IT doesn't seem that long ago that railway enthusiasts could undertake visits to any number of huge diesel traction depots. One by one, those famous installations have been closed down and many have now been wiped off the face of the earth. Among those bulldozed in relatively recent times are Tinsley, Stratford, Gateshead, Eastfield, March, Bristol Bath Road and Old Oak Common. To that grisly litany can now be added one of the largest and most important of them all, Thornaby, which has been razed to the ground some four years after it closed. Situated a few miles west of the main line from Eaglescliffe to Middlesbrough and next to the once sprawling Tees marshalling yard, Thornaby featured the last roundhouse built by British Railways. It opened in June 1958 and replaced a number of local steam sheds at Stockton, Haverton Hill and Middlesbrough.
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