If I had the $ and room I'd model this intriguing rail facility, here in the US..I love the trackage, tunnel(s), and machinery, and even the sooty look to it..I'm a 'point to point' switchback guy, not a roundy-rounder. This is my style.. with lots of necessary moves to be made to run a RR realistically....
Amazing stuff. That system of letting the empty wagons run down a gradient and through a set of spring point, to run back in the opposite direction was used on the Coal Tips, at Garston when I worked there in the early 90`s.
I live in South Shields and moved here long enough ago to see parts of the system in operation. It is sad to think there is no trace of the railway nor the colliery left. We in the North East seem very good at erasing our industrial heritage.
Perhaps someone should show some of this old footage in the local schools, especially as some of the kids dads and granddads will have worked at the pits. Or perhaps it could be shown at a museum.
I reckon the line, with its loop round to near the beach, should have been kept as an add-on to the metro, adding a couple of extra stations for the town.
Someone should make a working model layout of this old system, unless someone somewhere already has. And it should have live overhead working which would have plenty of arcing just like the real thing.
No.10, No.9, No.4, No.2 and No.1 survived into preservation, however No.1 was scrapped at Bowes Bridge in 1979. None of the English Electric Locomotives (No.11 - No.15) survived and were scrapped between 1989 and 1992. No.10 and No.4 are in much better condition than the others, as No.4 can run on batteries, No.10 is reliveried into NCB Green. No.9 has started to be restored as well.
