FEBRUARY 2003
Jim Walker's wife was not impressed when he dragged home an LMS porter's trolley which had been languishing on Carnforth station since the golden age of steam. "More junk," she observed. Like many an old railway man, Jim hated to see his working heritage go to waste. So when Carnforth was "de-manned" in the mid-1980s, he'd asked if he could have the trolley as a souvenir. "It would only have gone to the tip," he recalls. Instead it went down to the bottom of his garden, along with much else which his missus regarded as junk. There it languished for about 14 years. Needless to say, it continued to degenerate - rather like the platforms from which it had been plucked. The story of Carnforth's decline, from a great Lancashire railway centre to a station once voted the worst on the network, has been well documented. Not least in this column. When I was last here, in May 2000, the place was a disgrace. Platforms and benches were encrusted with pigeon droppings. There was hardly a sliver of glass left in the overhead canopies. The underpasses were dank and smelly. Weeds flourished between the sloping slabs that had replaced the platforms where London to Glasgow expresses once ground to a halt. When I called in again on a recent Sunday morning, the transformation seemed nothing short of miraculous. In an imposing entrance hall are two plaques. One marks the other well-documented fact about Carnforth: that it was here, in 1946, that the great director David Lean filmed the location shots for Brief Encounter. The other lists those institutions that have made a contribution to restoring this significant station. Network Rail is among them, as you might expect. But without the film connection it seems unlikely that the names would include tourist boards, building societies and even the David Lean Foundation. The long-term movers and shakers behind this admirable project, though, have been the Friends of Carnforth Station and their financial arm, the Carnforth Station and Railway Trust. They're local people, for the most part, well aware that Carnforth has had a great railway past and could have a great future. Jim is one of them. He was the fireman on the Class 8F steam loco, number 48773, that left Burnley sheds on 4 August 1968, and came to rest at Carnforth at the end of the steam age. Retired through ill health, he's now the unofficial station manager. His LMS porters' trolley, beautifully restored by cabinet-maker Terry Boxford, adorns the entrance hall. "I'm glad I held on to it," says Jim, leading the way along dung-free platforms, past colourful plant pots and sturdy benches, down the brightened-up underpass and up the other side. He's carrying what looks like a large box spanner. It turns out to be the device with which, twice a week, he winds up the handsome Victorian clock, also restored by Terry Boxford. "Look," says Jim as we admire the casing with its gently swinging pendulum. "That's the beating heart of a station coming back to life." There should be even more life after Easter when the trust is hoping to reopen the legendary refreshment room, complete with a little museum telling the story of how one of the great British movies was made. Suitable background music will be played. "I fancy a bit of Al Bowley myself," says Jim. He's well aware that Carnforth could be more than a museum piece dedicated to a '40s film. It could be a major railway centre again, if only those sloping slabs could be replaced by platforms to accommodate stopping trains on the West Coast route. "With a proper integrated transport policy, you'd be able to leave your car at Carnforth and take the train to Windermere," says trust chairman Peter Yates. "Or go straight from Euston to Carnforth and then on to the Lakes. But there are so many railway companies involved and no politicians prepared to give a lead. From the reaction we've had, you'd think we wanted to build a nuclear power station rather than revitalise a station." Jim Walker puts it another way: "For what we've been quoted for restoring two platforms, we could have raised the Titanic." While other people worry about transport policy for the 21st century, Jim has found space elsewhere at Carnforth station for railway paraphernalia from the past. If you have anything suitable, give him a call on 01524 733722. The missus will almost certainly thank you for getting rid of that "junk".
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