BRITISH RAILWAY LOCOMOTIVE DEPOTS, WORKS AND STABLING POINTS.
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IPSWICH LOCOMOTIVE DEPOT (32B/IP) - In June 1846 by the Eastern Union Railway built the first locoshed at Ipswich. This was south of the current station, before Belstead Tunnel was built in 1860, when a new station was opened on the current site. The locoshed, a 4-road building on the old station site, was always cramped and poorly equipped with every day servicing of engines taking place in the open. At the end of 1922 the shed at Ipswich had an allocation of 131 locomotives being the third biggest shed on the Great Eastern behind Stratford (555) and Cambridge (178) sheds. After the Grouping, whilst Great Eastern types provided the majority of the types allocated to Ipswich shed, newer LNE types and engines from other LNER constituent companies were allocated. The shed was completely rebuilt in 1954 into a concrete 6-track straight through road shed. In 1959 Ipswich received its first allocation of mainline diesels and in that June, Class J19 0-6-0 No.64641 was the last steam locomotive to be repaired at the depot. Dieselisation came early to East Anglia and on March 5th, 1960, Class J15 0-6-0 No.65389 worked the last steam goods train from Ipswich shed to Snape. However a pair of Class B1 4-6-0's (61059 numbered Departmental No.17 and 61252 numbered No.22) were retained as a carriage heating units until November 1963. In 1963, 55 diesel locomotives were allocated to Ipswich, 12 shunting loco's, 9 Class 15's, 12 Class 24's and 22 Class 31's. The depot closed in May 1968 and fuelling and light repair facilities were moved to the station yard. During the early 1980's the site was used as the electrification depot for the extension of the overhead wiring from Colchester to Harwich, Ipswich and Norwich. After closure of the depot the Carriage and Wagon Works continued for many years closing in 1994. The site today is occupied by a housing estate. The stock sidings west of the station are still open, operated by Freightliner and also used to store some of the EMU's on used on local services. A new depot is under construction in 2022 in the old goods yard to house the new fleet of Class 720 EMU's currently entering service. Seen here are the stabling sidings in July 1977 with 03158 on the fuellers and a hybrid DMU stabled in the sidings. This end of the DMU is Class 100 but I think the other end might be a Class 105.