A Class 33 'Shredder' seen on a freight in Southall Yard - alongside the iconic towers
<b>Southall memories - sunset</b>
The once classic view west from Southall station - my home station as a child trainspotter :) I was capturing the fairly uncommon sight at the time of a Class 33 &quot;Crompton&quot; on a freight, seen parked up in the sidings - but luckily I also managed to capture, for posterity, the familiar view of the old water tower, now converted into flats, and gasometer - the latter being sadly no more, having been dismantled in 2018 - there is now just an empty space in the sky where it once stood.

<b>The water tower</b> originally a water tower that was built between 1895-1903 to supply water to the steam locomotives. After being decommissioned in 1968 and becoming derelict, it was converted into six-storeys of flats in 1979-1983 by Frank Vickery and Elena Moffet. More here: <a href="https://www.architecture.com/image-library/RIBApix/image-information/poster/southall-water-tower-london/posterid/RIBA135168.html?Action=Cookie" rel="noreferrer nofollow">www.architecture.com/image-library/RIBApix/image-informat...</a>

<b>The gas holder</b> at the side of the railway line just to the west of Southall station [now sadly no more] - the iconic structure had stood there for decades empty and disused and now is a thing of the past, having made way for a new housing development.

The gas works was set up by the Brentford gas company back in 1869. It was required to meet rapidly increasing demand in Middlesex, which outstripped the capacity of the company's original works on the Thames at Brentford. 

The large &quot;Blue gas holder&quot; was No5 and was built in the early 1930`s, it had a storage capacity of 7,500,000 cubic feet (210,000 m3) and was a &quot;Waterless holder&quot;.

Number 5 also had a very large &quot;LH&quot; and &quot;Arrow&quot; painted on one side to help pilots identify London Heathrow when on final approach. This was painted on the side in 1964 (after the second incident), the first being in 1960 <b>when a Pan Am 707 landed at RAF Northolt by mistake.</b> More here:
<a href="https://www.derelictplaces.co.uk/main/industrial-sites/36882-southall-gas-holder.html#.X4R24S9Q1N1" rel="noreferrer nofollow">www.derelictplaces.co.uk/main/industrial-sites/36882-sout...</a>

<b>Class 33</b> - in December 1957 British Railways ordered forty-five Type 3 diesel-electric locomotives from the Birmingham Railway Carriage &amp; Wagon Company (BRCW) for Southern Region duties. They were required as part of the general modernisation resulting from Phase I of the Kent Coast Electrification scheme. The number was later increased to a total of ninety-eight including twelve special ’slim line’ locomotives for use on the width-restricted Tonbridge-Hastings line. Based on the BRCW type 2’s (Class 26/27) of the Scottish Region, the Southern locomotives were more powerful with eight cylinder Sulzer engines and Crompton-Parkinson electrical equipment. All were delivered new to Hither Green MPD, beginning in 1959, and were allocated the numbers D6500-97.

All 86 of the first delivery were built as standard locomotives, numbered D6500 to D6585. Under TOPS they became class 33/0 and the surviving locomotives, excluding the 19 that were converted for push-pull operation (33101 to 33119), were renumbered 33001–33065. The 12 narrow-bodied locomotives were originally numbered D6586 to D6597, and later renumbered 33201 to 33212. More info here: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Rail_Class_33" rel="noreferrer nofollow">en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Rail_Class_33</a>

Taken with a Zenith TTL SLR camera and standard lens. Scanned direct from a print, with no digital restoration.

<b>Photos that were nearly lost to oblivion!</b>
The original negative has gone AWOL so this is scanned from a print ;)

You can see a random selection of my railway photos here on Flickriver: <a href="http://www.flickriver.com/photos/themightyhood/random/" rel="noreferrer nofollow">www.flickriver.com/photos/themightyhood/random/</a>
class33 southall london station watertower gasholder gasometer buildings architecture