Some Notes on Scotby Station
by Bill Fawcett

Scotby was one of the original stations at the west end of the Newcastle & Carlisle Railway, formally opened on 19 July 1836 and receiving its first regular trains the following day.

The station house was originally very similar to that at Greenhead: a distinctive Tudor-Revival cottage with a prominent first-floor dormer gable, corbelled out above the front door.

This did not provide much accommodation for the ‘Collector’ (later designated Stationmaster), let alone any passengers. The needs of the latter tended to be met by the elegant waiting sheds, which the N&C introduced during the eighteen-fifties along with another innovation – platforms.

Scotby had one of these sheds, such as still grace a few stations like Haydon Bridge, and it was on the opposite side of the tracks from the house. Until 1863 that was the Up (Newcastle) platform, since the N&C insisted on running its trains on the right-hand track.

The platform itself was little more than ten feet wide, so that there was very little room to spare between the (admittedly open) front of the waiting shed and the platform edge. There would also have been no pedestrian route over the busy tracks other than by a sleeper crossing.

In 1888 the NER Traffic Committee decided that the time had come to improve matters, probably in response to local criticism, and a programme of works was put in hand under the direction of the Locomotive & Works Committee. An overall scheme was approved in July, the first work taken in hand being a footbridge. The contract for its ironwork was let on 9 August for £287-4-0 to Sproat, Marley & Company, of Hebburn, the NER’s usual suppliers. On 18 October the contract for the various building works was let to a local man, R Johnston, of Scotby. His original tender was £460-18-4, but on 1 November he was allowed to revise this to £483-1-0.

Three buildings were involved: the station house, which was enlarged almost out of recognition; the Down side (as it had become) waiting shed, which was replaced; and a new waiting room/office building on the Up platform. The alterations to the house entailed extending the first floor upwards and to the rear. This provided three decent bedrooms upstairs. Downstairs there were a sitting room and living room at the front, with a kitchen and scullery at the rear.

Unlike the comparable enlargements of Wylam or Low Row stations, where much of the original character was retained, the work at Scotby was quite drastic, though it made for a far more comfortable house. No trace survived of its distinctive dormer gable, while the windows had their hood-moulds shaved off and mullions removed to accommodate big new sashes. The east gable, however, retained one of the slit windows from the original bedrooms.

The Down (Carlisle) platform received a new timber waiting room block, with brick gables, set almost three feet into the side of the cutting so as to give adequate clearance along the platform. The new accommodation was generous, with a booking office, general waiting room, ladies waiting room with toilet, and men’s toilets.

The roof materials from the old waiting shed were recycled into another timber office range on the Up platform. This had a large waiting room with a booking office at the one end. The improvements are characteristic of what was expected of a wealthy company, like the North Eastern, in late-Victorian times.

An audit of staff conducted by the Newcastle & Carlisle Railway in 1841 lists David Kennedy as the ‘Collector’ at Scotby, on a salary of £45 per annum. It was evidently not a busy post as he was one of the two lowest-paid ‘Collectors’ on the line, the other being at Ryton. By contrast those at most of the stations received £50, while the ‘station keeper’ at a place like Hexham or Haydon Bridge, received £100.

This article was first published in Cumbrian Railways, Journal of the Cumbrian Railways Association, Volume 9 No.2, May 2007 in response to an appeal for more information by the current owners. For more information and useful contacts see the North Eastern Railway Association website

Books by Bill Fawcett available via the NERA website.

	This volume traces the evolution of the buildings created by the companies which amalgamated to form the North Eastern Railway in 1852, with extensive coverage of the works commissioned by George Hudson, the Railway King. It also looks at the buildings of the Stockton & Darlington Railway up to the late 1850's and those of the Newcastle & Carlisle Railway until its amalgamation with the NER.
This volume explores the full range of buildings produced in the period from the early eighteen fifties, where Volume 1 left off, to Peachey's departure at the beginning of 1877. These range from stations, grand and modest, including such lost gems as Barnard Castle, to the locomotive workshops, such as Gateshead, whose early evolution is fully explored.
	This volume picks up the story of North Eastern Railway architecture at the start of 1877, when William Bell began his almost forty year stint as architect, and follows it through the LNER and British Railway periods down to 1995, when the York railway architects office was disbanded, in the run up to railway privatisation.