Coursington Road Junction

Location type

Junction

Name and dates

Coursington Road Junction (1900-1930)

Opened on the Motherwell New Lines (Caledonian Railway).

Description

This was a double track junction controlled by a signal box on the east side of the junction, just south of the Coursington Road over bridge. Trains approaching from the north could go south west to the Dalzell Steel Works or south east to Lanarkshire Steel Works and on to Shields Colliery Junction. Immediately to the north of the road bridge were sidings for a pumping station (west) and Coursington Boiler Works (east), both approached from the junction. A little to the north the line crossed the South Calder Water.

The line received its Act in 1890, a route from Jerviston Junction, to the north, to Shields Colliery Junction. A connection to the Dalzell Steel Works was also approved along with the doubling of that line through Park Street to Motherwell, just south of the new station.

The 1912 OS map shows the Dalzell route disconnected at the junction, but by the time of the 1939 map the connection has been made but the box has gone. The signal box had closed in 1930. The line north to Jerviston Junction had ceased to be a through route, the portion just north Coursington Road and over the South Calder was retained to reach a large slag tip stretching eastwards on the north side of the South Calder viaduct. This had been a tip prior to 1930, but was previously approached from the north.

The tip remained in use until the late 1950s, which was around the time the northern portion of the line was revived as the northern approach to the new Ravenscraig Steel Works, cutting through the tip site. The route via Coursington Road was not reused.

The road bridge remains at Coursington Road and nearby piers of the bridge over the South Calder.

Tags

Junction

External links

NLS Collection OS map of 1892-1914
NLS Collection OS map of 1944-67
NLS Map
NLS Map
07/07/2019