Signalman's house, potato shed and small waiting room at Ballyward railway station

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Collection of buildings of c.1906 originally belonging to Ballyward Railway Station, including the signalman’s house, [?cattle] shed and a small waiting room. The grouping is set to N of Station Road, roughly 5 miles NE of Castlewellan.

1. Signalman’s house

The former signalman’s house is relatively small and plain with gabled roof, roughcast façade and small porch. Originally it matched the (former) stationmaster’s house a distance to the W, but unlike the latter it has been modernised in recent years, with a large extension added to the rear, modern (mainly top hung) windows installed, and a large flat roofed garage built against the E side.

The façade is finished in roughcast render with in-out quoins and a sill course. The gabled roof is covered in fibre cement slates and has an overhang with plain barges and boxed in eaves and verge. Plain rendered chimneystack to W of centre of ridge of main section of roof. The rw goods appear to be PVC.

The front elevation is asymmetrical and faces S. To the right of centre is a small gabled porch with slated overhanging roof with plain barges. To the W face of the porch is a panelled and glazed door set within a segmental arched recess. To the S (gabled) face of the porch is a window opening with segmental arch head and modern frame. The E face is blank. To the left of the porch (on main façade) there are two windows as before.

The W gable is blank, as is the E. The right hand edge of the E gable is abutted by a modern flat roofed garage. The writer could not see the rear elevation in its entirety; however the original gabled projection appears either been demolished or enlarged.

2. Potato shed

A distance to the E of the house is a large single storey timber-built structure, [believed to have been originally a potato shed], with a curved (Belfast truss) roof. The curved roof is covered in corrugated iron and has an overhang with boxed in eaves.

To the long N elevation are three large timber sheeted double doors.

The short E elevation is blank. To the left hand end of the W elevation is a timber sheeted pedestrian door with a small adjoining window with security bars over.

The dimensions of the potato shed are roughly 18m x 7.8.

Next to the left hand side of the S elevation there is what looks like a cattle (or sheep) run and a pen with concrete posts, metal rails etc [presumably the shed was used latterly for livestock]. To the centre of the actual façade there is a pedestrian door and, to right of this, two high level window openings with timber shutters.

3. Small waiting room to north

A distance to the NE of the shed, (N of the N platform), there is a very small single storey mono-pitched roof, brick-built building which was probably originally a waiting room (the former main waiting room / ticket office is on the S platform). The roof has a shallow mono-pitch, but the writers could not see what it was covered with.

To the symmetrical S elevation of this there is a central timber sheeted door (which does not look original) with boarded sidelight and fanlight areas. To the left of the doorway there is a two light window with curved corners to each light. There is an identical window to the right hand side of the doorway. Both windows are now quite dilapidated and partly boarded over. The doorway and the windows share the same continuous concrete lintel.

To the short W face is a small narrow central single light window (partly boarded over). The E and rear elevations are both blank.
The façade is in red brick with a concrete coping.

Historical information

Ballyward railway station formed part of the line between Ballyroney and Newcastle. This line was opened in 1906 and was jointly operated by the Great Northern Railway and the Belfast & County Down Railway. The buildings themselves are believed to have been designed by the GNR’s company engineer, William Henry Mills. The line (which for the last five years of its life was run solely by the GNR) closed in 1955. After this, the Ballyward station buildings were acquired by private owners, and the houses occupied as private dwellings. The potato shed appears to have been used latterly for livestock.

For background information about the Belfast Roof Trusses, see HB18/08/139.

References- Primary sources
1 PRONI OS/6/2/35/4 OS map, 6in County series, Co Down, sh 35, 1921

Secondary sources
1 S. Maxwell Hajducki, ‘A railway atlas of Ireland’, (David & Charles, Devon, 1974), map 9
2 H.C. Casserley, ‘Outline of Irish railway history’ (David & Charles, Devon, 1974), p.225
3 W.A. McCutcheon, ‘The industrial archaeology of Northern Ireland’, (Belfast, 1980), p.161

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

Not listed

Criteria for listing: historic interest

Not listed

Evaluation

Collection of buildings of c.1906 originally belonging to Ballyward Railway Station, including the recently modernised single storey signalman’s house, a large, wooden-built curved roof potato shed, (which appears to have been latterly used for livestock) and a very small brick-built waiting room.

General comments

Additional information added in connection with the Belfast Roof Truss Survey.