Wormit | |
---|---|
![]() Eastern part of Wormit seen from the Tay Rail Bridge | |
Location within Fife Location near the Dundee City council area | |
OS grid reference | NO3624 |
• Edinburgh | 33 mi (53 km) |
• London | 359 mi (578 km) |
Council area | |
Country | Scotland |
Sovereign state | United Kingdom |
Post town | Newport-on-Tay |
Postcode district | DD6 |
Dialling code | 01382 |
Police | Scotland |
Fire | Scottish |
Ambulance | Scottish |
UK Parliament | |
Scottish Parliament | |
Wormit is a village on the south shore of the Firth of Tay in north-east Fife, Scotland. It is located at the southern end of the Tay Rail Bridge and together with Woodhaven and Newport-on-Tay, Wormit is a part of The Burgh of Newport-on-Tay. The name of the village is thought to be derived from the plant wormwood. [1] [2]
Wormit Railway Station, opened on 1 May 1889 [3] and closed on 5 May 1969, [4] was operated on a closed branch line, The Newport Railway, which left the main line (Edinburgh/Dundee) railway immediately at the south end of the Bridge to serve Wormit/Newport. After closure, Wormit Station was later dismantled and rebuilt at the heritage Bo'ness & Kinneil Railway to the west of Edinburgh.
In 1955, there was a serious train crash in Wormit Station in which three people were killed and forty-one were injured. [5]
Wormit claims to be the first Scottish village to have installed electricity. [6] [7] A windmill located on Wormit Hill generated the power, with a steam engine supplementing this when the wind was low. This was later replaced by a coal-gas engine until the 1930s, when Wormit was connected to the national grid. Alexander Stewart, who built many of Wormit's early houses, owned the windmill and steam engine [8] and offered electrical lighting to homeowners as well as basic street lighting. Consumers paid 10 shillings a quarter and could use as much electricity as they liked. The first houses to have electricity had sun rays painted on the front, and these can still be seen along the highest row of terraced housing in the village.[ citation needed ]
During the Second World War, King Haakon VII of Norway visited a house in Wormit used as a base by officers of the Norwegian Army. The soldiers painted a sea motif for the king on the walls of a bedroom, and it is still present in the house. [9] Norwegian Catalina flying boats of No. 333 Squadron RNoAF were stationed at Woodhaven, Fife, and a Norwegian flag is still flown in the harbour, which has since been changed back into Wormit Boating Club, from where occasional pleasure sailings operate for much of the year upon the River Tay, mainly between the Tay Rail Bridge and Tay Road Bridge.[ citation needed ]
Wormit water reservoir was built in 1923 in anticipation of the population of the town growing, but war intervened and the reservoir was eventually decommissioned due to costs. [10] Trevor Cox, a professor of acoustic engineering at the University of Salford, identified the reservoir as one of the "strangest sounding places in the UK". It is a large concrete box 60 m (200 ft) long, 30 m (100 ft) wide and 5 m (16 ft) high. In a normal room, sounds die away quickly due to sound waves reflecting in to the walls, losing energy. In Wormit water reservoir, the size of the room means the time between reflections is much greater, coupled with sound waves losing less energy when reflecting off concrete, meaning sounds last for much longer. This was demonstrated by an experiment in which a balloon was popped inside the reservoir. [11]
Wormit has its own primary school (established in 1896), [12] church, blacksmith, garage, hair dresser, restaurant and local shop. The local secondary school is Madras College, St Andrews.
There are several sports clubs within Wormit, including tennis, bowling and boating clubs. Wormit Bowling Club was established in 1901; its clubhouse was built in 1955. [12]
Fife is a council area, historic county, registration county and lieutenancy area of Scotland. It is situated between the Firth of Tay and the Firth of Forth, with inland boundaries with Perth and Kinross and Clackmannanshire. By custom it is widely held to have been one of the major Pictish kingdoms, known as Fib, and is still commonly known as the Kingdom of Fife within Scotland. A person from Fife is known as a Fifer. In older documents the county was very occasionally known by the anglicisation Fifeshire.
The Tay Bridge carries rail traffic across the Firth of Tay in Scotland between Dundee and the suburb of Wormit in Fife. Its span is 2.75 miles. It is the second bridge to occupy the site.
The Tay Road Bridge carries the A92 road across the Firth of Tay from Newport-on-Tay in Fife to Dundee in Scotland, just downstream of the Tay Rail Bridge. At around 2,250 metres (1.4 mi), it is one of the longest road bridges in Europe, and was opened in 1966, replacing the old Tay ferry.
Newport-on-Tay is a town in the north-east of Fife in Scotland. The Fife Coastal Path passes through Newport-on-Tay. The area itself has views of the two bridges that cross the River Tay and distant views of the Scottish Highlands.
The Firth of Tay is a firth on the east coast of Scotland, into which empties the River Tay. The firth is surrounded by four council areas: Fife, Perth and Kinross, Dundee City, and Angus. Its maximum width is 3 mi (4.8 km).
Woodhaven used to be a small village between Newport-on-Tay and Wormit in Fife, Scotland. Due to expansion of these two villages over the years, it is now just the name for a harbour and pier . During World War II there was a flying boat station at Woodhaven operating four PBY5 Catalina aircraft manned by Flight A of No. 333 (Norwegian) Squadron, Royal Air Force. The Norwegian personnel were based at RAF Leuchars along with their colleagues in Flight B who flew land based Mosquito aircraft.
The Fife Coastal Path is a Scottish long distance footpath that runs from Kincardine to Newburgh along the coastline of Fife. The path was created in 2002, originally running from North Queensferry to Tayport. It was extended in 2011 with a new section running from Kincardine to North Queensferry, then again in 2012 from Tayport to Newburgh. The path, which usually takes between one week and 10 days to walk in full, now runs for 187 kilometres (116 mi). The Fife Coastal Path is managed and maintained by Fife Coast and Countryside Trust, a registered environmental charity, and is designated as one of Scotland's Great Trails by NatureScot. About 500,000 people use the path every year, of whom about 35,000 walk the entire route.
Forgan is a civil parish in the Scottish county of Fife. It extends 4 miles in length along the north coast of Fife and is at the southern mouth of the River Tay. It is bounded by the other Fife civil parishes of Ferry-Port on Craig, Leuchars and Balmerino. It contains the towns of Newport-on-Tay and Wormit. The roads and railways leading to the Tay Bridges pass through the parish.
The Dundee and Arbroath Railway was an early railway in Scotland. It opened in 1838, and used the unusual track gauge of 5 ft 6 in (1,676 mm). In 1848 it changed to standard gauge and connected to the emerging Scottish railway network.
Bo'ness railway station is a heritage railway station in Bo'ness, Falkirk, Scotland. It is not the original Bo'ness railway station, which was located roughly a quarter mile west on Seaview Place, now the site of a car park.
Newport-on-Tay East railway station formerly served the town of Newport-on-Tay, Fife, Scotland. The station closed in 1969.
The Edinburgh and Northern Railway was a railway company authorised in 1845 to connect Edinburgh to both Perth and Dundee. It relied on ferry crossings of the Firth of Forth and the Firth of Tay, but despite those disadvantages it proved extremely successful. It took over a short railway on the southern shore of the Forth giving a direct connection to Edinburgh, and it changed its name to the Edinburgh, Perth and Dundee Railway.
The Newburgh and North Fife Railway was a Scottish railway company formed to build a connecting line between St Fort and Newburgh, in Fife, intended to open up residential traffic between the intermediate communities and Dundee and Perth. It opened its line, which was expensive to construct, in 1909 but the local traffic never developed. It closed to passenger traffic in 1951, and completely in 1964.
The St Andrews Railway was an independent railway company, founded in 1851 to build a railway branch line from the university town of St Andrews, in Fife, Scotland, to the nearby main line railway. It opened in 1852. When the Tay Rail Bridge opened in 1878 residential travel to Dundee was encouraged.
Gauldry, locally sometimes The Gauldry, is a village in Fife, Scotland. It is located 3 kilometres (1.9 mi) southwest of Newport on Tay, 2 kilometres (1.2 mi) south-east of Balmerino, and 1 kilometre (0.62 mi) south of Bottomcraig.
The Newport Railway was a Scottish railway company that built a line along the south bank of the Firth of Tay in Fife. The line was opened in 1879, and connected to the Tay Bridge, giving quick access to Dundee; daily residential travel to Dundee from Tayport became a practicality.
The Inner Tay Estuary is the inner, western part of the Firth of Tay, from the Tay Railway Bridge in the east to the Queen's Bridge over the River Tay in Perth and the bridge in Bridge of Earn on the River Earn. It is one of the largest estuaries in eastern Scotland, and is up to 2.5 km wide. It consists primarily of intertidal sand and mud flats extending seaward to the main channel, most of which are on the northern shore. Landward of these are salt marsh and Phragmites reedbeds. The estuary contains two large islands: Mugdrum Island, opposite Newburgh; and Moncreiffe Island, immediately below Perth. The estuary's narrow form, and the large volume of freshwater from the Rivers Tay and Earn, restrict the influence of saltwater west of the Tayport narrows. Much of the tidal water is freshwater or mildly brackish.
The Railways of Kinross were a local network of three rural railways which made the town of Kinross in Scotland their objective in the 1850s.
Wormit railway station served the town of Wormit, Fife, Scotland from 1889 to 1969 on the Newport Railway.