# Bristol Temple meads unseen (Picture heavy) Jan 2009



## Newage (May 14, 2010)

Hi All

This was an explore that took place way back at the start of 2009. Myself, Fluffy and one of his more "normal" mates had the chance
to look around the under ground parts of Bristol Temple Meads station that the public never get to see.

Me and Fluffy drove down to Bristol to meet up with his mate and the guy who was to show us round so at 11pm on a Saturday night, and after the last train had left Bristol the tour started.

The parts of Bristol Temple Meads that we were going to explore is under the "New" station built around 1870 by Francis Fox this was an extesion to
the orgianl GWR train shed built around 1840 by IKB.

Ok enough preamble on with the pictures, the first port of call for the night were the Wine and beer cellars.

First off is the main tunnel leading to the wine vaults.










Off of this tunnel is a small side passege which still has it`s narrow gauge railway and incline leading to verious cellars and vaults. The picture on the left is looking up the incline 
and the picture on the right is take from inside the loading/unloading area at the top of the incline. Note the winch gear to haul loaded/empty wagons up and down.









With passages off to the right and left these are both wine vaults.









Another side passage leading off the loading area.









These smaller vaults are linked with many cross passages which still have many old items still in place.









Even more cross passage exist off the main tunnel each with beer and wine storage areas.









So it was time to leave this area and move on to the next under ground location, this time back to the main entrance and down in to a different side passage that leads to a 
WW2 air raid shelter. The picture on the right shows the shelter entrance.









These are a few shots from inside the air raid shelter.The shot on the left is the first flight of steps down then round a corner to the main way in to the bunker. Going through
the red door frame opening.

















The shelter even features it's own toilet and washing area. note on the picture on the left is a large gas tight air vent (top right hand corner).









Well......
We are almost done so if you made it this far down this thread you know you want to keep going.

So on to the next and last area, this was one of the under ground training areas, it was used by the S&T department to train it staff in all forms of track and signal work.
The picture on the left is one room but there is a side passage leading off to the left under the yellow and black sign which leads into the the room in the right hand picture.
The wooden structure at the rear of the right hand picture is a mock up signal box.

















There are still many artifacts laying around from when this was still used in the early 1970's

















Well thats almost it, just one more picture.






As you can see from the station clock it's now 3:35 am, so we had been down there almost 4 hours and thats not all of it.
Thanks for looking and well done for getting to the end, any and all comments are most welcome and thanks must go to Fluffy and his mate with the contacts needed to look round.
If you want to see more picture go to http://www.flickr.com/photos/newage2/sets/72157624024078970/

Cheers Newage & Fluffy


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## krela (May 14, 2010)

Top pics!

You missed quite a bit though. 

*cough*


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## scrappy (May 14, 2010)

i like it, great set of pics there!


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## DigitalNoise (May 14, 2010)

Good stuff lads, very fascinating. 
I've been trying to crack something similar lately, but much closer to home...


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## ThenewMendoza (May 14, 2010)

Brilliant! Why does Bristol have such a lot of subterranean spaces?

M


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## krela (May 14, 2010)

Mainly because there wasn't much flat space to build bonded warehouses near the docks so they had to get creative with secure storage.

Bristol is all hills and marshes which is unusual for a (once) very busy port.


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## tommo (May 14, 2010)

fantastic, was talking to someone about this the other day and now we have pics, great little explore, great location, well done u


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## Foxylady (May 14, 2010)

krela said:


> Mainly because there wasn't much flat space to build bonded warehouses near the docks so they had to get creative with secure storage.


Ah, I wondered why there were beer & wine cellars there. 
Very nice explore and pics, Newage. Love the training areas.


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## Richard Davies (May 14, 2010)

St Pancras has a lot of underground storage areas, a lot of beer brought down from Burton On Trent was stored in them.


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## Black Shuck (May 15, 2010)

Thats bloody Fantastic, well done Newage.


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## smileysal (May 15, 2010)

What a fantastic place. Love the wine cellars, and loving the narrow gauge railway in there. Excellent pics Newage, I love this. I like the mock up signal box and track in there too. This is somewhere I'd love to be able to go and see. maybe one day. 

Nice work mate, this is excellent. 

 Sal


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## chris (May 16, 2010)

Really superb ansd some great photography


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## hydealfred (May 16, 2010)

Superb - nice shots


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