Springburn is located to the north of Glasgows city centre. At one time the heart of locomotive building. The following link is to an ariel photo of Springburn station and surrounding area.

 

http://www.mitchelllibrary.org/virtualmitchell/image.php?i=17191&r=2&t=4&x=1

 
This other image is taken at ground level

 

http://gdl.cdlr.strath.ac.uk/springburn/spring125.htm

 

I hope these links work and sorry but not figured out the colour change yet. I will get there.

A small list of possible problems will follow shortly

Ewing

Plenty of scope there for all the track laying you are ever likely to want to do :exclam

This type of layout can be very effective and there's a lot of scope for building construction. Obviously a little "selective compression" would be needed to save baseboard space, but a lot could be achieved with a "cut and paste" backscene.

Nice one Ewing :exclam

BTW if you highlight your link with your mouse and then click on the arrow that says black (on the top line of the reply panel) a drop down list will appear. Choose blue  and the link will change colour. Job done. 

Cheers Jeff

I have thought about building this for many years ( too many ) and took a lot of photos around 92/93. No scanner so unable to show them.

The problem is height. Far left hand side overbridge is Springburn Road with Station Road on the other side of the retaining wall running in a semi circle.

From track base to the roofs of the tenements must be what? 80 feet. More?

My thinking is to build on two connecting boards ( station only )

The lower board for the trackbase and retaining wall with a second add on board for Station Road and its tenements.

 



The red lines are the Northern subarban lines in a bay platform with the usual run round ( the only points on the layout)

The blue lines are the passenger lines ( still deisel ) and the green lines were for freight ( now all gone )

The sidings for the Atlas works could be added later. Sighthill junction is a bridge I will not even think about crossing right now.

So yes a lot of potential. But I need to sort out the baseboard/height problem to give it a chance of success. I really want the tenements in half relief. I think that indivdually lit windows on buildings adds a great deal to a layout and would set the scene best. ( the topography of the whole Springburn area has changed dramatically since the sixties. Station road doesn't even exist now! )

Any input gratefully accepted.

Ewing

Cabby-driver,i have a 5 storey block of flats on my railway=170mm
yours would be about 190mm=8ins,ie half backscene ht
i like your ideas dont see any reason they will not work.
base+one level=70/80 mm+builbings and backscene total about 640mm
or 25ins very feasable.
:roll::cool:

Ewing

Your project seems very feasable the height isnt really a problem and you can make half relief buildings or less than half to save width space .

you really need to determine space available to build the project

Are they going to be baseboards that are permannantly fixed or do you need to have them collapsable for storing away when not working on them .

shape of baseboards aswell will determine what you can do

Many model railways are nowhere near scale models of places they are often representations of places because of restrictions on space and shape.

Im sure many members will help and advise you on many parts of this remember the early planning is important so you really need to get a good idea of how to proceed before sawing the wood

cheers Brian.W

Great basis for a layout Ewing.

 

Thanks for those links by the way.  I lived in Glasgow in the sixties and will have a bit of an explore of what else they have.:thumbs

The wife managed to somehow get our scanner to co-operate and here are a few pictures I took of Sprinburn around 92/93

 



 



 



 

This last one is a side on view of Sighthill junction signal box. Getting a front pic was impossible because of buildings and walls. The box is gone now with everything controlled from Cowlairs all the way to Cumbernauld.

Ewing

Ewing

From your photos that looks like a good area to model

You mention 1992 roughly is that a rough time period you would like to model it or is the layout going to cover a large time period?

Im sure another front image of the signal box must exist if notr it will be modellers licence.

cheers Brian.W

Ewing,
        It sounds like its going to be a cracking layout.building those tenaments will be a major job,but when they're done,and lights fitted,it will make a terrific backdrop to your railway.
         Looking forward to seeing it grow!(Don't forget to photo it as you build it!)

Cheers,John.B.

Great photos Ewing - very nostalgic seeing the "summer outing" one.  Like so many other places in the 60's - crowds of people off to the beach or some other place.  Railways were often their only method of mass transport and very few of them had cars.

It would make a great layout or even a diorama scene.

They are great Ewing, love the mix of OHLE, diesels, colour lights and semaphores in one location!

The particular time I want to model is around the early sixties. Since I was born in 64 its a time I have no personal knowledge of but there is a great deal of material ( photographs and articles ).

http://www.jhowie.force9.co.uk/303tributepage1.htm

 

http://www.eastbank.btinternet.co.uk/303.htm

The link above may help to explain how and why my fascination with railways began. There really was nothing like standing behind the glass and watching the driver, the signals and learning the bell codes etc. An experience no longer available.

My father worked in St Rollox works, later known as BREL Ltd (Springburn) but always known locally as The Caley. Therefore we always travelled by train. He never owned a car.

A journey from Glasgow city centre started at Glasgow Queen St ( low level ) to Springburn. There then took place what my mother refered to as the  "dirty dive" because when the class 303 doors opened it was like the traps at a greyhound race, just with a lot more runners, as a couple of hundred  bodies ran across the platform to secure seats on the waiting dmu, normally a class 101, for the fifteen minute journey to Cumbernauld. The fun really began when a six car emu arrived with only a 3 car set waiting. Or, and my mother was convinced they did it for sheer badness and not operational reasons, the emu pulled into the far bay platform and the diesel was waiting at the seldom used platform four. Kept everybody fit though.

But I digress. The Glasgow Blue Train services began in November 1960 and were withdrawn after only six weeks due to severe technical problems ( a series of transformer explosions I think ) . It was further 10 months before they resumed running.

So the early sixties gives me a great deal of leeway with what can be prototypical. Class 303, early dmus, and all sorts of early deisels. A4s were having their last days out of Buchanan Street station and would be seen moving between there and Cowlairs. Ex-Caley locos would still be hauling north bound goods from College Goods yard (near High St) In fact with both Cowlairs and the Caley so close I could run damn near anything and who could say it was wrong.

Ewing

The image below is a scanned partial of a map obtained from Alan Godfrey maps. It shows the southern approaches to Springburn and is full of detail. The map dates from 1933 but I doubt that the overall track layout would have changed much. I have also put in a link to their website and you may wish to add them to your suppliers list. The old ordnance survey maps can be a good resource for folks like me who enjoy researching the prototype. And in my opinion the prices are pretty reasonable.

 



 

http://www.alangodfreymaps.co.uk/

cheers

Ewing

 

 

Ewing

as you say the early sixties will give you a great deal of scope but remember its your railway so you can run a pendolino or a rocket on it if you want to.

Its nice to have a personal link to the layout you are building im sure once you start asking family and friends you will gather quite a lot of info.

Have you been able to decide what size and what type of baseboards you are going to build yet?

cheers Brian.W

Yes Brian the basic idea for the baseboards will be one for the station area and that will be around 7ft.  This will be a frame to make it as light as possible. Intend making a start on Sunday (my day off). The back scene of tenements and Station Road will be built seperately as an add on to save space while building it.

Since for the moment a permanent home for the layout wont be possible I am thinking in the long term and I am going for as close to the prototype as possible. One of the main advantages from my point of view of model railways is creating a working replica of the past. I wouldn't like to think of myself as a rivet counter…..but if its possible to be historically accurate then why not. Besides I have always enjoyed the research.

Will post my progress but it will be slow going as I work around 70/80 hours per week.

Ewing