Posts

A Rural Northumbrian Railway Station

 Hawkhill Station  Hawkhill is a fictional stop on the Alnwick branch, which itself has managed to hold on through the Beeching Cuts. It's the for a few more years after Beeching, set roughly 1966-71 and pegged nominally at 1970. The railway in a sense of a temporary reprieve between the turmoil of the Beeching act, and the forthcoming collapse of British industry and mining. Rolling Stock Alongside the Beyer-Peacock built Clayton Type 1 (D8589-D8597) and Met-Cam DMUs that worked on the Alnwick branch, in the post-steam era it is hypothesised that Sulzer Class 2's (D5101-D5111) from Gateshead are drafted in for passenger and freight work where neccesary. Local passenger services are typically Met-Cam DMUs, but services from further afield are hauled by the Sulzer diesels. Typically freight is managed by the Claytons, but in the (all too frequent) event of failure the Sulzers are again drafted in.
Post a Comment
Read more

Introducing "Hawkhill"

What am I setting out to achieve? The mission statement of this project is as follows: To have an operable and exhibitable 4x1' finescale layout by November 2024, at least basically scenicked,  and operable hands-off with at least two distinct trains. Let us step into the local alehouse: From our viewpoint at the window of The Farrier's Arms, though a hazy rain shrouds the distant town in a grey mist, across the Alnwick road, the gas lamps of Hawkhill station flicker orange in the late afternoon gloom. Above the crackle of the public bar's coal fire, you can hear the clank and rattle of wagons being pinched around the goods yard and before long, the rumble of a train. Braving the rain and rising wind, with hat pulled down and collar up, you peer over a blackened bridge parapet and catch a glimpse of the afternoon goods: a rather poorly diesel shuffling wagons on the coal drops.  Hawkhill is a fictional station on the Alnwick branch, scheduled for closure under the Beechi...
Post a Comment
Read more