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Note: text in square brackets is added for clarity and was not part of the location's name.

Description

This is the junction between the Glasgow to Fort William line and the Mallaig Extension (West Highland Railway) (originally the Banavie Branch of the West Highland Railway).

A signal box remains open here, one which has seen its name change twice. The box is in the 'V' of the original junction (Mallaig line to north and Glasgow Queen Street High Level line to south). However it is surrounded by lines as the approach to Fort William Junction Yard starts from the Glasgow line and runs parallel to, and then joins, the Mallaig line.

Just to the west the line, on its approach to Fort William, the line is crossed by a bridge of the former Lochaber Narrow Gauge Railway. This bridge was built for double track, but carried one - the southern track which would have been the westbound line, but was bidirectional. Land was taken for two tracks throughout between the pier and aluminium works. Just to the south was a second bridge, crossing the main road. It was removed in 1978 with closure of the narrow gauge line.

Directly to the west are the currently unused Fort William Oil Sidings.

Note by John McGregor:
The first sidings in the Junction 'V' were early additions, together with urgent alterations at the old fort yard and the south side (loading bank) loop there. Besides putting in more sidings for WW2 traffic, the LNER had two (three?) of then looped up. In the 1950s, summer coaching stock/local holiday excursion stock was stabled there, taken to and fro by the duty pilot, which used the looped lines to run round. Engines stabling/picking up ballast trains may have done so too, sometimes. I'm not 100% sure when the Junction loop was first installed. I donâ??t have a copy of Major Marindin's inspection of the Banavie branch in 1895.

Major Pringle's 1901 inspection of the Mallaig line doesnâ??t mention it (I think) so I assume it was there already.

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