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Wishaw And Coltness Railway
All photographs of this railway in date order.
![Looking west at Mossend East Junction / Fullwood Junction.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //]](/images/0/79.jpg "Fullwood Junction")
![Looking south at Mossend South Junction. The former Clydesdale Steelworks are on the left.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //]](/images/0/82.jpg "Milnwood Junction")
![Class 90 on test run at what was to become Shieldmuir station.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //]](/images/0/929.jpg "Shieldmuir")
![Looking east at the site of the former Stirling Road station.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //]](/images/0/930.jpg "Stirling Road")
![Freightliner heading east and about to turn south at Mossend East Junction.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //]](/images/2000/2079.jpg "Fullwood Junction")
![New line laid in at Stirling Road for Watsonhead. Line to Costain in background. The new line occupies the former route east to Morningside.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //]](/images/2000/2115.jpg "Stirling Road")
![Approaching Mossend East Junction from the east.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //]](/images/6000/6417.jpg "Fullwood Junction")
![Aerial view of Mossend Marshalling Yard.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //]](/images/7000/7131.jpg "Mossend Marshalling Yard")
![Aerial view of Shieldmuir. The industrial estate and post office depot (centre) occupy part of the site of the former steelworks.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //]](/images/7000/7253.jpg "Shieldmuir")
![Aerial view Dalzell Steelworks looking south-east. The works is served by a short branch.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //]](/images/7000/7258.jpg "Dalzell")
![Aerial view of Whifflet (left) to Coatbridge Central (right) with the line to Rutherglen leaving from a triangular junction. Also visible is the site of Whifflet Upper.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //]](/images/7000/7259.jpg "Dundyvan")
![Aerial view of the junctions to the south of Mossend Yard looking west. Note the Freightliner on the north to east curve.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //]](/images/7000/7262.jpg "Mossend")
![Aerial view of Garriongill Junction. Bottom left to top centre (Stirling Road); W&CR. Low left to centre right (Law Junction); Wishaw Deviation. Centre to centre right; Caledonian Railway.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //]](/images/7000/7265.jpg "Garriongill Junction")
![Aerial view of Mossend Yard. Looking east.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //]](/images/7000/7326.jpg "Mossend")
![Holytown. S.L.S. tour.<br><br>[G H Robin collection by courtesy of the Mitchell Library, Glasgow 09/06/1962]](/images/9000/9601.jpg "Holytown")
![Holytown. S.L.S. tour.<br><br>[G H Robin collection by courtesy of the Mitchell Library, Glasgow 09/06/1962]](/images/9000/9602.jpg "Holytown")
![57581 with an SLS railtour at Holytown, Lanarkshire, on 9 June 1962.<br>
<br><br>[K A Gray 09/06/1962]](/images/25000/25643.jpg "Holytown")
![View north east from the A73 road bridge south of Newmains in May 1971 as a Clayton brings a lengthy freight out of the Costain cement works to join the former Wishaw and Coltness line at Stirling Road Junction. The train will join the WCML a mile further west at Garriongill Junction.<br>
<br><br>[John Furnevel 03/05/1971]](/images/36000/36065.jpg "Stirling Road")
![Mossend Marshalling Yard viewed from the north end bing (bing now removed).<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //1987]](/images/7000/7981.jpg "Mossend Marshalling Yard")
![Approaching Mossend Marshalling Yard from the north is a 47 hauled passenger train. It is about to pass under the A8.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //1987]](/images/7000/7982.jpg "Mossend Marshalling Yard")
![37423 heads south to Mossend with an oil train.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //1987]](/images/7000/7983.jpg "Mossend Marshalling Yard")
![Busy little 08s shunting at the north end of Mossend Marshalling Yard.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //1987]](/images/7000/7984.jpg "Mossend Marshalling Yard")
![37423 heading north out of Mossend light engine.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //1987]](/images/7000/7985.jpg "Mossend Marshalling Yard")
![Coal yard at Mossend. View looks north.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //1987]](/images/7000/7986.jpg "Mossend Marshalling Yard")
![Looking south over Mossend North Junction.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //1987]](/images/7000/7987.jpg "Mossend North Junction")
![A 27 languishes at Mossend awaiting disposal.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //1987]](/images/7000/7988.jpg "Mossend Marshalling Yard")
![Cleekhimin. The approach viaduct for the line to Ravenscraigs west side. View looks west. This line once connected to the WCML at Shieldmuir and served Dalzell, Ravenscraig and the Lanarkshire steelworks.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //1987]](/images/8000/8270.jpg "Cleekhimin")
![Not far from Morningside (behind the camera) looking to Stirling Road on a December evening in 1987. The Coltness Iron Company (later Costain) line ran from the distant centre to the right. The distant bing belonged to the Gillhead Colliery. The line seen here was later re-opened and this view can be compared with the scene 23 years later [see image 29593].<br><br>[Ewan Crawford /12/1987]](/images/29000/29594.jpg "Morningside (Caledonian)")
![View from the removed bridge over the B754 for Flemington Coal yard. Two (!) 8Xs head south with the limestone empties from Ravenscraig for Shap. Passing the closed Flemington station, once Motherwell station.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //1988]](/images/8000/8330.jpg "Flemington")
![The removed bridge over the B754 for the Flemington coal yard.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //1988]](/images/8000/8331.jpg "Flemington")
![Flemington Coal Yard. Ahead the line ran to the buffer stops and behind the branch ran to a south east facing junction at Shieldmuir.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //1988]](/images/8000/8451.jpg "Flemington Coal Yard")
![Flemington Coal Yard. Ahead the line ran to Shieldmuir. The bridge has been removed. In the background from left to right is Ravenscraig.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //1988]](/images/8000/8452.jpg "Flemington Coal Yard")
![Express passing Shieldmuir Yard which served the Inshaw Works, Wishaw Steelworks, a large coal depot and provided a back route to Ravenscraig, Lanarkshire and Dalzell steelworks. Site now Shieldmuir station.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //1988]](/images/8000/8621.jpg "Shieldmuir Junction")
![Southbound express passing Shieldmuir Yard. The steelworks in the background only provided scrap for Ravenscraig by this date. Now the site of a Post Office depot.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //1988]](/images/8000/8622.jpg "Shieldmuir Junction")
![A 47 creeps up to the signal at the entry for Shieldmuir Yard which gave access to the Netherton Branch - a steelworks only in use for scrap provision for Ravenscraig by this date. This site is now Shieldmuir station and the yard is lifted.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //1988]](/images/8000/8623.jpg "Shieldmuir")
![An Eastfield 47 on the Shieldmuir Yard loop. Site now Shieldmuir station. Most of the remains of the yard was lifted in 1987 and the rest by 1990.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //1988]](/images/8000/8624.jpg "Shieldmuir Junction")
![With the WCML out of sight off to the left and BSC Dalzell in the distance on the right this view looks west at the former six tracks wide bridge over Craigneuk Street as it was in 1988. The bridge was swept away many years ago but the trackbed was more recently reclaimed for the roundabout and new road to Carfin which passes down the west side of the former Ravenscraig Steelworks.<br /><br />This bridge carried a number of lines (from west to east); a loop line from the WCML which served the Lanarkshire Steelworks, a line to the Dalzell and Lanarkshire steelworks, a line to Jerviston Junction running beside Dalzell Steelworks and Coursington Colliery and a line to Jerviston Junction via Ravenscraig Steelworks.<br /><br />At the time of the photograph Shieldmuir station had not yet opened and the yard there had only recently been cut back (it was to completely go in preparation for the station opening).<br /><br /><br>
The area of brownfield beyond the railway bridge used to be the Lanarkshire Steelworks and at this time was being landscaped.<br>
<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //1988]](/images/32000/32458.jpg "Shields Colliery Junction")
![View across Lesmahagow Junction with a ballast train in the foreground reversing into the Findlays Sidings. In the background is 37140 with a permanent way train and the buildings of the Motherwell Bridge company.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //1988]](/images/54000/54161.jpg "Lesmahagow Junction")
![A class 47 at the head of a rake in Mossend yard during a sunny evening in 1989. The Chivas tanks (first two vehicles) are probably destined for Keith.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //1989]](/images/16000/16133.jpg "Mossend Marshalling Yard")
![A brand new Class 90 passes Shieldmuir heading south. On a test run the locomotive and rake had come up the WCML, passed round the junctions at Mossend and was now heading south. This is now the site of Shieldmuir station.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //1989]](/images/16000/16140.jpg "Shieldmuir")
![Iron ore from Hunterston Terminal to Ravenscraig Steelworks is hauled out of Mossend Yard by 37099, 37010 and 37210 on 7 June 1990.<br><br>[Bill Roberton 07/06/1990]](/images/39000/39460.jpg "Mossend Marshalling Yard")
![View over Milnwood / Mossend South Junction with lines diverging to Holytown, Coatbridge Central and Bellshill. In the background is British Steel Tubes division's Clydesdale Mill. A further line in the 'V' of the junction served Mossend Yard's down yard.<br><br>[Bill Roberton 01/05/1991]](/images/53000/53195.jpg "Milnwood Junction")
![View south over a busy looking Mossend Yard on 29 October 1991. <br><br>[Bill Roberton 29/10/1991]](/images/36000/36948.jpg "Mossend")
![SPT liveried 314209 passing through Mossend Yard in July 1996 heading for Motherwell.<br><br>[John Furnevel 01/07/1996]](/images/5000/5910.jpg "Mossend Marshalling Yard")
![Looking north through Mossend Yard in 1996 with the locomotive holding sidings in the right background.<br><br>[John Furnevel 01/07/1996]](/images/5000/5911.jpg "Mossend Marshalling Yard")
![A class 37 brings a freight into the south end of Mossend yard in the summer of 1996.<br><br>[John Furnevel 01/07/1996]](/images/41000/41984.jpg "Mossend")
![The (then) new sidings for opencast coal being laid in at Stirling Road in 2000. The branch to Costain runs round to the left. Both are now closed.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //2000]](/images/56000/56797.jpg "Stirling Road")
![A 156 heads south through Mossend Yard in 2001. <br><br>[Ewan Crawford //2001]](/images/52000/52600.jpg "Mossend North Junction")
![Since removal of the bing at the north end of Mossend Yard it has become much harder to get an overview of the yard. This was my attempt in 2001. The Euroterminal is on the left.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //2001]](/images/52000/52608.jpg "Mossend Marshalling Yard")
![Freight at Mossend East Junction in 2002.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //2002]](/images/17000/17556.jpg "Fullwood Junction")
![Freightliner-hauled container train passing Mossend East Junction in 2002.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford //2002]](/images/17000/17567.jpg "Fullwood Junction")
![Dalzell Steelworks, Motherwell, viewed over the West Coast mainline. This works has a long association with railways. By the time I knew it, in the late 1980s, it was served from Ravenscraig, the approach from the WCML having fallen out of use. Today it is a relaid WCML link which is used. View north on 29th of March, 2004.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford 29/03/2004]](/images/33000/33416.jpg "Dalzell")
![An Edinburgh Waverley - Glasgow Central via Shotts train calls at Carfin in February 2006. View west towards Holytown Junction from the B7066 road bridge.<br><br>[John Furnevel 13/02/2006]](/images/6000/6861.jpg "Carfin")
![Holytown looking east 2006.<br><br>[John Furnevel 13/02/2006]](/images/10000/10431.jpg "Holytown")
![An eastbound coal train rumbles through Holytown station in February 2006. The edge of the former bay platform can be seen on the left and what is now open ground to the south of the station once accommodated a sizeable yard. The train is signalled for the Cleland & Midcalder line at Holytown Junction.<br><br>[John Furnevel 13/02/2006]](/images/22000/22593.jpg "Holytown")
![SPT liveried 318267 pulls away from Holytown station in February 2006 with a Milngavie - Lanark service.<br><br>[John Furnevel 13/02/2006]](/images/39000/39980.jpg "Holytown")
![The Network Rail monitoring and measurement train speeds south through Shieldmuir station in March 2006.<br><br>[John Furnevel 22/03/2006]](/images/7000/7236.jpg "Shieldmuir")
![A northbound train from Lanark heading for Glasgow about to call at Shieldmuir station on 22 March 2006. The huge Shieldmuir Royal Mail depot now occupies the area in the right background.<br><br>[John Furnevel 22/03/2006]](/images/7000/7237.jpg "Shieldmuir")
![A Lanark - Dalmuir train, formed by unit 318266, pulls into Shieldmuir station on 22 March 2006.<br><br>[John Furnevel 22/03/2006]](/images/7000/7247.jpg "Shieldmuir")
![A view taken from the bing a short distance down the out of use branch from Jerviston Junction (New) to the former BSC Ravenscraig Number 3 Sidings. The works were on the skyline above the track and have been completely demolished as have the BSC Clydesdale works which were out of shot to the left. (Photograph taken to compare with that in RAIL 590 page 70 by C P Whitbread - although the view here continues to the right to show the still standing Dalzell Steelworks. Due to tree growth the angle is not quite the same and the railings on the bridge have been removed!) <br/><br/>The location is interesting as the bridge betrays that this was the site of a junction - the left side is a girder and the right masonary. The route to Ravenscraig is the newer one (originally slightly different alignment of junction serving Cleekhimin Colliery then closed then re-aligned and re-opened as an approach to Dalzell and Lanarkshire steelworks) and the lifted line which ran to the right was the original Wishaw and Coltness Railway alignment running south to Motherwell and beyond over a large and now demolished viaduct.<br><br>[Ewan Crawford 10/05/2008]](/images/19000/19101.jpg "Jerviston Junction (Old)")
![A Glasgow Central - Edinburgh Waverley service, formed by 156 478 calls at Carfin on 17 September 2008.<br><br>[David Panton 17/09/2008]](/images/20000/20735.jpg "Carfin")
![Sections of the former Merry Street bridge in the process of being transferred from road to rail at Mossend Euroterminal in preparation for their journey north to the Strathspey Railway on 3 October.<br><br>[Mick Golightly 03/10/2008]](/images/20000/20967.jpg "Mossend")
![A 6-car 334 set pulls into Shieldmuir with the hourly Lanark direct service on 29 April. A new housing development is now underway on land off to the left once occupied by part of the former steelworks.<br><br>[David Panton 29/04/2009]](/images/23000/23464.jpg "Shieldmuir")
![Looking north at Whifflet South Junction. The distant unit, on the right, is located roughly where the Wishaw and Coltness Railway connected with the Monkland and Kirkintilloch Railway. Whifflet South was the starting point for the line to Gartsherrie built by the Garnkirk and Glasgow Railway which avoided the M&K route to Gartsherrie. The unit is lying over out of the way of the mainline between trips to Glasgow [thanks MB].<br><br>[Ewan Crawford 26/09/2009]](/images/25000/25597.jpg "Whifflet South Junction")
![The 'Watsonhead' coal loading pad was built just shy of the former Wishaw and Coltness terminus at Morningside when a short section of the former line was re-opened from Stirling Road. Historically the W&C line was continued on ultimately to Bathgate by the Wilsontown, Morningside and Coltness (the uneasy relationship demonstrated by the fact there were two Morningside stations on either side of a roadbridge for the two companies, later the Caley and NB). The loading pad was to be removed after Watsonhead opencast was worked out but is still in place, albeit somewhat overgrown, presumably due to a number of other opencast possibilities in the area. The view looks west towards Morningside Junction at Stirling Road. Formerly the branch to the Chapel Colliery was to the left, the passenger line to Newmains to the right and Morningside (Caledonian) station and a branch to the Allanton Brickworks and collieries behind the camera. [See image 29594]<br><br>[Ewan Crawford 27/06/2010]](/images/29000/29593.jpg "Morningside (Caledonian)")
![GBRf 66723 <I>'Chinook'</I> rumbles through Holytown on 3 June with the 6S45 North Blyth to Fort William Alcan tanks.<br><br>[Ken Browne 03/06/2011]](/images/34000/34403.jpg "Holytown")
![DBS 92019 <I>'Wagner'</I> heads through Holytown on 3 June with the 6V15 Mossend - Didcot.<br><br>[Ken Browne 03/06/2011]](/images/34000/34410.jpg "Holytown")
![WCRC 47790 powers through Holytown with 1Z34 the <I>Northern Belle</I> tour returning south on 3 June 2011.<br><br>[Ken Browne 03/06/2011]](/images/34000/34426.jpg "Holytown")
![The 4M74 Coatbridge FLT to Crewe Basford Hall containers passing through Holytown station on 14 July 2015 behind Freightliner locomotives 86607+86613. <br><br>[Ken Browne 14/07/2015]](/images/52000/52390.jpg "Holytown")
![DRS 68002 with Motherwell - Edinburgh ECS through Holytown on 15 July 2015. <br><br>[Ken Browne 15/07/2015]](/images/52000/52401.jpg "Holytown")
![DBS 66176 arrives in Motherwell Up Goods Loop with steel slabs from Tees New Yard on 26 October. It will then veer left into Dalzell Works.<br><br>[Bill Roberton 26/10/2015]](/images/53000/53020.jpg "Dalzell Steelworks")
![WCR 47245 works 0Z92 through Holytown from Fort William to Steamtown Carnforth.<br><br>[Ken Browne 09/03/2017]](/images/58000/58415.jpg "Holytown")
![DB Cargo no.66103 passes Holytown working 4E99 from Mossend Euroterminal to Tees Dock BSC Export Berth<br><br>[Ken Browne 09/03/2017]](/images/58000/58451.jpg "Holytown")
