Station Name:MANORS (NORTH & EAST)

 

Date opened: Manors North 1.1.1909 (replacing Newcastle New Bridge Street) and Manors East 30.8.1850 (replacing Newcastle Carliol Square).
Location: Trafalgar Street
Company on opening: Manors North - North Eastern Railway, Manors East - York Newcastle & Berwick Railway.
Date closed to passengers: Manors North - 23.1.1978
Date closed completely: 23.1.1978
Company on closing: British Rail (North Eastern Region)
Present state: A new, shorter island platform (7 & 8) has been built and is still open. The abandoned sections of platform 7 & 8 and the adjacent platform 9 are extant but devoid of all buildings. The subways and stairs beneath platform 7 & 8 are also still extant but is being (2005) converted into a restaurant. These platforms formed Manors East Station. A section of the southern end of Platform 1 & 2 (Manors North) and platform 6 is also extant but heavily overgrown. The majority of platforms 1 & 2 and all of platforms 3, 4 & 5 have been demolished and the area redeveloped.
County: Northumberland
OS Grid Ref: NZ253643
Date of visit: 1984 & 9.7.2005

Notes: The first Manors station was the western terminus of the Newcastle & North Shields Railway. A terminus was planned near the new Royal Arcade but the station was never built, because of speculation about a Central Station to serve all the Newcastle railways, existing and planned. Instead, the company curtailed their line on the east side of a street called Manors where they built a temporary terminus.

Although the line opened in 1839, the station buildings were not complete until the beginning of 1842. In the event, the company was taken over by the Newcastle & Berwick Railway who brought their line into a junction at Heaton and so gained access over the North Shields route to the centre of Newcastle. From another junction on the east side of Trafalgar Street they extended further into the city centre, to a junction with the Newcastle and Darlington line at the new Central Station.

The old Manors terminus then became a coal depot and a new through station was provided above Trafalgar Street, on the site of the eventual platforms 6 and 7, access between platforms was by way of one of the arches of the new viaduct - the start of a fine tradition of subways at Manors.

The railway layout at Manors did not change much until the 1880's when the North Eastern Railway embarked on the quadrupling of the main line to Heaton and the enlargement of Central Station. By then they had absorbed the Blyth & Tyne Railway whose Newcastle terminus lay in New Bridge Street, barely a thousand feet away from Manors.

Widening between Manors and Heaton was completed in 1887 and a new station opened at Manors, on 13 June. The new station retained the down platform and office building of its predecessor, perhaps pending their eventual replacement if a link were formed to New Bridge Street. The up platform was replaced by a long island (later platforms 7 and 8) and a platform (later 9) high above Melbourne Street. Access between them was by means of the arch spanning Croft Lane. This public route provided a subway from which stairways led up to the new platforms. The steep fall of the land meant that the eastern entrance into Croft Lane lay much lower than the western one and so a second passage was provided, leading directly from the foot of the platform 7/8 stairs to a landing on the stairs leading up to platform 9.

Quadrupling of the line between Manors and Central Station was completed in 1894 but the next significant development was alongside the railway rather than on it. This was the opening in 1901 of Manors Power Station to supply electricity to the City's tramway system. The competition stimulated not only the electrification of the Coast line but also the eventual construction of the Manors - New Bridge Street link with new platforms at Manors which opened on 1 July 1909.

The extensions to Manors were made on a lavish scale, with two through platforms and three bays. These formed platforms 1 to 5 of the combined station but were called
Manors North, while the older platforms became numbers 6 to 9 and were renamed Manors East.

The suffixes North and East were dropped from the public timetable from 16 June 1947 although they continued in use in the working timetable and other official documents. In February 1969 the suffixes were officially dropped and the station was then known as Manors.

The closure of the old Manors North platforms took place on 23 January 1978 in readiness for the construction of the new Metro. The Metro used a new underground alignment bypassing Manors and then taking over the old North Tyneside loop via Tynemouth, this opened on 14.11.1982.

After the closure of the Manors North platforms the station was then only served by a limited Morpeth local service on the main line. A notable feature was that from 1904 to 1964 the overhead electrics on the quayside branch worked into the station. This steeply graded branch was worked by steeple cab electric locos, Manors was where traction was changed to steam/deisel. The station had both third rail and overhead wire electrics until 1964. There was also an early example of an LNER power operated signal box which was commissioned in 1937, closing in 1973.

Other web sites: Trainspots - for the current Manors Station

Click here for the transcript of W. Fawcett's history of Manors Station

 

The abandoned Manors North platforms in 1984 - one of the subways can be seen on the right
P
hoto by Keith Ward



Manors Station in July 2005 - the new platform 7 & 8 can be seen on the right, a section of the old platform 7 can also be seen on the far right. The remaining section of Platform 1 can be seen to the right of the small brick building on the left.
P
hoto by Michael Brady

The layout of Manors Station in 1925
Drawn by Alan Young


The entrance to Manors North in October 1972 - this building has now been demolished and the area has been redeveloped.
Photo c.The SINE Project - reproduced with permission

One of the subways at Manors was used in the cult 1971 film 'Get Carter' . Michael Caine is seen here looking down to the station entrance at the corner of Melbourne Street and Trafalgar Street. These stairs led up to the island platform (7 & 8) and to a subway to Platform 1. The stairs have now been stripped out and a restaurant is being (2005) built in the old station entrance.

For more pictures of Manors Station click here


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