Cranmore Water Tank

An initial sketch of the water tower showing a brick tower with an iron tank sat on the top.
Credit: A.Milner,

When the preserved East Somerset Railway was opened in 1973, a Water Tank and Crane were installed in the motive power depot and the water tanks on steam engines were filled at the depot. To keep the tanks topped up during the day, a water hose at Cranmore station is used. For day to day operations, this arrangement is fine, but on busy days such as special events and for visiting steam charters, this arrangement is far from satisfactory. On many special events, operations have had to be interrupted whilst the engine returns to the depot to be topped up, causing delays.

For many years, better facilities have been proposed at the station. In 2005, an appeal was launched to purchase a combined water tank and crane for the station, but this project was not successful.

Therefore, in 2007 the Cranmore Water Tank project was launched. The aim of this Project is to provide a watering facility at Cranmore station. There are many benefits to this proposal:

1. It will increase operational advantages as locos will not have to return to the shed to take on water, meaning that on busy days such as Thomas events and Galas, the timetable does not need to be disrupted.
2. It will also mean that servicing visiting locos from the main line will also be easier.
3. It will provide another point of interest and photographic opportunity around the station.

The water tank will be mounted on a 4 metre high brick tower, built in a similar style to our GWR signal box. The bricks for this have been reclaimed from a similar signal box formerly at Mells Road. The site of the water tower is proposed to be at the East end of the Down platform.

We have some parts of a water crane which we hope to use but there are several key components missing so if anyone knows of a spare water crane similar to the one shown here, we will be interested.

Progress of this project can be followed via the Photo Gallery.