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File: 2012003-0055
Dean Forest Railway, Norchard Station, near Lydney, Gloucestershire, England, United Kingdom, on Wednesday 11th October 2012.
If you want to know about the heritage railway and its history, feel free to skip to Chapter Two: About the subject of Dean Forest Railway.
Chapter One: What is this photo about, and why I took the photo.
I am a photographer, but I am also a graphic designer. At that time I took the photograph, I was a very busy full-time single parent and full-time carer for my kids, so my career was put on hold. However whenever I have time to spare, I try to keep up my photography and graphic design skills by doing some projects when I can.
This was one of the graphic design projects I was doing. The project was to design a (non-existence) fictional CD album art, and I would prefer to take my own photographs, then import them into my graphic design work. The subject of the album art was about a fictional female singer-songwriter, whom had lived in an old industrial town, and wanted to leave so she could pursue her dreams of stardom.
For the album art design, I needed photos of old buildings, coal mines, and anything I can think of that would give the feel of a ran-down industrial places. Try to give the impression that the factories closed down, and that the coal mines have ran out of coal, all in black and white. The title of the album is called The Old Dying Town.
I was aware of some disused warehouses in Gloucester, and an old coal mine in Wales, those would made good background for the album art. I somehow noticed this heritage railway station not far from Lydney, in Gloucestershire, and stopped there, to see if there’s anything I can take photos of, for the design.
While looking around, and taking photos of the steam and diesel passenger trains, I noticed at the north end of the station, there was some kind of an out-of-the-way storage space for old rolling stock, like old carriages and boxcars. I think they kept the broken or damaged old railway vehicles there, maybe awaiting restoration, or to be broken up and used as spare parts.
So I took some shots, moved around for different viewpoints, try to get anything worthy of a background. I figured it would give the illustration of a railway scrapyard, and gives a gloomy feel that the fictional town lost its railway links. Hoping the photo would give the illustration of the town becoming a ghost town.
The photo was shot in 2012, and when I visited there in 2021, they were doing some improvements to this area, including building a platform.
Point of note: Those photographs were done with the camera set to Black and White, I did not take the photos in colour, and they were not converted into B&W by means of photo-editing software.
Chapter Two: About the subject of Dean Forest Railway.
The Dean Forest Railway is a 4 to 5 miles long heritage railway, still running vintage steam, and classic diesel trains, as a tourist attraction in the Forest of Dean, in Gloucestershire.
It started in 1799 as an idea for a horse-drawn tramway, linking the Forest of Dean to the rivers Severn and Wye, for the transportation of coal and iron materials.
Between 1800 to around the 1870s, it went through so many processes. Like building lines and branching out, changing company names, financial problems, rival companies, converting from horse-drawn tramway into steam powered railway, merging companies, change of railway gauge sizes, and so many other factors.
It became known as the Severn and Wye Railway during those years.
From around the 1870s onwards, in order to cope with financial difficulties, and to help with funding, they started fee-paying passenger services in addition to the goods carrying services. But ongoing financial problems, lack of traffic, and many other factors, continued up until around the 1940s.
After the Second World War (1939-1945), the railways in this area started to go downhill, mainly due ot declining coal industry in the area, lack of passengers, improvements in transportation elsewhere, and the nationalised of British railways.
Many stations and lines started closing down, or completely shut down, during the 1950s and 1960s.
Starting from the early 1970s onwards, a railway preservation society was formed to try to buy and save as much of the old railway, and run it as a heritage railway for tourism, and was then named as Dean Forest Railway.
At the current moment, the Dean Forest Railway is approximately between 4 to 5 miles long between Lydney and Parkend, with Norchard station as its home base, but they are hoping to extend the line to 7 miles in near future.
They run a range of mostly steam trains to 1960s diesel trains, with various carriages, and at least 5 stations.
For more in-depth details, simply Google “Dean Forest Railway” for a full history or for visiting.
NOTICE:
You are free and welcome to comment on my photo, about the photograph itself, or the subject in the photograph, or share your relevant experience.
Do NOT use the comment boxes as advertising spaces or billboards for the groups, those will be deleted.
File: 2012003-0059
Dean Forest Railway, Norchard Station, near Lydney, Gloucestershire, England, United Kingdom, on Wednesday 11th October 2012.
If you want to know about the heritage railway and its history, feel free to skip to Chapter Two: About the subject of Dean Forest Railway.
Chapter One: What is this photo about, and why I took the photo.
I am a photographer, but I am also a graphic designer. At that time I took the photograph, I was a very busy full-time single parent and full-time carer for my kids, so my career was put on hold. However whenever I have time to spare, I try to keep up my photography and graphic design skills by doing some projects when I can.
This was one of the graphic design projects I was doing. The project was to design a (non-existence) fictional CD album art, and I would prefer to take my own photographs, then import them into my graphic design work. The subject of the album art was about a fictional female singer-songwriter, whom had lived in an old industrial town, and wanted to leave so she could pursue her dreams of stardom.
For the album art design, I needed photos of old buildings, coal mines, and anything I can think of that would give the feel of a ran-down industrial places. Try to give the impression that the factories closed down, and that the coal mines have ran out of coal, all in black and white. The title of the album is called The Old Dying Town.
I was aware of some disused warehouses in Gloucester, and an old coal mine in Wales, those would made good background for the album art. I somehow noticed this heritage railway station not far from Lydney, in Gloucestershire, and stopped there, to see if there’s anything I can take photos of, for the design.
While looking around, and taking photos of the steam and diesel passenger trains, I noticed at the north end of the station, there was some kind of an out-of-the-way storage space for old rolling stock, like old carriages and boxcars. I think they kept the broken or damaged old railway vehicles there, maybe awaiting restoration, or to be broken up and used as spare parts.
So I took some shots, moved around for different viewpoints, try to get anything worthy of a background. I figured it would give the illustration of a railway scrapyard, and gives a gloomy feel that the fictional town lost its railway links. Hoping the photo would give the illustration of the town becoming a ghost town.
The photo was shot in 2012, and when I visited there in 2021, they were doing some improvements to this area, including building a platform.
Point of note: Those photographs were done with the camera set to Black and White, I did not take the photos in colour, and they were not converted into B&W by means of photo-editing software.
Chapter Two: About the subject of Dean Forest Railway.
The Dean Forest Railway is a 4 to 5 miles long heritage railway, still running vintage steam, and classic diesel trains, as a tourist attraction in the Forest of Dean, in Gloucestershire.
It started in 1799 as an idea for a horse-drawn tramway, linking the Forest of Dean to the rivers Severn and Wye, for the transportation of coal and iron materials.
Between 1800 to around the 1870s, it went through so many processes. Like building lines and branching out, changing company names, financial problems, rival companies, converting from horse-drawn tramway into steam powered railway, merging companies, change of railway gauge sizes, and so many other factors.
It became known as the Severn and Wye Railway during those years.
From around the 1870s onwards, in order to cope with financial difficulties, and to help with funding, they started fee-paying passenger services in addition to the goods carrying services. But ongoing financial problems, lack of traffic, and many other factors, continued up until around the 1940s.
After the Second World War (1939-1945), the railways in this area started to go downhill, mainly due ot declining coal industry in the area, lack of passengers, improvements in transportation elsewhere, and the nationalised of British railways.
Many stations and lines started closing down, or completely shut down, during the 1950s and 1960s.
Starting from the early 1970s onwards, a railway preservation society was formed to try to buy and save as much of the old railway, and run it as a heritage railway for tourism, and was then named as Dean Forest Railway.
At the current moment, the Dean Forest Railway is approximately between 4 to 5 miles long between Lydney and Parkend, with Norchard station as its home base, but they are hoping to extend the line to 7 miles in near future.
They run a range of mostly steam trains to 1960s diesel trains, with various carriages, and at least 5 stations.
For more in-depth details, simply Google “Dean Forest Railway” for a full history or for visiting.
NOTICE:
You are free and welcome to comment on my photo, about the photograph itself, or the subject in the photograph, or share your relevant experience.
Do NOT use the comment boxes as advertising spaces or billboards for the groups, those will be deleted.
Please enjoy the pictures from this set, but please resist the temptation to post a comment identifying the location - Thank you.
Lhoist rolls across the last trestle on the old TC before Rockwood. The scrapyard here has filled up quite a bit these last few years.
When I visited Wombwell Diesels on 25 May 1979 there was an obvious progression of destruction among the vehicles present culminating in totally broken barely recognisable buses in the middle of the site. Before that were buses just starting the breaking process and before that, near the entrance, were the most recent arrivals. Representing the latter category is RT 3254 - one of several that had been among the last to run in service at Barking Garage. The bonnet plate is missing - predictably - but that provides a point of interest in that the green paint is relevant to this being one of thirty four RT`s bought by LT from London Country in 1972 to offset a vehicle shortage.
66044 with a single wagon in tow takes the crossover at Kingsbury Branch Junction running as 6Z32 Bescot to Kingsbury E.M.R. the shortest scrap run yet. Plenty of detritus litters the foreground with a trio of E.W.S. HTA's and 08730 tucked away in the corner as usual.
Harry' Andrew Barclay 1823/24 at Crossley's scrapyard in Shipley.17th June 1983 H scowcroft collection
SMS 797 looked to be a recent arrival at Wombwell Diesels on 25 May 1979. Inevitably it would probably at some point end up looking like SMS 655 next to it.
We passed this field of cars on our way back from somewhere, so had to stop to see what it was exactly. An enormous load of old Audi's, and just a few Skodas in a corner.
Seen at Cotswold/Kemble (EGBP) Air Atlanta Icelandic Boeing 747-412(BDSF) TF AMI in painted over Magma Aviation titles. Formerly Singapore Airlines 9V SMO delivered as a pax 747 in Oct 1992. Converted to cargo configuration after being acquired by Air Atlanta in Oct 2006. This 747 suffered a heavy landing at Liege Belgium in 2023, its final flight into Cotswold was made with gear down at a maximum height 0f 7,000ft (2133m) on 10/10/23.
At left is a 59 year old Boeing 727-100 2 MMTT with alongside the cockpit section of BAe 146-200 G SMLA, the ex Air France Airbus A320 I was unable to Identify.
Befeza Zinc's plant switcher makes a quick trip over to the NS interchange. I've passed over these tracks many times in the last 8 years of shooting Lhoist, but this was the first time I've ever actually seen the train that runs on them. A cool surprise.
One of several views that I took across the vast breaking area at Wombwell Diesels on 25 May 1979. In the foreground are what look like window pans from the nineteen London Country Routemasters that arrived here the previous year.
A couple of Class 303 units (303041/057) in the sidings at Berry's scrapyard in Leicester on 30 December 1989. These two ex-Scottish units had latterly been working in the Manchester area. The SR unit behind the 303s is 5017 (4-EPB of Class 415/1).
DMS 1249 at Wombwell Diesels on 25 May 1979. There are two things I particularly remember from that visit. One being the shock of seeing such young buses being broken apart - this one was just seven years old and was among the first few to reach the scrapyard though this would quickly increase into a steady flow. And the other thing was being told by one of the workers how easy it was to destroy a DMS and that within a few hours there would be nothing recognisable left and that the metal reclaim and yield was poor in comparison to other types. Wonder what Health and Safety people would say about working practices.....
Following the first mass withdrawals of RM`s in September 1982, North`s of Sherburn- in- Elmet east of Leeds took the first batch of RM`s for scrapping following initial parts reclaim. This was the sight that I found on 4 November 1982. It was so very different to RM`s being dumped at Aldenham for scrapping - that seemed fairly normal. But here in Yorkshire so far from London the reality of the policy to scrap RM`s as fully intact buses really hit home. Almost all of them were driven here and were so complete that only a set of blinds were needed to make most ready for service.
66761 slowly eases 5Z85 back into the Sims Metals Group scrapyrad at Beeston conveying a mixture of ex Great Western, East Midlands and LNER Mk3's fo a date with the cutters torch. Steering well clear is 43318 rushing south with 1B63 Nottingham to St Pancras; completing the scene is a point carrier abandoned against the blocks in Beeston Down Sidings. Chatting to the locals this appears to be the first train into the yard since the construction of the Stuart Adams footbridge over the railway here which links the Boots Beeston site with University Boulevard. The bridge provides excellent views in either direction but a pair of steps is certainly advisable.