Colwick Yard in Nottingham - The Remains of a Giant Walk & Explore 

I was signalman in the 90s I used to man Netherfield and Rectory amongst all signal boxes on the East of Nottingham all the way to Newark and Grantham. Quite sad to see it gone 😢

As a boy (in the late 1950s) I used to play in the area of the viaduct and also the land that was then an area of sand/mineral extraction, which is now known as Netherfield lagoons. One of the small tunnels, referred to by the author as culverts, was used by a narrow gauge rail system built to transport the extracted material to a plant at the end of Private Road No.3 of the Colwick Industrial Estate. It was abandoned before this time but the track was still there and being boys, me and my mates pulled out a derailed wagon and spent many happy hours taking advantage of a slight gradient to ride through the tunnel ! We also befriended the signalman at Rectory Junction and spent some time with him watching the trains go by. In the 1980s when I had a son of my own the area was brilliant for scrambling bikes - enough said about that. Moving on to the the 1990s I spent many hours supervising the discharge of the oil trains at the Total rail siding and I can tell you that at 6am in the morning there could not have been a colder place in the UK ! The rail siding was connected to the Total Oil Terminal on the Colwick Industrial Estate by an underground pipeline which ran behind Morrisons and then at the side of the Colwick Loop Road. The brick building at the river end of the rough track, by the viaduct, was the fire pump which extracted water from the Trent and pumped it to the fire main at the Total rail siding. I have an aerial colour photograph of the area taken in the 1980s after the first section of the Colwick Loop Road was built but before any industrial or retail development. The only building on the land then were the Railway Social Club and the Total Sidings. Thanks for the video - I have to confess however, of some sadness seeing the decomissioned Total Sidings.

Hi Ant, Im a ex-EWS driver based over at Toton but live close to Carlton station, so I used to relieve the tank trains at Carlton station (the train would leave Lindsey refinary at about 0200) at about 0430 in the mrning, then would take the train through Nottingham station and down to Beeston where I'd run the loco around the train. Would then bring the train back to Rectory junction and back the train into the sidings, usually it would consist of 24 x 100 ton tank wagons (each holding approx 25,000 gallons of either petrol or diesel). The loco would then be detached from the wagons and moved out of the yard and just beyond the security gates, in later years we had to move the loco up to a shunt neck next to Rectory signal box. Once the train had been unloaded it would be reformed, then would work forwards to Grantham station, where it would the loco would be run around the train again. The train would leave Grantham and travel up the East Coast Mainline to Newark where it would turn off right, back towards Lincoln and then on to Immingham docks. I also used to take the empty coalsets up to Oxcroft, Welbeck and Thoresby collierys back in the day and more recently taken Network Rail test trains up to the NR test track up there. Excellent videos by the way and they've brought back so many memories of the above workings... cheers!

That was so fantastic Ant. So much to see just loved it. So many trains 🚂 always good to see. The history you give is great too. You can never learn to much. Thank you so much for taking me along and please stay safe and take care

Another great vlog Ant with real atmosphere which gives us the true feeling of the area again amplified with fantastic drone footage.

I live up the road and had no idea this was there. Learn something new every day. Thank you

Just superb stuff 👍🏻 The drone shots along with your old film and some tracks still down……what more could we want! 😃

There's no suspense with this one Ant, straight in with the forgotten rails, superb. Great drone footage plus Railmap giving a good idea of the lay of the line. Liking the added vid section.👍🏻👍🏻

I enjoyed watching, right on my door step and didn't realise, even been over that viaduct on trains and have never had any sensation of how stunning it is!👍😎😮😊

Very interesting Ant - lived on Station rd at Thurgarton and used to love watching the trains go past from my bedroom window ( Nottingham to Newark line) loved seeing the coal trains oil trains etc. Used to catch the old style trains into Notts on a Saturday morning You know the ones that you had to open from the outside. I loved seeing the train in the distance- that little yellow dot getting closer and closer, never failed to excite me and a sort of anxiety all at the same time. Loved the video - got any more on the old style ( 70/80 trains) so nostalgic ☺️

Fantastic, always wondered about Colwick and you’ve brought it to life me. A huge yard and very impressive. The electrical lines leading to and from the various apparatus is what I was looking at in a previous lifetime👍🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿

Thank you for the video and chat this day. Cheers Ant! 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿🙂👍🇺🇸

Great points of history made this a very entertaining video, loved seeing the old track still down and the entrance to Total depot. Brilliant views from the drone of the junction and viaduct, nice to see some frost too!!!

Love the photos and the drone footage, Thank you.

Interesting stuff and some nice footage. The old stills helped too, along with your own archive film. Sad to think how many of these class 60s EWS/DBC have left to rot, just rusting away with surprisingly few miles on them. This is the first of your videos I've watched, after seeing you guesting on other channels. I've subscribed and will enjoy rummaging through your videos.👍👌😁 Have a great New Year when it comes, Cheers for now, Dougie.

I've just come across your videos, it just popped up on RU-vid so had to watch it. So interesting so Thank You for making them

I live local and worked down on the industrial estate for many years. Spent many hours wandering around this area on foot and bike. Loved the video. Great work.

Just watched this vid back to back with the Gedling Branch vid , both first class. Thanks Ant as always

I've just discovered your channel, so rather belated thanks for this video! Really like the overlaid satellite image showing what once was, the drone footage is brilliant too plus the choice of music really sets off the whole thing!! It's amazing how nature claims back these sites, despite the fact that the ground is likely to be polluted. I'm going to spend time over Xmas looking at your other videos, that's sure to be better than any offerings on TV......

Does anyone remember the Hoveringham Gravel Pits in this area. I used to fish in them as a young lad in the late '40's and early '50's as well as in the Trent close by. My dad was a relief signalman in the area and worked boxes from Colwick Yard, Gedling Colliery to those further afield. I rode in the cab of an austerity loco from the colliery to Colwick Yard when my dad was in the box at the colliery, that was awesome. I have gone further afield my self to Vancouver Island in Canada but really enjoyed the video and trying to orientate myself.

In the early 200's there were still abandoned wagons in some parts of the country but all of these seem to have gone in almost all instances. I remember old abandoned wagons in Cambois, Newcastle. More in other areas. Councils seemed to go through a huge remediation process of land after about 2008 - 10 and to have any tracks now is increasingly rare. Even if most land is not but on, they remediated the land and prepared it for future development. Footpaths replaced dereliction of old wagons and anti-social areas of congregation as many were burned out etc. The early 2000's had some really haunting and emotive sights.

Thankyou so much for this my dad who’s no longer with us used to drive engines up and down here I remember going on the steam engines with him and making me a bacon sandwich off his shovel in the 60s he also worked the shunting engines and worked for British sugar corporation and I was born in netherfield happy memories 😀

love this video! I lived in carlton for 14 years and was always intrigued by the disused railways and the past they hold about where i lived

Great video to find out about my local area. Will be watching the rest you've done. Thank you

Thanks for the video beautiful viaduct and learning a bit more about the area!!😎🚃🚃🇬🇧

Thank you for your map at 2:53 I often walk my dog on a park just off Colwick Loop Road where I can tell the old rail line used to run along but I have often wondered about the terrain and whether it served another purpose in a previous life. This map confirms my thoughts that it used to be part of a large train yard... I just did not realise how large!!! Edit 3:32 is a better map actually, and the park in question is the one just to the right of Colwick Loop Road, just above where Halfords is written on the map.

Great video!!! Used to live in Colwick in a development built in the late 90s, early 2000s that backed onto the railway to Newark that went to Netherfield. Didn't even realize any of this was there!!! I knew Netherfield was a very industrial area, especially as you get out to Gedling, but didn't know there was a railway that went that way over the Trent!!! Really interesting to see this. Thanks for showing us this!!!

Fantastic, hard to believe that massive heavy trains of coal once set off from here behind "O4", "8f" and "9f" classes of steam locos and heading up the Midland line to London.

The first of your videos I've watched, very impressive and informative.

Awesome, My Family are from Netherfield, My Grandfather was a Sub Ganger on the Railways :-) Brilliant Video. He took my Dad early hours of the morning to stand on the footplate of Mallard at Colwick Yard when it was building steam, My Dad was in Awe, it was the Concord of its day and every Boys dream, god rest them both. My Grandfather had served during the war with the Fireman and He gave my Grandad the nod.

First time viewer, instant subscriber. Fascinating, information rich, engaging, visually stimulating content. Couldn't ask for more. Thanks for your magnificent efforts. 😎👌

Very intesting, a massive place at one time,,,,thanks for the video,,

That was a good one Ant, plenty to see if you look for it.

Another great video Ant thumbs up love the class 60 on the tanks my favourite class of locomotive.

Thought that was great. Keep doing what you do. Brilliant.

Brought back a lot of great memories ,the Netherfield lagoons used to be fields with much smaller ponds ,I know cos I fished them lol ...can remember the block of old railways houses that used to be at bottom there and even the big old buildings they kept trains in as you walked down past Jackie bells to Trent ...

Love the Ariel shots thanks for sharing, oh and I now subscribed.

i use to live on colwick road just after the corner shop. talking over ten years since ive been back, use to love the netherfield station.

Very enjoyable video and intresting to see what's happened after years of being closed, like to see one of the former Tinsley rail yard and diesel loco depot as that would be great to do .

Mother Nature always shows us just how unimportant we are.

Great show. I used to live overlooking the shunting yards as we called them, and from our 3rd floor bedroom window we used to enjoy watching the coal waggons being hauled up the tower and then tipping their loads into Engine tenders. Regarding the oil terminals my grandfather was employed by Regent (later Texaco) in the 1930s to build and develop their oil terminal next to the Marshalling Yards. Other companies at around the same time until the 1970's were Esso, (my dad worked there), Shell and BP, all were served by rail but they also were sometimes served by barges which came up the Trent from the Humber.

Really interesting video. Rectory Junction box closed in 2013 along with Netherfield Junction as the Derby EMCC extended its control area.

Interesting video I'm liking the old black and white photo's mixed in showing how it used to look. Finding some of the original track was good it always seems quite sad how nature takes over these places with all the new trees trying to get past the lines and bending round and growing literally around them in years to come when some of these trees are mature you might end up with one with a railway line going straight through a tree. Liking the drone footage that really shows the area off to a treat. Stay safe.

The test train stored there is for the Midland Mainline electrification testing train. It's a mixed top and tail set with HST power cars either end with one class 91 and various Mk3s in a mix of liverys in the middle. Used for testing the Kettering to Colby route.

great coverage of remains of the old yard so sad to see it all go

Very interesting video. My memory of the extensive marshalling yards is limited to 1969/70 as seen from a Grantham - Nottingham train during a train-spotting trip from Peterborough.

Fascinating video great. If you find any old track look on the Railway chairs it usually has the date stamped on it.

Really interesting and well presented thank you 👍Excellent choice of music

if you went to the industrial area down the road (Road is literally called Road No.2 its in cowlick) a lot of the entrances to work yards still have railway embedded into concrete

Great video Ant, Shame the sidings went but that’s progress for you, if you went down colwick loop road you would see the remains of a platform near the racecourse And on the other side of the racecourse island there’s remains of the old railway which runs behind virgin and smyths toys. Really enjoy watching your videos can’t wait till the next one 👍

Used to play that area as a kid...loved your video thanks....

I took my four year old son on this trail for an adventure, and he absolutely loved finding the "secret railway" in the trees, the signal box, the longest bridge ever, and the river that smelled like someone had done a poo in it (he wasn't wrong). As he's only four, I don't think a row of bricks that were once a platform edge will quite hold his attention, and was wondering if there is another trail in the Nottingham area that has old sections of rails, tunnels and things that are very obviously railway for him to find? Many thanks.

Some heritage railways would love those old rails. A new one is opening up locally to where I live and another closed line is potentially being reopened for mainline use. Going to need loads of track going forward. Up to now lines have been lifted from old coal power stations but that source is coming to an end.

I am from Grantham used to go over that bridge to Nottingham I can remember all those Sidings being there full of coal wagons I think there was a station netherfield and coalwick ?? this was back in the 70s

Nice video Ant, a few mates of mine used to work at Total Lindsey refinery.

Very Good video Trekking & Towpaths!

i wish i had time to go for a explore in that area. it really does look interesting.

When I were a lad, if we went on holiday to Norfolk/Suffolk, always looked on the OS map for a nearby disused railway, and follow it as much as possible. Good times :)

I heard that is where they are going to store the DATS test trains, so at least some rails will remain, but they will need security and fencing, great video..

That gate controlling the water flow as kids we just called everything like that sluice gates, no matter what type of water gate it was it was always sluice gate, funny how certain things never leave you even though the last time we as kids were out exploring was 65 plus years ago, great post Ant

Netherfield had me thinking of Pride and Prejudice. Enjoyed the video very much.

Some good footage here, well done

18:46 I got a love image of a tanker going across that bridge

Very nicely produced piece. Well done.

That's a back-flow preventer to keep water from flowing upstream if the downstream ditch floods from below.

Brilliant. Very informative. Thank you

I lived at Radcliffe when I was a boy. The garden backed on to the railway and Colwick Yard was in full swing. I remember an incident (I forget what year it was, but it was in the days of steam). Trains would sometimes have to wait to enter Cowlick Yard and this meant waiting on the Rectory Viaduct over the Trent. A fireman climbed up on to the tender to work on the coal and fell off his engine and into the river. His body was never found.

Well done, enjoyed and I really appreciate the Google map vies with the red lines added. 5*

Brilliant, many thanks.

Very interesting. Good work.

Cracking video, thoroughly enjoyed it.

After watching a few of these videos I found myself searching online for maps of Nottinghamshire collieries.I was very surprised to find that radford and wolloton use to have pits. my dad is a retired train driver and he started in 1965 and retired in 1999 so I think around 35years as a driver, thats where my interest for trains,disused lines,old stations come from and of the disused lines i natural find myself interested in old collieries. I would love to see a video of the old colliery near Eastwood which now has an industrial estate close to it ,I also think a video based on the old nottingham victoria Station which now houses intu Victoria Centre with underground station platform level parking , that would be a good video. from the multi story car park you can still make out parts of what the station would have looked like with the old brickwork and over where what is now the nottingham contemporary use to be a tunnel that passed under the lacemarket and hockley and came out by intu Victoria Centre though I think the tunnel opening has since been closed at both ends which is a great shame

Really enjoyed seeing this, thanks for posting. I've got a book on the history of Colwick MPD & Yard (by Book Law Publications, and well worth having a look for), so very interesting to look at the maps and arial views in it while watching. I have a distant memory of going to Colwick about the time it was closing. My Dad had bought one of the platform seats from Radcliffe-on Trent which then sat in his garden at Plungar for the next 40 years or so. On a Sunday afternoon back in the days when Treasure Hunts were popular we would count the number of cars that stopped sharply before backing up and taking a second look into the garden to check it out.

Another great video

Good! Sometimes we need go back to see what left behind that’s history!

Hi Ant great video again take care x

54K + views, well done on this film Ant.

At 15:50. May have been a weigh-bridge divert. A weigh-bridge was frequently on it's own short section of track, so that there were only movements over it which needed to be weighed. An ultra-short loop with the weigh-bridge (and associated weighing apparatus hut) within inches of the through route.

Oil trains still do run across the viaduct and cut through notts! I’m going to have a trip down here soon honestly amazing, I just want to sit by the side of the Trent near the viaduct !

Well produced, interesting video

That split viaduct looks pretty interesting, both in design and the old brick structure expanded/reinforced with a concrete one.

Superb pal......

British Railways ended in 1964, it then became British Rail - so a slightly inaccurate description at 2:32. ... The word you are looking for at 5:25 is sluice gate. ... The UN code 3Y 1202 at 14:20 denotes diesel oil. ... A great vid, thank you

Hello, i enjoyed watching that. Not much of the old railways left now. They should never of let Dr Beaching get his hands on them in the late 1960s.

great video thank you

Superb video

Thank you

Worked at gedling colliery which was served from colwick yard for the coal trains. Many happy days “bunking” colwick sheds. Sometimes got some interesting visits from Grantham when the Pacific’s needed repair.

Very interesting. On the old sidings at Colne in Lancashire l found an unbroken LMS Hotels beer bottle in dark green glass. That was about 28years ago. The site has since been developed into houses. There were big culverts, turntable and floor tiles where buildings once were. It was all open, unfenced and anyone could access it. Part of British history lost when these places go.

Interesting, thanks!

Lovely video.

Great stuff! So fascinating! I'm local, from Mapperley, but live abroad now. When I come back to visit family I'd like to go and find this - presume the footpath goes from Colwick Industrial Estate? Thanks - love local history!

I think even if there was a private sign, it probably wouldn't have stopped me 😂😂👍

Thank you! Found you quite by accident.

I used to go down here just over sixty years ago, it's some times difficult to work out were things were.

I can remember the giant coal loading hopper that appeared at the beginning of your film, Railway Terrace in Netherfield & the Railways mans social club. But I didn't know that tracks were still in place, I shall check it out next time I go for a walk the area.

Disused and abandoned railways; the perfect metaphor for England's next 40 years.

Very interesting 👍

Good one ...

The remnants of track work by the oil terminal gates (~10:30) once formed a run round loop that ran down to Rectory Jn. The points at the other end still exists I believe.