Listed Building

The only legal part of the listing under the Planning (Listing Buildings and Conservation Areas) (Scotland) Act 1997 is the address/name of site. Addresses and building names may have changed since the date of listing – see 'About Listed Buildings' below for more information. The further details below the 'Address/Name of Site' are provided for information purposes only.

Address/Name of Site

PRINCES STREET EAST, HELENSBURGH CENTRAL STATION INCLUDING PLATFORMS, CANOPIES, SCREEN WALLS AND GATESLB48538

Status: Designated

Documents

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Summary

Category
B
Date Added
21/03/2002
Local Authority
Argyll And Bute
Planning Authority
Argyll And Bute
Burgh
Helensburgh
NGR
NS 29696 82379
Coordinates
229696, 682379

Description

James Carswell, North British Railway Company Engineering Department, 1898-9. 2-storey, 4-bay Renaissance station offices with separate range of single storey waiting rooms linked by partly glazed barrel-vaulted platform roof and leading to platforms with panelled screen walls and further fine pitch-roofed canopies. Pink sandstone ashlar to office block with base course, pilaster quoins and tiered Giant pilasters dividing bays (panelled at ground), architraved windows with stone mullions, dividing and wallhead cornices with panelled apron band and parapet; brick with sandstone ashlar dressings to rear and to single storey waiting rooms.

STATION OFFICES: 4-bay elevation to East Princes Street (grouped 2-2) with pedimented outer bays. Tall and wide door opening in bay to left of centre, outer bays at ground with panelled door with 2-pane fanlights flanked to centre by bipartite windows, and bay to right of centre with larger timber-mullioned bipartite window (originally with stone transom and mullion); regular fenestration above. Right return elevation blank at ground with 2 widely spaced single windows above. 2 bipartite windows at ground floor to left return; 1st floor window to right. Platform elevation with series of irregularly disposed panelled doors, in tall doorways with plate glass fanlights, and windows. Timber sash and case glazing with 6-pane windows to platform. End and mutual gable stacks, that to right end truncated. Decorative rainwater hopper to platform elevation.

INTERIOR: part seen. Ticket office retaining grand classical timber entablature above modern glazed counter, cornice with bracketed capitals supporting paired consoled posts and broken pediment to centre, half paterae interposed above.

CONCOURSE ROOF, PLATFORM SCREEN WALLS AND CANOPIES: barrel-vaulted roof spanning concourse of inner terminus with arched ribs springing from cornices of flanking offices/waiting rooms, and with raised central section for ventilation (louvred) given pitched roof; ends glazed in screen of arcaded, round-arched, small-pane lights. Platform canopies supported to track-side on line of decorative cast-iron columns, comprising panelled, polygonal bases with swagged coping and fluted band at foot of shaft crowned with Ionic capital, and supporting decorative filigreed iron spandrels carrying cross beams of pitch roofed, glazed canopies; outer sides carried on panelled brick screen walls with decorative corbels supporting cross beams.

VEHICULAR AND PEDESTRIAN GATEWAY: to right of principal office block. Flat-arches on metal joists with brick parapet and framed by pediment-capped piers. Decorative wrought- and cast-iron gates running on wheels, setted road surface with metal tracks.

Statement of Special Interest

The station was built as the terminus of the Glasgow, Dumbarton and Helensburgh Railway. Walker and Sinclair remark particularly on the 'great glazed canopy spanning effortlessly across the platforms'. The station replaces an earlier building opened in 1856, which proved impossibly small in terms of platform area and provision of waiting rooms. A report by the Board of Trade's Railway Department in May 1892 encouraged the North British Railway Company to expand, resulting in the present structure. During early stages of the construction exercise, James Bell, the in-house engineer, persuaded the Company to include a station manager's house at 1st floor above the station offices. The town hall flanks the station offices to west, the one enhancing the context of the other. The West Highland Railway was served by Helensburgh Upper Station opened in 1894, and which despite the demolition of the station building in 1980 is still operational.

References

Bibliography

HELENSBURGH AND GARELOCH TIMES 20 April 1898. SRO BR/NBR/8 1753. Walker and Sinclair NORTH CLYDE ESTUARY (1992), p67. Brian D Osborne HELENSBURGH AND GARELOCHSIDE IN OLD PICTURES (1980).

About Listed Buildings

Historic Environment Scotland is responsible for designating sites and places at the national level. These designations are Scheduled monuments, Listed buildings, Inventory of gardens and designed landscapes and Inventory of historic battlefields.

We make recommendations to the Scottish Government about historic marine protected areas, and the Scottish Ministers decide whether to designate.

Listing is the process that identifies, designates and provides statutory protection for buildings of special architectural or historic interest as set out in the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) (Scotland) Act 1997.

We list buildings which are found to be of special architectural or historic interest using the selection guidance published in Designation Policy and Selection Guidance (2019)

Listed building records provide an indication of the special architectural or historic interest of the listed building which has been identified by its statutory address. The description and additional information provided are supplementary and have no legal weight.

These records are not definitive historical accounts or a complete description of the building(s). If part of a building is not described it does not mean it is not listed. The format of the listed building record has changed over time. Earlier records may be brief and some information will not have been recorded.

The legal part of the listing is the address/name of site which is known as the statutory address. Other than the name or address of a listed building, further details are provided for information purposes only. Historic Environment Scotland does not accept any liability for any loss or damage suffered as a consequence of inaccuracies in the information provided. Addresses and building names may have changed since the date of listing. Even if a number or name is missing from a listing address it will still be listed. Listing covers both the exterior and the interior and any object or structure fixed to the building. Listing also applies to buildings or structures not physically attached but which are part of the curtilage (or land) of the listed building as long as they were erected before 1 July 1948.

While Historic Environment Scotland is responsible for designating listed buildings, the planning authority is responsible for determining what is covered by the listing, including what is listed through curtilage. However, for listed buildings designated or for listings amended from 1 October 2015, legal exclusions to the listing may apply.

If part of a building is not listed, it will say that it is excluded in the statutory address and in the statement of special interest in the listed building record. The statement will use the word 'excluding' and quote the relevant section of the 1997 Act. Some earlier listed building records may use the word 'excluding', but if the Act is not quoted, the record has not been revised to reflect subsequent legislation.

Listed building consent is required for changes to a listed building which affect its character as a building of special architectural or historic interest. The relevant planning authority is the point of contact for applications for listed building consent.

Find out more about listing and our other designations at www.historicenvironment.scot/advice-and-support. You can contact us on 0131 668 8914 or at designations@hes.scot.

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