Carlisle Transfer

Carlisle Transfer

The passenger and goods facilities around Carlisle were worlds apart in their levels of efficiency. The spacious, jointly owned Citadel Station concentrated all the passenger trains at the one location for easy interchange between the services of the seven English and Scottish companies that operated to Carlisle before the 1923 Grouping.
No attempt was made by the same seven companies to centralise the goods services , as a result the town was ringed with yards and goods depots. Transfer freights between all these facilities caused a great deal of congestion with up to 40 locomotives dedicated to local trip workings and yard shunting. The goods lines avoiding Citadel Station were essential to prevent delays to the passenger services. This fragmented state of affairs lasted until 1963 when a huge marshalling yard at Kingmoor, to the north of the city was opened. It greatly improved the speed of freight through Carlisle and saved a fortune in enginemen's wages, but it came too late. The decline of general freight and the movement to block trains and containerisation was so rapid that Kingmoor was progressively shut down during the 1970s and 1980s.

This 1 hour drive session looks at just one of those dozens of transfer goods trains that were such a common sight of the railway scene of Carlisle. This one travels from Durran Hill to Currock Junction Sidings and returns via Upperby Yard.

Carlisle Transfer
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