Wigan Album
Whelley
7 CommentsPhoto: . Ozy .
Item #: 34994
I have a friend who lives in Dalbeattie Rise her house is the end one at the top then it’s all fields beyond.
This Box is very near Rose Bridge sidings.
Sorry Garry , but Ordnance Survey grid reference No… He say … Whelley loop line … Close to Whelley station … Can’t ignore that I’m afraid … More than mi job’s worth .
The box also operated the Kirkless branch line.
The Signal box was in the versinaty of Northumberland Street Whelley. The box did work the Springs Branch line from off the Kirkless connection too.
The Rose Bridge or Roundhouse Sidings was controlled by this box. After these links closed the box became redundant and later demolished.
The other two boxes that survived this line up to the end, was Whelley Junction box and De Trafford junction box.
Location is Roundhouse Sidings signal box, on the Whelley Loop Line.
The last surviving boxes operating on the route were..
Roundhouse Sidings
De Trafford Junction
Platt Bridge Junction
Platt Bridge was a modern flat roofed 1950s/60s BR LMR type 15 replacement signal box that interestingly controlled two separate routes, one was the Springs Branch-Bickershaw Junction route
The other was the Whelley Loop line that Ran from Amberswood-Bamfurlong & passed directly beneath & adjacent to the box .
After the signal box at Platt Bridge closed on the 15th March 1973 it was dismantled by BR with it's parts being placed back into a central S&T spares pool, along with the similar & recently closed BR LMR type 15 boxes at.
Tyldesley
Howe Bridge West Junction
Newton Le Willows
After closure the entire 50 lever frame, locking room base walls & front windows from Platt Bridge Junction box & a large part of the upper structure & rear walls & roof from Newton Le Willows box went on to be rebuilt and reused at Warrington Central.
A large part of Tyldesley's lever frame (30 levers worth) & most of the superstructure from Howe Bridge West Junction went on to be rebuilt at Heysham Harbour, but after closure there was acquired by the Dean Forest Railway to be rebuilt & reused at Lydney in Gloucestershire.
Lydney's interlocking all these years later is still stamped 'Tyldesley' .