Doncaster Avoiding Line
Encyclopedia
Doncaster
Doncaster is a town in South Yorkshire, England, and the principal settlement of the Metropolitan Borough of Doncaster. The town is about from Sheffield and is popularly referred to as "Donny"...
and routes goods traffic, principally coal and steel, away from the main line station where it would have to cross from the Sheffield line to the Hull or Cleethorpes lines and cause a bottleneck.
The line was passed in an Act of Parliament in 1903 but work did not commence until 5 years later. Built mostly on embankment
Embankment (transportation)
To keep a road or railway line straight or flat, and where the comparative cost or practicality of alternate solutions is prohibitive, the land over which the road or rail line will travel is built up to form an embankment. An embankment is therefore in some sense the opposite of a cutting, and...
it opened in 1910. It was brought into use following the opening of Wath marshalling yard
Wath marshalling yard
Wath marshalling yard, also known as Wath concentration yard, was a large railway marshalling yard specifically designed for the concentration of coal traffic. It was set at the heart of the South Yorkshire Coalfield, at Wath-upon-Dearne, approximately halfway between Barnsley and Doncaster, in...
in 1907, and in preparation for the opening of Immingham Dock
Immingham Dock
Immingham Dock is a port facility, with linking railways, opened upstream from Grimsby by the Great Central Railway in 1912. It was first conceived in 1874, during the company's Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway days, after test borings north-west of Grimsby had been made by marine...
in 1912.
The Doncaster Avoiding line runs from Bentley Junction on the Doncaster to Hull/Cleethorpes line to Hexthorpe Junction on the Doncaster to Sheffield line. It is double track throughout with Bentley Junction being a 'flyover' junction and Hexthorpe Junction a 'flat' junction. The only junction in between was Sprotborough Junction, opened in 1916, where connections were made with the Hull and Barnsley and Great Central Joint Railway
Hull and Barnsley and Great Central Joint Railway
The Hull and Barnsley and Great Central Joint Railway was a joint line which ran from Aire Junction, on the main line of the Hull and Barnsley Railway, near Gowdall and an end on junction with the Great Central and Midland Joint Railway at Braithwell Junction.-Description:The railway consisted of...
. These were two sets of 'double cross-overs' with the signal box between.
The line was worked under permissive block regulations
Permissive block regulations
Permissive Working on the UK railway allows more than one train at a time to be on the same line in a :*block section*signal section*dead-end platform line...
, but these were suspended when passenger trains were to work over the line and absolute block substituted. There was a rising gradient towards Hexthorpe Junction which if trains were heavy and had been stood in the queue from Sprotborough Junction a banking locomotive was provided. This came from Mexborough depot and was usually a J11, N5 or L3 but sometimes a G.C."Fish" engine which was on shed at the time. This locomotive also was used on the "Top Yard" to York Road
Doncaster (York Road) railway station
Doncaster railway station was built as a terminus for services on the Hull and Barnsley and Great Central Joint Railway in Doncaster, South Yorkshire, England. It was reached by a triangular junction from the main line just outside of town...
goods and when it was away from its post Doncaster's passenger pilot locomotive would deputise if required
The line is still open and fulfils its original purpose, even more important today with faster trains on the East Coast Main Line
East Coast Main Line
The East Coast Main Line is a long electrified high-speed railway link between London, Peterborough, Doncaster, Wakefield, Leeds, York, Darlington, Newcastle and Edinburgh...
in both freight and passenger.