Skip to main content

Velvet Strands at Laytown

 A beautiful sunny afternoon heralded my arrival at the seaside station of Laytown. Alighting from the train the light bounced off the ice-cream yellow paintwork on the former GNR wooden station building. 

Originally opened in 1844 by the Dublin and Drogheda Railway, Laytown promised “celebrated Velvet Strands” and it is not difficult to see why: the station is raised above its nearby coastline, offering views across the southern bay to the hinterland of Braymore Point, whilst Bettystown’s strand, famous for horseracing, is located to the north.  

The station built by the DDR still stands, now a private residence, as the two-storey rendered house to the entrance of the car park. Although recorded as built around 1847 by Buildings of Ireland, the Dictionary of Irish Architects records an entry in the Dublin Builder from 1865 where a “new station and two workmen's houses recently erected by Dublin & Drogheda Railway Co.”. The architect is unknown, but it can demised that this more permanent station replaced an earlier incarnation, or perhaps even just a platform. The building contained the station master’s living quarters on the upper storey.

In 1899 the board of directors at the GNR approved the construction of a new wooden station at Laytown, with the original DDR station to be retained completely as the station master’s residence. The tender was awarded to a Mr Thomas Creaser at £323. And so two grand structures now co-existed: the new station bearing the hallmarks of semi-arch windows, doors and a beautiful central glazed entrance with wooden sliding doors to the waiting area, ticket office and ladies waiting room. The yellow-brick chimney stacks evidence the provision of heat, and the stylistic polychromatic brickwork of the GNR. 

Today it is with a heavy heart that I stand in front of such a rare surviving example of a wooden GNR station now boarded up, its painted cream-cone promises peeling and warping. A drawing for the station has not been located but an exact version for Ballyward and Leitrim shows the immense effort taken in so carefully designing and constructing these types of stations. 

Source: Irish Railway Record Society Archive

Another GNR wooden incarnation was the signal cabin with its red-brick base and moulded semi-arch window and door hoods. The signal cabin stood at the northern end of the eastern platform but is again, like so many of its brethren, no longer in situ. The detailing of the moulded woodwork tied it to the station building, as did the stylised brickwork which chimed with the half-formed arches of the wooden-framed windows and doorways. 

Source: Eiretrains

Another casualty has been the ironwork lattice-girder footbridge. Like the one preserved at Malahide, the lattice-design is an example of the engineering genius of the DDR’s chief engineer: Sir John Macneill. Macneill formatted and championed the lattice design for its strength and adaptability for scale: from footbridges to the Boyne Viaduct, Macneill demonstrated the qualities of this design. 

Source: Eiretrains
The present incarnation doesn’t exactly fill the modern traveller with the same sense of engineering ingenuity. 

Leaving the station I walk toward the beckoning seaside, stopping to admire the ellipsed hammered-stone bridge over the narrow road. The original DDR infrastructure still survives here at least. Pat’s supermarket supplies me with a 99 ice-cream cone, as I cross the road to gaze at the Laytown viaduct. I’m enjoying it so much I forget to take a photograph, so here’s Google Maps’ version from 2019.

Source: Google Street View
Like Gormanston, the present viaduct was designed by the GNR’s chief engineer’s son, George Mills. It was constructed by the Cleveland Bridge and Engineering Co. in 1896 to a similar design as Gormanston, chubby legs firmly planted in the shifting sands beneath. The lattice-girders may be the original viaduct built by Macneill for the DDR, whilst George Mills’ design may be the encasing ironwork and new piers. 

The Dublin Builder records that the viaduct was originally a wooden structure built by the DDR and replaced by that company in 1865 for a new iron one. This matches the construction of the DDR station building, showing that Laytown had proven its status as a worthwhile destination. 

And so, like the many Victorian tourists before me, I promenade along Laytown’s velvet strands before returning to the station to wait for my train home. But for me, there is no waiting room, no staffed office, and no fire by which to warm the cockles despite having two stations to choose from. 

Sources

Ciarán Cooney and Eiretrains
Freeman's Journal, 18 Sep 1850, p. 1 
Geohive.ie
Google Maps and Street View
Irish Railway Record Society Archives
Newspapers.com 

Popular posts from this blog

Paradise Lost: Howth Junction and Donaghmede

Alighting onto a post-apocalyptic concrete and steel abyss I surveyed the mesh of stairs, like an Escher lithograph, leading everywhere and nowhere simultaneously. “Where am I?” asked a bemused elderly lady I had stepped onto the platform with: “Howth Junction”. “Oh dear”. Relativity, M. C. Escher, Lithograph, 1953. Oh dear indeed. Where is the front of this ‘station’? I refuse to call it one: it is merely a set of stairs and a lift. Following signs to the exit I’m greeted with a dystopian Alice in Wonderland prospect of turning left into a car park and right along an overgrown, dirty footpath. I choose the latter; at least it might lead somewhere. The path to former station master's house, Howth Junction Dodging filth like the mad hatter, the elegant brick gables, stone lintels and terracotta chimney stacks of the former station master’s house can be spied amongst a wilderness of ivy, grass and razored-fencing. Forlornly neglected, the graceful merging of Classical ped...
Read more

Sweet Dreams at Navan

Upon my first visit to Navan in 2018 in search of the railway station I was astounded that such a large town could have had its train service removed, when much smaller villages along the Sligo and Maynooth routes were still connected to the capital. Little did I know that two years later I would marry a Navan-native, settle in the area and pass the station every day, miffed and mournful at its wasted potential. The line opened with ambition 172 years ago in 1850, built by the Dublin and Drogheda Railway as a branch line from Drogheda to Oldcastle. Boyne Valley Railtour at Navan, 1977, Railway Preservation Society of Ireland My station safari was rewarded by passing over the extant railway tracks at the station’s level crossing – the line is still in operation for Tara Mines – and the heralding of the former station master’s house. A typical two-storey GNR example, its red brick man has been pebbled-dashed, disguising the polychromatic contrast intended for the, still exposed, yellow b...
Read more

Valley of the Engineers: The Boyne Viaduct

Leaving my Roman sojourn into George Papworth’s Drogheda railway station , I head northward to the Boyne Viaduct. I pass the original Dublin and Drogheda stone engine shed and then – holy moley – the earth falls from under me and the Mesopotamian arch of Ctesiphon is recreated twelve-fold.  Boyne Viaduct (S. Osgood) Agog, I needed to watch my step and not the towering vertigo-inducing spans which rose piercingly from the River Boyne’s embankment. I stopped, composed and consoled myself that the steep steps down would be worth the ascension after my mooching about.  Boyne Viaduct (S. Osgood) Soaring across the Drogheda skyline the Boyne Viaduct was designed by Sir John Macneill (1793-1880) from 1844 and constructed between 1851 and 1855. Twelve round arches span the southern embankment, with three on the northern side, whilst tapering stone piers support the central section. Boyne Viaduct (S. Osgood) Constructed of hand-cut limestone and granite blocks, visual aesthetics were n...
Read more