Stockton Haulage Depot [Stranraer]

Location type

Sidings

Names and dates

Stranraer Carriage Sidings (1942-1966)
Stockton Haulage Depot [Stranraer] (1979-1994)

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

Where: Dumfries and Galloway, Scotland
Opened on the Portpatrick Railway.

Description

This site had been carriage sidings, then a freight depot. It is no longer in railway use.


Carriage Sidings


During the Second World War additional carriage sidings were needed at Stranraer, replacing those at Stranraer Town. These were east of the station and on the south side of Stranraer Harbour Junction. Unfortunately there was a road here, which had to be lifted up onto a girder bridge immediately to the south of the existing stone bridge over the main line.

The sidings closed with the closure of Stranraer Town in 1966.


Stockton Haulage


The site was redeveloped in 1979 as a depot for Stockton Haulage Ltd., handling steel sections being exported from Teesside Steel Works, Scunthorpe Steel Works and Etruria Steel Works to Ireland by ferry. A covered area and overhead crane covering both sidings and a roadway alongside was installed. In addition to the steel traffic any number of different goods were handled here.

The depot fell out of use in the early 1990s, the track being lifted around 2015. Stockton Haulage Ltd no longer exists. Conveyance of goods to Stranraer southwards from Girvan is awkward with the line having tight curves and steep gradients.

Today, with the relocation of ferries to Cairnryan, the depot site is less suitable.

Tags

Stockton Haulage Carriage Sidings Wartime


Books


Portpatrick and Wigtownshire Railways (Library of Railway History)
Rails to Portpatrick (Local History Series)
The Port Road: Dumfries to Stranraer, Portpatrick, Kirkcudbright and Whithorn