The Stationary Winding Engine House forms a large vaulted underground structure, located under the main line just north of Fitzroy Bridge (next to Gloucester Avenue) where the railway crosses the Regent’s Canal. The winding engines and other equipment that it housed operated from 1837 until 1844, drawing trains from Euston up Camden Bank by means of an endless rope, to meet a waiting locomotive at the top of the incline. The equipment was sold in 1847, but the vaults are generally in sound condition though filled with debris and partially flooded.
The vaults are of international importance for their historical and technological significance. They are a remarkable survival of the London and Birmingham Railway (L&BR), the first modern main line railway with a London terminus. The winding engine vaults represent a relatively brief transitional stage in the technological development of railway transportation, being one of the very last uses of rope haulage on a public railway. Their architectural interest lies in the grand scale and unique design of their underground brick construction.
The Winding Vaults were listed at Grade II in June 1990 and raised to Grade II* in April 2010 following a successful application by Camden Railway Heritage Trust.
Although stripped of machinery after only seven years use, the vaults have survived well. The main lines, including the West Coast Main Line, run over the vaults as they did almost two centuries ago.
Their size is apparent from the photographs. Features that can be noted are:
- The flooding of the vaults to approx. +30.00m, about three metres depth in the longitudinal vaults, as seen in the “tide mark” evident in the image below (taken before sediment clearance). This level is approximately the water level of the Regent’s Canal.
- The collapsed vaulting over the eastern boiler room. This vaulting and its supporting piers were added around 1849, after the vaults ceased operations and were sealed.
- The volume of sediment on the floor of the vaults, even after substantial investment by Network Rail in clearance in 2016, continues to obscure several features, particularly the difference in invert level of the engine room and the other vaults.
For more information see History of Rope haulage on Camden Incline.