Inside a tiny house on the train tracks that ‘could have been swept away’

A tiny house on the train tracks is one of the last of its kind on the railway line.

The cottage on Portland Street is one of the last vestiges of Southport’s first railway station, which was based there in 1848. Back then, the cottage was used as the former stationmaster’s house and also had an adjacent ticket office.

It remained so until the station closed in August 1851, when the train line was extended around the corner into Chapel Street, welcoming passengers to the growing seaside resort of Southport. After the station closed, the little cottage became the home of a crossing guard and their family who looked after the level crossing.

The cottage later became the home of a railway staff member. Today it is used by the Southport Model Railway Society, who lease the building from Network Rail.

READ MORE: Inside a £3.5 million Hollywood Hills style home in an affluent village

READ MORE: Liverpool’s next mini heatwave will last a whole week

The ECHO was invited to take a look inside the cottage as part of our Behind the Doors series, which takes a closer look at some of the region’s much-loved buildings. You can take a look inside the property with the photos below.

Southport Model Railway Society president Tony Kuivala, 76, told the ECHO: “I’ve always had an interest in railways.

“We build and operate model railroads from small gauge to those you might see in a garden. I think it has more to do with letting go of the pressures of life. You meet like-minded people.

“It can be quite relaxed and social. The social interactions when you have two or three people working together.”

For many years the cottage on Portland Street was the home of a crossing guard who was responsible for opening and closing the gates at the level crossing. Railway enthusiast and photographer Martyn Hilbert, 66, told the ECHO: “In the early days of railways, when there was a level crossing, crossing guards tended to make a living.

“It wasn’t as dense as it is now – maybe there were only five or six trains a day, or as many as a dozen. The crossing guards used to live in the cabin with their family. They were available 24 hours a day. day until a train came.

“It’s incredible how people lived in such cramped conditions, but that’s how it was back then. The fact that they had the cabin provided by the railway company would have been quite a prestigious thing.

“As railways grew and signaling systems developed, lodgers’ cottages became redundant as signal boxes appeared.”

The gatekeeper’s cottage on Portland Street later became the home of a railway staff member. The cottage remained empty for around 15 years until the Southport Model Railway Society moved in in 1988.

Tony said: “It was a big decision within the railway as to whether the building should be demolished.”

Demolition of the cottage was estimated to cost around £20,000 in the 1980s and there was a dispute over who should cover this cost within the railway. Tony said: “They saw us coming as a solution to their problems. I got it in 1988 for £200 a week.

“We are a Grade II listed building dating back to 1848. History is what makes us special.”

CONTINUE READING