Steamed up

As a student commuting every term between Barrow-in-Furness and Leeds in the 50s, I spent many hours on Carnforth station while changing trains and I remember the famous refreshment room, with the coal fire in the winter (Time runs out for station steeped in myth, November 8).

I hope the project to restore this piece of national heritage is successful. The long ramps to the underpass are a dominant feature of the station and, until I read your article, I had not realised their importance in the selection of this station as the setting for Brief Encounter

Incidentally, your comment that Carnforth was chosen because it was "so remote the war office felt the film set's lights blazing in the blackout were unlikely to attract the Luftwaffe" gives the impression of some backwater. However, a bomb on the station would have put both west coast routes to Scotland (the main line over Shap and the older route hugging the Cumberland coast) out of action - not to mention the approach to the strategic shipyard at Barrow.

By 1945, the threat from bombing by the Luftwaffe anywhere in the north was regarded as minimal.
John Lydon
Leeds

Steamed up  The GUARDIAN Wednesday 10 th November 1999

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