Bristol Bath Road Depot

[hornbachhh]

Hi, I am looking for information to assist me with my model of Bristol Bath Road Depot. I have almost everything I need except for the office's floor plan ( 3 storey) . I have contacted several sources including Locomaster Profiles who created the facinating video of Bath Road just prior to closing and had no luck. What I really need is to find someone who actually worked there just prior to closure who would be kind enough to draw me a sketch of the 3 floors indicating doorways and who's office etc. I am making a full size model of Bath road which can be followed on youtube if you are interested my user name is hornbachhh and you can follow the build. I would like to include in the model the interiors of the buildings as close as possible and I am planning on being able to remove each floor one at a time to enable me to add interior details. I would be very grateful if there is anybody out there willing to help an ex pat with such information even if its not 100 % but enough to give me an idea. Many thanks Andy

[the green mile]

No worries mate! I can certainly knock up some sketches showing the general layout of each floor as I remember it from about 1980 . Not to scale of course but as near as the old grey matter will allow. I'm no expert at IT but I did pass my O level in technical drawing 4 decades ago so it will have to be on paper by post. If you are able to send me a forwarding address by e-mail to hengistpod@live.co.uk I will see what I can do.

I might have to pick Robin's brain a bit before finalising.

Roy

[Robin Summerhill]

I might have to pick Robin's brain a bit before finalising. Roy

Andy was in touch with me by email yesterday and I suggested that he join up and ask the question!

If we put our brains together we can probably come up with something for him, together with the other ex-82A men around here. Perhaps we need to arrange a "special" meeting at the Barley Mow, armed with pen and paper?

If we do manage to get something together, I can always finish it off as a scanned paper copy to. jpg that can be emailed, or in Vista.

Email me off list and we'll get something sorted out. My email address in on my profile page.

[the green mile]

Robin

I think I could force myself to visit the Barley Mow again. Bit busy for the next week or so but I will knock up some rough sketches and notes then be in touch.

Roy

[the green mile]

Open questions although I'm sure Robin will know most of the the answers:-

When did the traincrews move from the ground floor accomodation at Bath Road to Temple Gate House? Am I correct in assuming it was when the depot closed or was it earlier?

Memory lapse on my part - did the breakdown vans stay until closure. I'm sure the 76 tonne crane departed earlier. I recall all breakdown callouts were coordinated by EWS Control at Doncaster from about the mid 90's rather than the Regional Control. We had to sign a contract before they would come out.

Once the Enparts service was ended materials came in by road. Swifts Transport had the national contract using their fleet of red lorries. Large components were delivered via the new roadway from the car park opposite the depot dropping down under Bath Road to the back of the depot. Does anyone recall lorries being rotated on the turntable to access the lifting hoist?

[Robin Summerhill]

Open questions although I'm sure Robin will know most of the the answers:-

Robin knows none of the answers because it was all long after his time

In my day:-

Train crews were still happily booking on in the gound floor of Bath Road office block.

Reg Paton was still merrily getting the crane out every time there was a mishap

The Enparts was still running and Howard Hiscocks was taking himself off to Derby or Crewe or Doncaster every day getting urgently-needed bits

[the green mile]

I was under the impression you were there considerably later than me. I left in 1982. As Andy is modelling the depot in it's final years I was trying to work out if the ground floor was substantially the same right up to the end. I can't think of a reason why traincrews would have moved prior to closure but who knows? In the mid to late 90's traincrew control transferred from Temple Gate to Swindon where Great Western set up its own dedicated control above the island platform on the station.

Good old Reg - what a true gentleman he was. I think he came off breakdowns towards the end and it became a task assigned predominantly to the service shed supervisors. However Reg was still in charge of maintaining the crane and vans as plant supervisor.

[Robin Summerhill]

I was under the impression you were there considerably later than me. I left in 1982.

I was there when you left to go to Doncaster in 1971 or so, but I think I had left by the time you got back.

Good old Reg - what a true gentleman he was. I think he came off breakdowns towards the end and it became a task assigned predominantly to the service shed supervisors. However Reg was still in charge of maintaining the crane and vans as plant supervisor.

One of his traits took a bit of getting used to - he wore a hearing aid and, when he was on the phone, pointed the earpiece at his top shirt pocket rather than his ear

Another tale about Reg that I recall is when we had David Sheppard's 75029 in the yard (can't remember why - must have been 1974/75) and it came off the road. Reg almost had to be physically prevented from splitting engine and tender in the re-railing process it. I think in his mind he had gone back 15 or 20 years

[the green mile]

I remember the hearing aid very well.

3 tales about Reg I can recall:-

Apparently he was passing through the station one day when he came across a young copper being given a hard time by some thug. Reg intervened and grabbed hold of the guy while the copper arrested him. That was typical of Reg. Something in the back of my mind tells me he may have been a Special Constable at some point.

In the early days of the breakdown gang, they used a Land Rover to get to site. Reg was pulled in by the police one day for driving with the orange light on the roof flashing. I can imagine him trying to convince the police that he was the '4th emergency service'.

About 1980/81 the 2 class 37 bankers on the Lickey ended up in the sand drag while crossing over to come back down. The obvious way to recover them was to winch them back on using a set of pulley blocks known as the Kelbus gear. When laid out correctly, it gave a 6 to 1 pull which was normally sufficient. Unfortunately Reg had the guys lay it out back to front which gave a negative mechanical advantage. Next day he was handing out instruction sheets which he had knocked up showing how to lay it out properly. Although Blackwell was probably closer to Saltley or Bescot, as far as breakdowns were concerned this was part of the Western Region and just within the boundary of Bath Road's area of responsibilty.

What a character. I couldn't possibly think of a bad thing to say about Reg.

[oldchapie]

WE MOVED THE TRAIN MANAGERS OFFICE ON MY LAST DAY ON THE RAILWAY ON SAT 26 MARCH I DAVINPORT WAS THE DRIVER MANAGER. BATH ROAD WAS ALMOST EMPTY AS FAR AS LOCO AND GUARDS WERE CONCERNED I MUST ADD IT WAS A SAD DAY FOR ME AFTER 47 YEARS.SERVING AT BATH RD, ST PHILLIPS MARSH, YATTON AND BARROW RD.1949 TO 1996

[the green mile]

I can imagine how you felt that day. Ivan D took me under his wing in 2006 when I wanted out of the Control. Even though he wasn't a crew manager by then, it was obvious he was held in high esteem by many of the old boys. Ever the fitness freak with regular marathons and cycling from Lands End to John O'Groats, he was the one who motivated me to do the 3-peaks challenge at the age of 54. He retired at 55 but I understand he is back at work with London Midland. That's the company we keep hearing about cancelling trains due to ongoing driver shortages. Last time I spoke to him was about a month ago. Him and his pals are cycling over the Alps next summer and he was looking for someone to drive the support van. I declined that offer using the excuse that it was dangerous driving on the wrong side of the road.

[jules]

Perhaps we need to arrange a "special" meeting at the Barley Mow, armed with pen and paper?

No room at the inn for a 31B man then

Once the Enparts service was ended materials came in by road.

I've often wondered this - the "parts" bit is obvious, but why was it called "ENparts"? My best guess so far is "Engineering Parts" ...

[Robin Summerhill]

Perhaps we need to arrange a "special" meeting at the Barley Mow, armed with pen and paper?

No room at the inn for a 31B man then

No problem with 31B men coming along, even though they might know more about the layout at Whitemoor and Pyewipe than they do about 82A

But all that said, we don't actually have to organise a full Bristol Railway Archive meeting and wait for Ralph to come down to meet up and have a beer at the Barley Mow - how are you fixed for next Monday week? We can argue all night about trespassing

Once the Enparts service was ended materials came in by road.

I've often wondered this - the "parts" bit is obvious, but why was it called "ENparts"? My best guess so far is "Engineering Parts" ...

Engine Parts (as far as I know) Part of the railway telegraph shorthand.

[the green mile]

Can't make it until Monday 26th - social life too full since retiring.
I just hope the security services don't start taking an interest in a gang of old codgers poring over drawings and diagrams in a sleepy backwater pub. Or could it turn into a new version of Last of the Summer Wine. I've always thought of myself as a sort of 'Foggie' character.

[Robin Summerhill]

So, bearing in mind jules and me, who would be Compo and who would be Clegg?

Be very careful with your answer .....