South Gosforth Traction Maintenance Depot is a vehicle cleaning, maintenance and stabling facility used by the

Tyne and Wear Metro The Tyne and Wear Metro is an overground and underground light rail rapid transit system serving Newcastle upon Tyne, Gateshead, North Tyneside, South Tyneside, and the City of Sunderland (together forming Tyne and Wear). The owners Nexus have ...

, located in

Gosforth Gosforth is an area of Newcastle upon Tyne, England, situated north of the Newcastle City Centre, City Centre. It constituted a separate Urban district (Great Britain and Ireland), urban district of Northumberland from 1895 until 1974 before of ...

Newcastle upon Tyne Newcastle upon Tyne, or simply Newcastle ( , Received Pronunciation, RP: ), is a City status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city and metropolitan borough in Tyne and Wear, England. It is England's northernmost metropolitan borough, located o ...

Tyne and Wear Tyne and Wear () is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in North East England. It borders Northumberland to the north and County Durham to the south, and the largest settlement is the city of Newcastle upon Tyne. The county is ...

, England. The depot is located in a triangle of land between

Longbenton Longbenton is a district of North Tyneside, in the county of Tyne and Wear, England. It is largely occupied by an extensive estate originally built as municipal housing by Newcastle City Council in the 1930s and extended in the 1950s. It is ser ...

Regent Centre Regent Centre is a large business park and residential complex in Gosforth, Newcastle upon Tyne, England. The business park is home to a variety of companies, including banking group Virgin Money UK, Virgin Money whose Head Office is located on t ...

and South Gosforth, and can be accessed by trains from both east and west. There is also a depot avoiding line running from east to west, which is not regularly used in public service.

History

Pre-Tyne and Wear Metro

In 1904, the North Eastern Railway (NER) started to electrify some of its lines in what is now

, using the third rail system. Initially electric trains operated only from Newcastle New Bridge Street to Benton station, but in stages electrification was extended to create the system known as the

Tyneside Electrics The Tyneside Electrics were the suburban railways on Tyneside that the North Eastern Railway and the London and North Eastern Railway electrified using the third rail system. The North Tyneside Loop was electrified from 1904 onwards and formed ...

. The trains for this system were, at first, stabled at carriage sheds in Heaton. The year after the first electric trains ran, the single-track branch line of the Gosforth and Ponteland Railway was opened, connecting to the NER line by a triangular junction just north of South Gosforth station. The line closed to passengers in 1929, only to reopen as part of the Metro, but freight services continuing to serve the line until the late 1980s, latterly sharing the track with Metro trains. In 1918, a fire broke out at the Heaton carriage sheds, which destroyed the building, as well as 34 units. A replacement depot was required, and the NER acquired a site on the northern side of the South Gosforth triangular junction in 1921. The replacement depot opened in October 1923. At the time, there were ten lines in the depot building, with a further two serving the repair shop. The depot was originally used to house rolling stock for the Tyneside Electrics network, which served

Gateshead Gateshead () is a town in the Gateshead Metropolitan Borough of Tyne and Wear, England. It is on the River Tyne's southern bank. The town's attractions include the twenty metre tall Angel of the North sculpture on the town's southern outskirts, ...

North North is one of the four compass points or cardinal directions. It is the opposite of south and is perpendicular to east and west. ''North'' is a noun, adjective, or adverb indicating Direction (geometry), direction or geography. Etymology T ...

and

South Tyneside South Tyneside is a metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of Tyne and Wear, England. It is bordered by all four other boroughs in Tyne and Wear: Gateshead to the west, Sunderland in the south, North Tyneside to the north and Newcastl ...

. Owing to falling passenger numbers during the 1960s, as well as rising costs, and the need to renew life expired infrastructure and rolling stock, the network was de-electrified and converted to

diesel multiple unit A diesel multiple unit or DMU is a multiple-unit train powered by on-board diesel engines. A DMU requires no separate locomotive, as the engines are incorporated into one or more of the carriages. Diesel-powered single-unit railcars are also ...

operation in 1967. Following this, Class 101, 104 and

105 105 may refer to: *105 (number), the number * AD 105, a year in the 2nd century AD * 105 BC, a year in the 2nd century BC * 105 (telephone number), the emergency telephone number in Mongolia * 105 (MBTA bus), a Massachusetts Bay Transport Authority ...

diesel multiple units were a common sight at the depot.

Tyne and Wear Metro

In 1978, passenger service on the North Tyneside Loop ceased, in order to facilitate its conversion to become part of the

. The South Gosforth depot was transferred to the Metro in 1980, and has been used by them since then for stabling, cleaning, maintenance and repair of the current fleet of class 599 ''Metrocar'', as well as an increasing number of class 555 ''Metro'', which are yet to enter service. In October 2020, prior to the arrival of the new class 555 rolling stock and the depot refurbishment needed to accommodate them, the Howdon satellite depot was constructed near

Howdon Howdon is a largely residential area in the eastern part of Wallsend, Tyne and Wear, England. It consists of High Howdon and the smaller settlement of East Howdon. Much of the High Howdon area was formerly called Willington prior to post-World W ...

North Tyneside North Tyneside is a metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of Tyne and Wear, England. It forms part of the greater Tyneside conurbation. North Tyneside Council is headquartered at Cobalt Park, Wallsend. North Tyneside is bordered by Ne ...

. The site is currently being used as a temporary stabling and maintenance facility for up to 10 units. As part of a £70 million depot refurbishment project, the first phase of demolition of the depot was completed in May 2021, with final closure in January 2023. Construction of the new depot was completed in January 2024. The new facility provides facilities for preventative and corrective maintenance, overhauls, train presentation, storage space for parts and materials supplies and office space for training and support functions. In addition, there are inspection roads and pits, a separate wheel lathe building, a wash-plant to clean train exteriors, a component drop, monorail cranes on light maintenance roads, an overhead crane on heavy maintenance roads for lifting roof components and a new control room to manage train movements.

Notes

References

External links

* {{Tyne and Wear Metro network Railway depots in England Transport infrastructure completed in 1923 Tyne and Wear Metro 1923 establishments in England