Wimborne, Dorset (OO)

| Home | Society’s Layouts | Wimborne, Dorset, (OO) |

Jump to: | The Model | History | Photo Tour |

The Model

Work is now progressing on this layout. All the trackwork and points have been laid, along with the Tortoise points motors. We have spent many months wiring the layout, and only just finished it in time for our exhibition in April 2007. And then we found that it didn’t work properly, so we had to ‘bodge’ it for the show.

The is a sentiment amoung the group that the wiring needs to be simplifed, and a smaller control panel made. We have also been discussing the possibility of replacing the fiddle yard with a cassette type system, as the points leading to the three inside tracks on the fiddle yard are way, way, too sharp. One item that we need to resolve is how we are going to operate the layout. If set up in our club rooms, then our members may want to run it as a tail-chaser. But at an exhibition, this would get quickly bore the public and operators alike, so some of us are advocating operating it like the real thing – we already have some period Woking Time Tables, and most of the stock is available Ready-To-Run, or as kits.

We will shortly be looking for ‘volunteers’ to do the ballasting, and construct the various buildings. Early volunteers will get the most choice! We are recycling the main station buildings from an earlier iteration, but it does have some degree of compression in it. The station buildings on the Up side should have a ‘dog-leg’ in them, since the whole station is on a 30 chain (1,980 ft) curve. We have had to do some impromptu fettling, because, as laid the model station was on a dead-straight piece of track, not the 22' 9" radius curve it should be to be to scale.

The History

Once the London & South Western Railway had opened from London to Southampton, many people started to think of westward expansion. One such person was Charles Castleman, a solicitor from Wimborne. Castleman became heavily involved in the promotion of the Southampton & Dorchester Railway as an extension of the LSWR.

The route chosen was dictated partly by the New Forest Authorities, and partly because between the New Forest and the County town of Dorset, there were only six market towns of any note. (i) Ringwood; (ii) Christchurch; (iii) Wimborne; (iv) Poole; (v) Blandford Forum; (vi) Wareham. Bournemouth at this time was a small fishing village with a population of 300. It was impossible to serve all of these communities, and with (iii) a given, the line ran Southampton – Brockenhurst – Ringwood – Wimborne – Wareham – Dorchester. The line opened on 1 June 1847. Christchurch was served by an omnibus from Ringwood, until the Avon Valley branch line opened in 1862. The branch was extended to Bournemouth East in 1870, with a second branch running from Broadstone to Poole opening in 1872.

The southern half of the Somerset and Dorset Railway was constructed as the Dorset Central Railway, and originally ran from Templecombe to Wimborne. It was then extended in 1874 from Corfe Mullen to Bournemouth West. The Bournemouth Direct Railway (Brockenhurst to Branksome via Sway) opened in 1888, but it was only when the ‘missing link’ of the Poole – Hamworthy Junction chord opened in 1893 was the ‘Old Main’ reduced to the status of a branch line.

The Somerset & Dorset continued to run a branch line service to Wimborne until 1930.

The branch closed to passengers in 1964, but the western end of the branch stayed open for goods, principally the Ministry of Defence fuel depot at West Moors. But when that traffic ceased in 1974, the line closed and the Local Authority demolished Bridge 75 over Leigh Road as quickly possible. When the LSWR built it over a narrow farm road, how were they to know it would become the A31?

Photo Tour

[Left] Overall shot of layout under construction. Station area is nearest the camera with Neal Turner (green shirt) and Dave Round working on the fiddle yard. (14 June 2005).

[Centre] Close up of the east end station throat looking west. The polystyrene blocks are protectors for the Tortiose actuating wires protruding theroufh the baseboad. Lines are (L-R) Down Yard headshunt, Down Main, Up Main, Up Yard sand drag. The A31 bridge will be bottom left just out of shot. (14 June 2005).

[Right] Another close up of the east end station throat looking west. The ‘recycled’ station and unique signal box can been seen, along with with a new model of the cattle pens, and a mock up of the goods shed to check by how much to compress the model. Martin Catford drives one of his Hornby Merchant Navy pacifics at the Blandford Charter 400 exhibition. (16 October 2005).