbria, England, came off the main Lancaster to Barrow in Furness line at a triangular junction at Plumpton and headed North East to the shores of Windermere. In the early days it was a fairly quiet rural line built to serve the Backbarrow Blast furnace and the Low Woods Gunpowder factory but in the 1890s underwent a drastic transformation with the advent of tourism. The Furness general manager at the time, Alfred Aslett, spotted the potential of the Lake and scenery and began a campaign to develop the railway, vessels and routes to attract holiday makers from the industrial cities of the North of England. He also developed the same business model on Lake Coniston, which was served by a branch line from Foxfield, originally built to tap the vast mineral wealth of the area. The line was always popular, with people doing circular tours taking in both railways and lakes, Dining and dancing in the elevated station refreshment room and taking small rowing boats and sailing boats out onto the lake. The Furness Railway steam yachts and pleasure boats made connections with the railway to take visitors up Windermere to the tourist hot spots of Hawkshead, Ambleside, Bowness and Windermere village itself. And everything was lovely until the infamous Beeching cuts and the growth of car ownership condemned the line to closure in 1965 and the magnificent Lakeside station with its verandah tea rooms fell into terminal decay. In 1970 providence struck when, after a previous rescue attempt failed, Jim Morris and Austin Maher formed the Lakeside Railway estate company and began negotiations to purchase the remaining 3 ½ miles from Haverthwaite to Lakeside with a view to re-opening it as a tourist line. The remainder of the line through Greenodd to Ulverston having been dissected by the construction of the A590 trunk road. In May 1973 with approval for a Light railway Order in place operations commenced and continue to this day. Over the course of this thread I’ll take you to some of the key sights and photo vantage points and take a look at the locomotives and rolling stock as well. The line still belongs to the Maher family to this day and the integrated Rail/Boat ticket trips attract visitors from around the world I’ll start at Haverthwaite, the railway’s H.Q, seen here just before the closure of the line where a venerable Midland Railway 2F 0-6-0 sees out it’s remaining days on the local pick-up freight working The trackplan for this period is quite busy but much had to go when the road was built and the area is now very cramped for space The original station building is still very much in use. Unusually for a railway whose building are made from local slate, sandstone or granite the buildings on this line were done in yellow brick which really made them stand out at the time.The cafeteria is well known for it's excellent British Cream Teas. (Can't stand them myself, much prefer the Cumberland Sausage sandwiches!) Getting quite hard to take a decent picture of this these days. Always a bus that has just off-loaded a gaggle of tourists parked in front! A typical scene today. Barclay 0-6-0ST ‘Carron no 14’ has run round and waits to head back to Lakeside. The train is almost always formed of four British Rail Mk I coaches finished in the classic ‘Blood and Custard’ livery Haverthwaite is 20 minutes from my house and as the wife is NOT an early riser, I've been popping though in the morning as the weather has been so nice, for England, In April and May More soon Kev
The original signal box, located on the Up platform, is typical of Furness boxes of the late 19th century The rugged portal of the West Tunnel looking towards the truncated route to Ulverston.The crossover to allow running around is in the tunnel itself. The railway stores some spare rolling stock at the other end of the tunnel The East tunnel is the route for Lakeside via Newby Bridge. The companies’ main workshops on the right. More soon
The next spot on the route is Backbarrow which has an extensive industrial history. The Backbarrow Blast furnace worked from 1711 to 1966 and the blast furnace still stands to this day preserved by the Backbarrow Heritage trust. The associated buildings that surround it are all being renovated and converted into very expensive, luxury housing. The railway runs on the hillside above the village I ran a big thread on the ironworks in the Cattle car section. https://www.trainboard.com/highball...ands-iron-furnaces-two-more-survivors.137377/ The reason for the growth of industries here was the ample waterpower from the river Leven that drove the bellows for the ironworks via a water wheel, Similarly water power was used for The Backbarrow Blue chemical works (Dolly Blue Soap) and the Low Wood gunpowder works. I'm planning on taking a look at the surviving bits of these soon. Not this weekend though as it is a Public holiday and the whole area is going to be rammed with tourists Kev
Still at Backbarrow, in a short storage siding is this mundane looking 14 ton tank wagon. It is more interesting than first appears however. It was registered to BNFL (British Nuclear Fuels) and was used to trasnport Nitric acid for re-processing irradiated fuel. I'm going to measure it and do a lot of detail photos soon with a view to making a model of it once past Backbarrow the railway runs alongside Finsthwaite Lane where a few hiking trails cross it including an ancient bridge over the cutting Carron No 14 trundles along bound for Lakeside Fairburn 2-6-4T 42085 is one of the two surviving members of the this LMS built loco clas and both are at the L&H. I'll go into more detail about these when I get to the Loco fleet more soon
Newby Bridge Waterside House bridge just before the station is a good place to video Princess slows for the station stop 42085 accelerates away The original waiting shelter. Note the signal in the distance.This was operated from a lever frame on the platform by Passengers wanting the train to stop Princess again Kev
At Newby Bridge the road crosses the railway at the Swan Inn. Behind the steam plume from Princesses exhaust you can just make out the row of Furness railway cottages built for the local staff. I need to photograph these soon In the last few months they had created a footpath from Newby Bridge to lakeside that follows the railway for part of the way. In the morning the sun is in the wrong place however. This ornate bridge is just before the station at Lakeside The home signal is off for the platform. There is a short engineers siding just past it The freight stock used by the Railways engineering department all had Telegraphic codes ( Ancient History)using the names of sea creatures This is a ZFW 'Dogfish' Ballast with a ZEV 'Catfish' behind it Next, Lakeside itself more soon Kev
So. i put on my hiking boots and explored the new 'West Windermere way' yesterday. Quite a pleasant walk with no steep gradients and well laid gravel. My aim was to see whether the new crossing over the line was a decent photo spot Not bad! The bridge itself is the isue, with ridicously high sides too tall for my tripod! I'm modifying a 'speed' clamp at the moment to make a camera mount that can clamp onto bridges and fences like it Princess is doing the lion's share of the work ,again seen headed for Lakeside but 'Victor' was outside the loco shed when I passed and I think it was in light steam so hopefully we get scenes like this again soon So..Imagine in the Edwardian era you did the grand tour of Cumberland on both the Windermere steamers and the Furness Railway lines This is the vista as you approach Lakeside The tragic loss of most of this fine building I'll cover in the next installment Kev
So the building at Lakeside was very ornate but by 1965 was semi derelict and most of it was demolished. This left the Lakeside cafe intact. Most of the track in the yard was lifted . Not much left and the former yard now houses the Lakes Aquarium and the car park. The souvenir shop and cafe are housed in the old building.
Locomotives and rolling stock of the Lakeside and Haverthwaite The star. For the 150th anniversary of the Furness Railway the National Railway Museum let the railway borrow 'Copperknob for a few days . Built in 1846 and withdrawn in 1900 it was displayed in a large Glass building at Barrow station before being bombed by the Luftwaffe in WW2. It still has shrapnel damage in its boiler cladding to this day The other remarkable survivor is Furness No.20 restored to working order and converted back into a tender engine having spent the major part of its working life, converted to a saddle tank, in the vast Barrow Steelworks arrow This is currently the oldest working steam engine in the world. Its sister engine, which sat at the entrance to Steamtown at Carnfort for decades is to be restored to working order in its saddle tank form A regular peformer was a former WW2 Austerity Saddle Tank 'Cumbria' resplendant in Furness Railway red, This Hunslet War department 0-6-0ST is a very powerful loco Much smaller, and a lot less Powerful 'Fluff' a Fowler 0-4-0DM built in 1937. Currently undergoing a complete restoration at the Ribble Steam railway There used to be a British rail Class 26 on the railway. I never saw it in action and it has now moved back to its home territory of Scotland to another preserved railway Much more useful are the railway's two British Rail Class 03 0-6-0DMs More soon Kev
The video. Mostly the last couple of years but some shots from 2000. It took me so long to get organised on this that the new 'West Windermere Way' footpath opened in time for me to include it! Kev
