Horwich Loco Works

Horwich Works was a railway works built in 1886 by the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway (LYR) in Horwich, near Bolton.
Horwich Works was built on 142 hectares (350 acres) of land bought in April 1884 for £36,000. Rivington House, the first of several workshops was 106.7 metres (350 ft) long by 16.8 metres (55 ft) wide and opened in February 1887. The long brick-built workshops had full-height arched windows and were separated by tram and rail tracks. Work to construct the three-bay, 463.3 metres (1,520 ft) long by 36 metres (118 ft) wide, erecting shop began in March 1885. Inside were 20 overhead cranes.
After nationalisation in 1948, locomotive construction at Horwich continued at a high level for ten years. During 1948 twenty LMS Ivatt Class 4 tender engines were completed, twenty-seven followed in 1949, with twenty-four in 1951, followed by a single locomotive in early 1952.
Between 1945 and 1950, 120 LMS Stanier Class 5 4-6-0 tender engines were built at Horwich by the LMS (53 locos) and British Railways (67 locos). The last BR Standard design steam engine to be built was outshopped in 1957.
BR continued to overhaul steam engines for several more years. The last steam locomotive (Stanier LMS 8F 2-8-0 48756) was despatched after overhaul on 4 May 1964.[6] In October 1969 it became part of British Rail Engineering Limited (BREL). Horwich continued in use as a works for other rolling stock up until it closed in December 1983. The foundry and the spring shop continued in use after this date, although the work force was reduced from 1,400 to 300.
In an effort to publicise the redevelopment of the site into small industrial units on 20 June 1985 locomotive 47491 was named Horwich Enterprise by Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Transport David Mitchell at Horwich Works. The site was sold by BREL to the Parkfield Group in 1988 and the rail connection to the works was removed in 1989. The site is now an industrial estate, appropriately named "Horwich Loco Industrial Estate", with most of the buildings still in use.