Foss Bank

Following on from Trawden, a new layout was started, set alongside the river close to where I lived in York at the time, it bore the name Foss Bank. I had childhood memories of the idiosyncratic Derwent Valley light railway, and I wanted to capture some of the atmosphere of the route. Imagination came into play and conjured up the highly improbable Foss Valley Light Railway that connected with British Railways at Foss Bank. The rear half of what was a very simple layout represented the national rail network and the front track that snaked along the riverbank the FVLR.

Foss Bank sort of set me along the finescale route, still in OO but with SMP track and plastic based point kits. I'd started to attempt stock that was a little more refined and to scale dimensions than some of the previous models; here we see a rather basic conversion of the Hornby class 25 into something approaching a 24, remember this model, it'll crop up a bit later on. Again the buildings were scratchbuilt, but by now I'd settled on plasticard as the most suitable material.

At the far end of the layout, the Foss Valley offices are obviously inspired by those of the DVLR, as is the Drewery shunter. This as far as the FVLR was concerned was probably the high point of rolling stock construction being a Dapol (ex Airfix) kit body on top of a modified Mainline 03 chassis. I seem to remember that this was the first model that I flush glazed; it too is still in existence having been passed on to my friend Laurie when he started a layout based on a possible interchange with the Derwent Valley Light Railway.