Exmoor puts in plan for goods shed rebuild
Exmoor Associates, the company formed to acquire trackbed for the revival of the Lynton & Barnstaple Railway, has officially submitted plans for a rebuild of the goods shed at the line’s Bratton Fleming station.
The station site was acquired by EA in late 2020 – the building was turned into a private house after the line’s closure in 1935 and is intact and currently rented out to provide an income. But the goods shed was demolished following the closure.
Now plans have been made to build a new replica of the shed, which would house a workshop, meeting room and volunteer facilities. EA believes Bratton Fleming is the best location for such a facility being close to the centre of the original line.
A submission for planning permission to North Devon Council has been made, with EA subsidiary the Yeo Valley Trust making a grant to cover the £956 planning application fee. A public consultation period ended on 6th September with a decision expected later this year.
EA has made contact with the North Devon Archaeological Society, in the hope that the expert group might be able to establish exactly where the original goods shed stood and whether its footings might still be buried on the site.
Meanwhile EA has successfully bid at auction for an original enamel running-in board from the L&B’s Snapper Halt. It is intended to display the sign, which cost a total of £7552, in the recreated goods shed.
In further plans for Bratton Fleming, a number of donations have made possible the purchase of a genuine Victorian post box, which will be placed in the wall at Bratton Fleming to replace an original that was removed following the station’s closure.
Donations towards the purchase of the post box were so prolific that the total raised will now finance its restoration and repainting, and likely much of the cost of opening up a cavity to re-site it in the wall.