Electrification: Lancaster-Heysham-Morecambe branch of Midland Railway

MIDLAND RAILWAY ELECTRIFICATION. LANCASTER-HEYSHAM-MORECAMBE SECTION - The electrification of the Lancaster-Heysham- Morecambe section of the Midland Railway Is proceeding and the three-and-a-half mile length between Heysham and Torrisholme Junction is now quite finished. It is understood that on Sunday the Midland Railway Company will make their first trial of the new rolling stock over the electrified} portion of the line. This will be the first single- phase train to run on an actual railway in Great Britain.

The section which is being electrified comprises about nine miles of double- track, there being four miles between Lancaster and Morecambe, and five miles between Morecambe and Heysham. Trains at present are run from Lancaster to Morecambe; and thence over a portion of the same route to Heysham but without going into Lancaster on that portion of the run. The Heysham and Morecambe termini are at the extremities of a "Y," Lancaster being located at the lower end of the body of that letter, Heysham at the top of the left-hand fork, and Morecambe at the top of the right-hand fork. Trains running between Heysham and. Morecambe, and vice versa, run the limbs only: and do not travel over the stem. The work is being carried out by Mr R M Deelay, locomotive superintendent, whose electrical assistant, Mr. J; Dalziel, is responsible for the general scheme and details of the electrical equipment, Mr W.B Worthington, the Company's chief engineer, J. Sayers, telegraph superintendent; and Mr. D. Bain, carriage and waggon superintendent. [Manchester Guardian 11 January 1908 page 12]

At this week's meeting of the Institution of Civil Engineers a paper was read on " The Single-Phase Electrification of the Heysham, Morecambe and Lancaster Branch of the Midland Railway;" by Messrs J. Dalziel and J. Sayers.

The authors stated the reasons for the electrification of the Heysham-Morecambe-Lancaster section of the Midland Railway on the single-phase. system, instead of the direct-current system hitherto used in this country. They explained that the choice of this particular section of the line for a more or less experimental electrification was partly due to the fact that it could be worked from an existing power station at Heysham. Though the traffic is light it is long-hour throughout the year, and, consequently, is expensive to work by steam, so that there was scope for saving in working expenses; also, the summer traffic is heavy and liable to congestion, two of the stations being terminals, and there being a considerable local traffic between Morecambe and the third station, Lancaster, which tends to congest the main-line trains. With regard to the disabilities under which it, been alleged single-phase apparatus labours - particularly in respect to its asserted unsuitability for high-schedule-speed, frequent-stop, suburban and inter-urban traffic necessitating high accelerations -  the authors gave the results of special tests, made with a view to ascertaining the accelerating capabilities of the Heysham equipment, and maintained that single-phase apparatus is not only equally as capable of working such services as direct-current apparatus, but, that the weight of the single phase trains is only a very small percentage greater than that of corresponding direct-current trains, and that the energy consumption is appreciably less. [Manchester Guardian 12 November 1909 page 5]

Reference    Manchester Guardian 11 January 1908 page 12
Reference    Manchester Guardian 12 November 1909 page 5