Can anyone suggest a suitable route from Warriston Gardens (Inverleith Row) to Waverley Station. The Cycle Journey Planner takes me to the station entrance on Princes Street which will involve lugging a laden tourer down the steps into the station. Is there another entrance that is cycleable? Thanks for any help (I don't know Edinburgh very well at all.)
CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » Questions/Support/Help
Warriston Gardens to Waverley Station
(14 posts)- Started 13 years ago by lurob
- Latest reply from kaputnik
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Posted 13 years ago #
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There are two entrances on Waverley Bridge. The south one you mix it with taxis etc.
The one nearest Princes Street has a barrier which has a bypass.
Destination correct
http://edinburgh.cyclestreets.net/journey/196850
Not sure about the routing. I think people who update the OSM data can't cope with all the changes brought on by the tram works!
Posted 13 years ago # -
Thanks, I'm quite happy to walk the really dodgy bits (I'm more of a rural cyclist!)but just wanted to avoid big flights of stairs.
Posted 13 years ago # -
perhaps one day they'll complete the platform-level entry into Waverley from the North by re-opening the Scotland Street tunnel...
Posted 13 years ago # -
"perhaps one day they'll complete the platform-level entry into Waverley from the North by re-opening the Scotland Street tunnel..."
Won't happen - not least because it arrives at track level.
The idea of re-opening the tunnel to peds/cyclists from Scotland Yard was always a non-starter. Apart from the cost not that many people would like to be underground for so long to a single destination.
It's much longer (and I think steeper) than the Innocent Tunnel.
However in other cities some way would have been found to use it link Waverley and the bus station! There are plenty of longer walks underground in London.
A travelator would have been a useful way of encouraging integrated transport...
Posted 13 years ago # -
The idea of re-opening the tunnel to peds/cyclists from Scotland Yard was always a non-starter ... It's much longer (and I think steeper) than the Innocent Tunnel.
To avoid coming out of the tunnel and straight into a train leaving Platform 19, the tunnel would have to exit earlier (into the bowels of Waverley Market), exit in Waverley concourse (via the vaults), or exit above Waverley concourse (via the bowels of Waverley Market). Save for the access tunnel, it's all demolished and concreted up for about 45 metres, so construction would be a touch difficult.
I believe the Innocent Railway tunnel gradient is 1:30, while Scotland Street is 1:27.
Posted 13 years ago # -
The one nearest Princes Street has a barrier which has a bypass.
And an alarm if you try to squeeze through the gap on the other side and clonk the barrier as you go.
Posted 13 years ago # -
I didn't really know anything about the Scotland Street Tunnel until this thread; interesting stuff.
http://www.edinphoto.org.uk/1_edin_t/1_edinburgh_transport_railways_-_edinburgh-granton.htm
Posted 13 years ago # -
chdot is correct when he says it is steep - like a lot of early railways it was planned and built by engineers more used to canals who prefered alternating flat (e.g. canal) and inclined (e.g. locks) sections rather than more constant inclines (which don't really work on a canal!). The inclines were well beyond the capabilities of engines at the time so you here hauled up it on a rope. Similar story on the still-used tunnel that takes you into Queen Street station (which is why it floods so readily when it rains - you're at the bottom of a big pipe!
Posted 13 years ago # -
not surprised the photos from Scotland St Tunnel are from Nick Catford... Any of the Queen Street tunnel?
Posted 13 years ago # -
you can see a diagram of the tunnel on theRCAHMS site It has the originaldestination of "Canal Street" - the Union Canal terminated at Port Hopetoun / Dundas (what is now Lothian House and the Scottish Widows HQ building) short of the intended destination in what is now Princes St. I believe at one point there was a plan to take it all the way to The Port of Leith using a series of lock gates.
Have to admire those Victorian engineers for their ability to drive an arrow straight tunnel through hard rocks with a completely constant incline. Not like those mud, chalk and clay-diggers in London!
I can't find any inside the tunnel to QS, but you can see a few of the portal and the incline itself (which extends in a cutting well beyond the tunnel if you Google for "Cowlairs Tunnel"
Posted 13 years ago # -
Try this and click through all the pictures etc.
http://www.subbrit.org.uk/sb-sites/sites/s/scotland_street_tunnel/index.shtml
It is a shame to have such an antiquity lying dormant but as Arellcat says, if you make it through the air duct and get spat through the steel gate bars you are then playing roadkill with Network Rail at 90degrees!
Posted 13 years ago # -
"
prefered alternating flat and inclined sections rather than more constant inclines"
Never thought of railways in those terms. Thought they were more accidents of geography, politics and ownership.
Canals actually have to be level(!) The Union Canal is so winding because it avoided locks by following the contour (singular).
Certainly before steam locomotion, wagonways often had inclines.
Some were gravity operated - one nearby. "The line was built to give a steady downhill incline to the sea, even though this required the construction of a substantial embankment, so that loaded trains could be sent down by gravity under the control of a brakeman, and then horses would only be required for returning the empty wagons."
Cowlairs (as mentioned above) "This tunnel was worked as a rope-worked incline (latterly with the assistance of steam banking engines operating uphill) between 1842 and 1908."
Posted 13 years ago # -
Now I'm just being a bore, but the Dundee and Newtyle (one of Scotland's oldest railways) is a classic example of a canal-style railway...
I think there was also the combination of the lack of any suitable steam locomotives for early railways / waggonways and using a stationary engine for the uphills, horses for the flats and gravity for the downhills was a necessity. Also a lack of iron or steel rails for adhesion purposes didn't help...
I'll get me coat. Let's talk about bikes again :)
Posted 13 years ago #
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