Forth Banks, Goods Station (first)

HER Number:
4321

District:
Newcastle

Site Name:
Forth Banks, Goods Station (first)

Place:
Newcastle

Map Sheet:
NZ26SW

Class:
Transport

Site Type: Broad:
Railway Transport Site

Site Type: Specific:
Goods Station

General Period:
POST MEDIEVAL

Specific Period:
Victorian 1837 to 1901

Form of Evidence:
Extant Building

Description:
The single most important piece of railway architecture of the 1860s in the area was the North Eastern Railway's Forth Banks Goods Station, designed by Thomas Prosser in 1866. The new goods station opened for freight in 1871, replacing a small goods shed of the former Newcastle and Carlisle Railway (one of the companies which amalgamated in 1854 to form the North Eastern Railway). Prosser gave the massive goods shed a pair of long, curved iron framed roofs with arched heads reminiscent of Dobson's Central Station and similar to the roof Prosser, himself, designed for York Station in the following decade. All that now survives of the goods shed is the undercroft, the south face of which is a sandstone wall pierced by arch headed openings. In 1904 a new goods station office was built at the end of the site, facing onto Forth Banks. This building, an imposing structure faced with brick and terracotta, may have been designed by William Bell (architect for the North Eastern Railway from 1877 to 1923). The following year Prosser's goods shed was cut in two by the building of the approach viaduct to the King Edward Bridge. Shortly afterwards it was extended to the east by the addition of a smaller, three storeyed shed built alongside the new goods station offices. This shed, which is a ferro-concrete building in a plain but functional neo-classical style, was built by L.G. Mouchel's Hennebique Company to a design by Bell. LISTED GRADE 2 .Existing fragments of the building as part of the 1904 Goods Station and the undercroft were recorded between 2011-2014. The undercroft was later demolished. During the stripping of the former goods yard as part of the same recording works timber setts and tracks and cobbles were revealed.

Easting:
424430

Northing:
563490

Grid Reference:
NZ424430563490

Lats/Lons:

Sources:
<< HER 4321 >> 2nd edition Ordnance Survey map, 1899, 6 inch scale, Northumberland, 97, NE; I. Ayris, Forth Goods Yard and Station Report to TWUDC; RCHME, Report on UDC Areas: Tyneside; B. Fawcett, 1987, Newcastle Central Carriage Shed, The North Eastern Express, Vol 26, No 109, p75-78; L.G. Mouchal & Partners Ltd, 1921, Hennebique Ferro-Concrete; Addyman Archaeology, 2014, Newcastle Area Command HQ, Forth Banks Goods Station site, Newcastle upon Tyne - Archaeological Buildings Recording; Addyman Archaeology, 2009, Newcastle Area Command HQ, Forth Banks Goods Station site, Newcastle upon Tyne - Archaeological Assessment; North Eastern Railways Archive, 1866, Proposal drawings of the Forth Banks Goods Station and Warehouse; North Eastern Railways Archive, 1872, Detail drawings of Forth Banks Goods Station; North Eastern Railways Archive, 1891, Proposal drawings for extension to Forth Banks Goods Warehouse; Bill Fawcett and Jenni Morrison et al, 2016, The history and archaeology of the Forth Banks Goods Station, Newcastle upon Tyne, Archaeologia Aeliana, Fifth Series, Vol 45, pp 187-222