IMAGES TAKEN NEAR TO
Claremont Court, STOCKTON-ON-TEES, TS17 6AP

View westward, towards Bowesfield Junction and the division of main lines northward to Stockton and across Co. Durham to Ferryhill, Sunderland and Newcastle by three routes, also westward to Eaglescliffe thence Darlington or Northallerton and the South: eastward from here was Newport Yard, Middlesbroug with all its great industry, then Saltburn and the Cleveland lines to Whitby etc. Therefore passing through Thornaby was a constant procession of heavy freight traffic. Here a Class J freight is headed by one of the ex-NER W. Worsdell class P2 (LNER J26) 0-6-0s concentrated in the area, No. 65774 (built as No. 525 in 10/1905, renumbered in 1946 as 5774, withdrawn 7/61).

Teesside Development Corporation's vision for the redevelopment of Stockton and its surroundings involved a mix of office buildings a residential areas around the River Tees, whose water quality was much improved by fixing its level at 2.65m above Ordnance Datum by means of the Image], thus avoiding twice-daily exposure of large areas of stinking mudbanks. It is hardly Venice, but some of the developments are quite striking and in this area the buildings styles seem to go together quite well. Some of the other nearby developments look more like something built by a six-year-old in a video game...

Northern diesel unit 142 084 leaves Thornaby as the 1808 departure to Middlesbrough; the destination blind is showing "MetroCentre", apparently for the next service to be operated by this unit. I travelled on it from Newcastle (via Sunderland and the coast), though I believe it may have worked through from Carlisle, a truly epic journey for a unit designed for short distance work.

Northern Class 142, No. 142021. Service for Saltburn.

First TransPennine Express train due to depart for Middlesbrough.

Thornaby Station is in effect an island platform with the station buildings and the car park in the middle. Easy access from Station Street is available via the footbridge in the foreground. Thornaby can be considered the main station for Stockton-On-Tees; although Stockton has its own station this is not much further from the town centre and there is a better service.

Towards Middlesbrough.

View eastward from Thornaby station, towards Newport Yard, Middlesbrough, Saltburn etc. Locomotive crew are believed to have been paid bonuses in this District, based on distance moved as well as the normal hours of work, so they drove their engines flat-out and Thornaby was a marvellous spot to see pyrotechnics. Nevertheless these ex-NER Raven 0-8-0s thrived: here No. 63347 (pre-1946 No. 1254, built 3/13, withdrawn 10/65) is thrashing westward on a Class H train consisting mainly of flat-wagons conveying steel slabs from the great Tees-side Dorman-Long etc. Works. (See also Image]).

Opened in 1858 as "South Stockton" by the Stockton & Darlington Railway on the lines from Darlington and Northallerton to Middlesbrough, this station had a major rebuild in 1882 by the North Eastern Railway which included the large island platform seen here. It was renamed "Thornaby" in 1892. View east towards Middlesbrough. Some of the brickwork from the 1882 station can be seen, but all the platform buildings were demolished in the early 1980s. The site was big enough to put a car park in between the platforms.