Perth Marshalling Yard

NO12NW 104 centred 102 251

Extends onto map sheet NO12SW.

For adjacent Almond Valley Junction, see NO12NW 105.

For Almond Valley Junction Signal Box (NO 10137 25246), see NO12NW 108.

The provision of new and technologically advanced marshalling yards in Scotland was a major feature of the 1955 Modernisation Plan for British Railways, being intended to replace a far greater number of smaller yards of simpler design and more limited capacity. The five Scottish locations selected for construction or development were Thornton (NT29NE 14.00) in Fife, Millerhill (NT37SW 1127) in Lothian, Perth, Cadder (NS67SW 55) to the NE of Glasgow, and Mossend (NS76SW 159) in South Lanarkshire. Of these, the yards at Perth and Thornton may be seen as a highly significant forerunners to the larger and later English yards.

Perth mechanised 'hump' marshalling yard was opened on 12 March 1962, and was situated 2 miles N of Perth station (NO12SW 192), on the 'down' (W) side of the line to Aberdeen and Inverness, and immediately S of Almond Valley Junction (NO12NW 105), onto the Crieff branch. It was constructed to service traffic to and from the Highlands, replacing four smaller yards at Perth, and causing a considerable diminution in operations at Aviemore and Stirling.

The yard was very sophisticated for its day, being fully mechanised using Westinghouse equipment based around a single hump, two sets of retarders, and radar-based control equipment of sufficient sensitivity to allow the hump shunting of large numbers of vans containing whisky.

The layout of this yard was constrained by its constricted location, the two sets of sidings being laid out alongside each other; the use of a headshunt was accepted for 'down' traffic. Six through reception roads were laid out alongside the main line and thirty sorting sidings (in five groups of six sidings) arranged towards the W. All these groups of sidings had access to the main line at the S end, but only two of them at the N end.

The yard typically handled 1300 wagons a day in 1962, with an extra 250 in the seed potato season. Extensive branch line closures and the cessation of the Strathmore route in the 1960's caused a steady diminution of traffic, so that the yard sees only small-scale residual use and its retention is uncertain.

(Illustrated with schematic plan, at unspecified date).

M Rhodes 1988.