IMAGES TAKEN NEAR TO
Sunnyside Court, ALLOA, FK10 2AG

North British Railway 0-6-0 locomotive, 1914 vintage, for local freight working, still very much at home in the central and Fife coalfields.

A pair of exLNER Class J38, designed by Sir Nigel Gresley in 1926 for local freight work. Taken from the end of the platform of the old Alloa Station. Behind the locomotives is the line to Dollar, closed to passengers in 1964 but remaining open for coal traffic. This is now a pedestrian and cycle route. Compare with https://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/997081

One of the reasons that far fewer people are killed in train crashes than in accidents on the roads is that for at least four weeks before passengers are carried on a new line train drivers have to drive empty trains back and forth until they know the exact position of the dozen signals and half-dozen sets of points. This Class 158 two-car diesel unit us one such driver-training train, just setting off from the new Alloa station, visible through the bridge in the distance, for a non-stop run to Stirling. Re-opening the line to Alloa took about thirty years from when it was first mooted and a final obstacle was the sale of the land beyond the bridge, which had been occupied a lager brewery, to a supermarket company, necessitating the purchase back of a small strip for the station and its approach road. The filling station accompanying the supermarket, which grew out of a Leeds-based firm called Associated Dairies, is already open, with petrol selling at almost 60p a pint.

Forty years ago and earlier this photograph could have been taken from the booking office of Alloa railway station. In fact the camera was balanced on the parapet of Erskine Street bridge, which is now closed to vehicles but retained for pedestrians. Until October 1968 (and for a decade or so afterwards until their total demolition) the platforms of Alloa railway station passed under the bridge and passengers would have descended stairs from the booking office to the platform. The present railway station at Alloa, opened in May 2008, is just beyond the bridge in the distance on the newly re-laid line from Stirling to Kincardine. The green dip to the left, with a partly flooded footpath disappearing round it, was the course of the Devon Valley railway to Dollar and Kinross, which lost its passenger services in 1964. The bridge and embankment with steps coming down from it, mark the course of the Earl of Mar's waggonway, opened in 1766 and used until 1924, from coal pits in the Sauchie area down to Alloa Harbour. Today its route through the town is maintained as a footpath. Forty years ago as well, the site of the flat-roofed apartments behind the brown fence was occupied by a locomotive depot and where the Asda supermarket is now was a lager brewery.

Looking west.

ScotRail Turbostar 170470 rests at Alloa station before working the 1416 service to Glasgow Queen Street. All services are formed by class 385 EMUs, but for some reason, this 170 found itself working the Alloa trip.

Opened in 1850 by the Stirling & Dunfermline Railway, this station closed to passengers in 1968 and completely in 1974. View west towards Cambus and Stirling. The island platform was located through the second arch from the left with the main building reaching up to the road bridge. As well as the current line from Dunfermline via Clackmannan, another line joined from the right, also from Dunfermline but via Oakley. Just over 10 years after this image was taken, the railway line was electrified.

This is the reverse of the photograph already in this square, labelled "Alloa Station Junction" http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/997081. It is taken from the footpath bridge at the end of the new station platform and shows the newly re-laid tracks ready for the Stirling - Alloa passenger services due to start about three weeks later. The left-hand one serves the platform at the new station and the right-hand passes beyond to carry coal trains to Longannet power station. The previous Alloa station, closed in October 1968, was mainly on the far side of the four-span Erskine Street bridge, although the platforms did protrude out this side. The grassy patch to the right marks the course of the branch to Dollar and Kinross, closed to passengers in June 1964. A leisure centre was built on the site of the old station and goods yard but sufficient room was left for a single railway track to curve round its south side.

Opened in 2008 by Network Rail as the terminus of the branch from Stirling, replacing an earlier station some 300m behind the camera position which had closed to passengers in 1968. View east towards the brand new passenger terminus. For an updated view following electrification in 2018, see Image At the time this image was taken, the line continued eastwards for freight trains only, via Clackmannan and Longannet power station to Dunfermline.