The British Rail Class 502 was a type of electric multiple-unit passenger train, originally built by the
London, Midland and Scottish Railway
The London, Midland and Scottish Railway (LMSIt has been argued that the initials LMSR should be used to be consistent with LNER, GWR and SR. The London, Midland and Scottish Railway's corporate image used LMS, and this is what is generally u ...
at its
Derby Works
The Derby Works comprised a number of British manufacturing facilities designing and building locomotives and rolling stock in Derby, England. The first of these was a group of three maintenance sheds opened around 1840 behind Derby station. Th ...
. Introduced in 1940 and withdrawn by 1980, they spent the whole of their working lives on the electrified railway lines north of
Liverpool
Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. With a population of in 2019, it is the 10th largest English district by population and its metropolitan area is the fifth largest in the United Kingdom, with a popul ...
.
The trains were designed to replace older electric trains built by the
Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway
The Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway (L&YR) was a major British railway company before the 1923 Grouping. It was incorporated in 1847 from an amalgamation of several existing railways. It was the third-largest railway system based in northern ...
on the lines from
Liverpool Exchange railway station
Liverpool Exchange railway station was a railway station located in the city centre of Liverpool, England. Of the four terminal stations in Liverpool's city centre, Exchange station was the only station not accessed via a tunnel.
The station w ...
to
Southport
Southport is a seaside town in the Metropolitan Borough of Sefton in Merseyside, England. At the 2001 census, it had a population of 90,336, making it the eleventh most populous settlement in North West England.
Southport lies on the Irish ...
and
Ormskirk
Ormskirk is a market town in the West Lancashire district of Lancashire, England, north of Liverpool, northwest of St Helens, southeast of Southport and southwest of Preston. Ormskirk is known for its gingerbread.
Geography and administr ...
. These lines were electrified with a
direct current
Direct current (DC) is one-directional flow of electric charge. An electrochemical cell is a prime example of DC power. Direct current may flow through a conductor such as a wire, but can also flow through semiconductors, insulators, or even ...
(DC) third rail. The Class 502s entered service between 1940 and 1943. They were DC-only and operated as both three-car and two-car sets, which could be coupled together to form five-car or six-car sets for use on the busier services.
Design
A very modern design for the time, they were equipped with air-operated sliding doors. They were similar to (but somewhat larger than) the
Class 503s operating in
Wirral, being both longer and wider, allowing 3+2 seating on the Southport 502s compared to 2+2 seating on the Wirral 503s. In addition the 502s had distinctive large resistance cooling grids mounted on top of the cab roof of the motor units. Virtually all electric suburban passenger trains in Great Britain now follow the basic layout pioneered by the Class 502s and 503s, with two sets of double-leaf air operated sliding doors on each side of each carriage.
Build
Unlike the Wirral Class 503s, which were built by contractors familiar with this type of layout on London Underground trains, the 502s which followed shortly afterwards were built by the LMS's own workshops in Derby. The 502s had conventional railway buffers at the end of each set, as they did a considerable amount of interworking with steam and later diesel services, whereas the 503s in Wirral had automatic Buckeye couplers and no buffers, as they did very little inter-running with services from outside. The Class 502s were considerably more powerful than their Wirral counterparts,
having four traction motors.
Interiors
The interiors of the Class 502s contained varnished wood,
tungsten lighting
An incandescent light bulb, incandescent lamp or incandescent light globe is an electric light with a wire filament heated until it glows. The filament is enclosed in a glass bulb with a vacuum or inert gas to protect the filament from oxidat ...
and deep-sprung seating.
Apart from the construction differences with the Class 503s, both types of train were given heavy overhauls at Horwich works, and the common red/black/grey seat moquette, and grey paint used on the interiors, plus other common details, gave them a considerable air of similarity.
Route changes
Liverpool Exchange station closed in 1977, being replaced by new underground stations at
Moorfields
Moorfields was an open space, partly in the City of London, lying adjacent to – and outside – its northern wall, near the eponymous Moorgate. It was known for its marshy conditions, the result of the defensive wall acting like a dam, i ...
and
Liverpool Central
Liverpool Central railway station in Liverpool, England, forms a central hub of the Merseyrail network, being on both the Northern Line and the Wirral Line. The station is located underground on two levels, below the site of a former mainline ...
as part of the
Northern Line
The Northern line is a London Underground line that runs from North London to South London. It is printed in black on the Tube map. The Northern line is unique on the Underground network in having two different routes through central London, two ...
of the
Merseyrail
Merseyrail is a commuter rail network serving the Liverpool City Region and adjacent areas of Cheshire and Lancashire. Merseyrail operates 66 railway stations across two lines – the Northern Line and Wirral Line, which are dedicated electri ...
network. The electrification was also extended to
Kirkby
Kirkby ( ) is a town in the Metropolitan Borough of Knowsley, Merseyside, England. The town, historically in Lancashire, has a size of is north of Huyton and north-east of Liverpool. The population in 2016 was 41,495 making it the largest ...
, on the Wigan line, to the north-east of the city and
Garston, to the south-east, using Class 502s. The units struggled to cope with the challenging
gradients
In vector calculus, the gradient of a scalar-valued differentiable function of several variables is the vector field (or vector-valued function) \nabla f whose value at a point p is the "direction and rate of fastest increase". If the gradi ...
in the new underground sections, which are as steep as 1 in 30 in places, and their reliability suffered.
Depots
The principal depot was in Southport, on the Preston / Manchester lines at Meols Cop.
In the mid-20th century there was a triangle, and the works were situated in the middle. The Preston line closed in the mid-1960s, and the electrified lines from Southport to Meols Cop remained for a further six years, to enable the Merseyrail 502 stock to reach the depot under their own power. Meols Cop closed in 1970.
Servicing was then continued at
Birkenhead North depot.
Hall Road also had a maintenance depot,
which conducted minor repairs,
and sidings to the north of station; and at the side of the depot. Stabling points were also situated outside Southport Chapel Street station and at Bank Hall,
to the west of the four live running tracks. The Bank Hall stabling point fell into disuse prior to the Loop and Link extensions of the 1970s and was replaced by
Kirkdale depot in 1976.
Numbering
British Railways numbers were:
* Driving Motor Brake Second, M28311M-M28369M
* Trailer Second, M29545M-M29594M
* Trailer Second (built as Trailer Composite), M29812M-M29820M
* Driving Trailer Composite, M29866M-M29899M
Formation
These formed, notionally, 34 3-car units Motor-Trailer-Driving Trailer, and 25 2-car units Motor-Trailer. The 2-car units only had a driving cab at one end and could not be operated on their own, only coupled to one of the 3-car units,
which was an unusual feature of this stock. It was normal to form the main 5-car sets with the motor cars at the outer ends of the formation, and the trailer coupled to the driving trailer in the centre. The 6-car sets were formed with motor cars at the outer ends of the formation with the driving trailers coupled together in the centre.
There were a number of different formations used, but 5-car sets were usual on the main Southport and Ormskirk routes, with a couple of the busiest peak trains being 6-car, formed of two three-car units coupled together. The Crossens shuttle was a 3-car unit, or a specially formed Motor-Driving Trailer 2-car unit.
As initially built there was considerable overprovision of first class accommodation, which usually ran virtually empty on these routes. This is an issue seen on some other suburban routes as well. Composite trailers 29812 to 29817 were converted to all-second in 1950 and renumbered. The remaining 3 composite trailers (29818 to 29820) and 29814 were converted to driving composites trailers, with a new cab constructed to match the original 1939 to 1941 design. These conversions allowed more three car units to be formed allowing for greater operational flexibility. The leading saloon of the driving composite trailers was downrated to second class non-smoking in the late 1960s. This saloon was the first class non-smoking section. An additional full width partition, with door, was built across the middle saloon so that approximately one third of this saloon (cab end) became the non-smoking first class section. First class provision was finally withdrawn on these routes in the early 1970s.
Livery
The units were painted various colours over the years. When initially built in 1939, they were the standard LMS maroon red. After railway nationalisation in the late 1940s units were repainted in light malachite green and further repainting from the 1950s to the standard BR dark green for EMUs. Towards the end of their green days, the units gained yellow warning panels on cab ends. When BR changed their liveries in the mid-1960s the units were repainted plain
Rail Blue
The history of British Rail's corporate liveries is quite complex. Although from the mid-1960s to the 1980s the organisation was associated with "Rail Blue", a number of other schemes were also used, especially when it was split into operating u ...
, continuing with the small yellow warning panel and eventually gaining full yellow ends, the white 'double arrow' British Rail symbol was carried on the DMBS only, continuing the tradition of the green livery of only carrying the BRITISH RAILWAYS symbols on motor coaches. First class lining and '1' numerals appeared on the bodyside next to the middle saloon of driving trailer composites, this was removed when the units were downrated to all second on 3 May, 1971 and 'Merseyrail' branding appeared on the centre lower body panels of all coaches with the formation of the passenger transport executive shortly after. Towards the end of their life, in the late 1970s, they were repainted again in their first two-tone livery, the standard blue and grey, in which scheme they were withdrawn. Following withdrawal, two reinstated departmental units were repainted with wasp stripes on the cab ends.
Withdrawal and preservation
Withdrawal
Units started being withdrawn from 1950.
From 1978, new
Class 507 units began to arrive on the network and the 502s, which by now were considered life-expired, were gradually withdrawn. The final regular passenger service was on 1 September 1980, with a farewell tour five days later.
The last set was withdrawn in November 1980.
Two DMBS cars were reinstated in 1981 for departmental duties, and allocated to
Hall Road.
The departmental units were renumbered from M28354 and M28357
to ADB977017 and ADB977018, respectively, and kept at Kirkdale until 1986.
All cars, except for one two-car set, were scrapped.
Preservation
A two-car set (driving motor 28361 and driving trailer 29896)
was claimed for preservation by the
National Railway Museum
The National Railway Museum is a museum in York forming part of the Science Museum Group. The museum tells the story of rail transport in Britain and its impact on society. It is the home of the national collection of historically significant r ...
. For many years the unit was kept at the
Steamport centre in
Southport
Southport is a seaside town in the Metropolitan Borough of Sefton in Merseyside, England. At the 2001 census, it had a population of 90,336, making it the eleventh most populous settlement in North West England.
Southport lies on the Irish ...
, where it was restored to original LMS condition, complete with maroon livery. It operated occasional special services on the Merseyrail electric network for several years in the 1980s. However, when Steamport closed, the NRM were unable to find an alternative location to display it, and relocated the unit to remote storage at
MoD Kineton
Defence Munitions (DM) Kineton occupies the site officially known as MOD Kineton, and is a Ministry of Defence property located close to the village of Kineton, Warwickshire, England.
History
Developed from 1941 onwards on land neighbouring th ...
.
In early 2007, it was suggested that the NRM was considering disposing of this unit as it no longer featured as part of its long-term plans. In response, a new preservation group (The Friends of the 502) was formed, with the aim of taking over responsibility for the unit's upkeep. In May 2009 the unit was moved by road to a private site in
Tebay
Tebay is a village and civil parish in Cumbria, England, within the historic borders of Westmorland. It lies in the upper Lune Valley, at the head of the Lune Gorge. The parish had a population of 728 in the 2001 census, increasing to 776 at th ...
,
Cumbria
Cumbria ( ) is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in North West England, bordering Scotland. The county and Cumbria County Council, its local government, came into existence in 1974 after the passage of the Local Government Act 1972. Cumb ...
. In March 2012, following re-development of the site, the unit was moved to the base of the Merseyside Transport Trust in
Burscough
Burscough () is a town and civil parish in West Lancashire in the ceremonial county of Lancashire, England. It is located to the north of Ormskirk and northwest of Skelmersdale.
The parish also includes the hamlet of Tarlscough and the Martin M ...
,
Lancashire
Lancashire ( , ; abbreviated Lancs) is the name of a historic county, ceremonial county, and non-metropolitan county in North West England. The boundaries of these three areas differ significantly.
The non-metropolitan county of Lancashi ...
. This move means that the unit is under cover for the first time in 15 years.
References
Sources
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Further reading
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External links
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{{British Rail EMU
502
__NOTOC__
Year 502 ( DII) was a common year starting on Tuesday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Avienus and Probus (or, less frequently, year 1255 ' ...
Rail transport in Merseyside
Train-related introductions in 1939