Douglas Basin open cast washery, loader and bunker on old line formation.
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Muirkirk Branch This line is closed. |
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Douglas Basin open cast washery, loader and bunker on old line formation. |
This line runs through what is today countryside. The population is low a former mining communities remain at Douglas.
From Douglas Station to Muirkirk Station. The line was single track with passing places.
This station was not convenient for the town of Douglas. When the Douglas Branch (Caledonian Railway) was extended west the station here was re-named Happendon.
This was a west facing junction with the Muirkirk and Lesmahagow Junction Railway which joined the line from the north. The Muirkirk line is now a road to access the Dalquhandy opencast coal site, but the north running line remains as a grassy trackbed.
This station was not convenient for the town of Douglas, but better than the former Douglas station. The station was uphill and to the north of the town. To the east of the station were a number of coalmines. The mounds of the former platforms and the base of the goods shed can still be found here. The stationmasters house is still in use as a house.
The Kennox Coop colliery branch left the west end of the station and ran easterly, but higher, with the line towards Douglas.
This was the station for Glenbuck, which was about half a mile north of the station. The former passenger timber platform and goods platforms remain here. Glenbuck has been given over to opencast mining and demolished.
This is the second Muirkirk station and was built when the Caledonian Railway branch reached Muirkirk. The original was on the west side of the road. In Muirkirk the line formed an end on junction with the Muirkirk Branch (Glasgow and South Western Railway). The first half mile or so from the new station running east was usd to connect coal mines to the original branch. About a mile to the east of the station was a west facng junction for the Spireslack branch. This junction never opened but the branch was used from its far end (Bankhead and Coalburn) to access coalmines by Glenbuck. The Caledonian Railway used the Glasgow and South Western Railway's locomotive shed here.