- Pilton railway station
Infobox UK disused station| name = Pilton Yard| locale =
Exmoor | borough =North Devon
| caption = | line = Lynton & Barnstaple| manager =LSWR | owner = Southern| platforms = 0 (Goods facilities only)| gridref = SS55763360| years =11 May 1904 | events = Opened| years1 =29 September 1935 | events1 = Closed|Pilton Yard, in the village of Pilton, to the north of
Barnstaple was, between 1895 and 1935, the main depot and operating centre of theLynton and Barnstaple Railway ('L&B'), a narrow gauge line that ran throughExmoor from Barnstaple toLynton andLynmouth in northDevon . Goods facilities were also provided at Pilton, but passengers were catered for at the nearbyLSWR station, Barnstaple Town, which provided connections with trains on thestandard gauge branch line to Ilfracombe. The L&B's main offices were also based at Pilton, in a building formerly belonging to the Tannery which had earlier occupied the site, and which took over the site after the railway closed.Pilton was the site of the L&B's only turntable. Locomotives always travelled with their boilers facing "down" the line, i.e. towards Lynton ("down" as it was away from London by rail, although geologically, Lynton was higher, and geographically nearer to London). The turntable was used to turn rolling stock periodically to even-out bearing wear. After closure, the turntable was installed at the
Romney, Hythe & Dymchurch Railway inKent , but is now owned by theLynton and Barnstaple Railway Trust and in storage for eventual restoration and reuse on the new L&B.The carriage sheds, locomotive shed and other remnants of the railway were destroyed in a fire in 1992. Much of the site is now a car park, although there are still signs of its former railway use.
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