English: Old Oak Common Locomotive Depot.
View westward beside the double-sided coaling plant, towards the quadruple roundhouse Shed. This was the main London Locomotive Depot for Paddington and the largest on the ex-Great Western Railway system, providing all main-line passenger and much of the freight motive power for the London Division, together with countless 0-6-0T engines for empty stock, shunting and local goods trips, also 2-6-2Ts for suburban passenger services. Coded 81A by BR, it had an allocation (in 1954) of 167 steam locomotives and 10 Diesel-electric shunters, also the two experimental gas-turbines (Nos. 18000 and 18100) which were on trial on express services for several years. The steam engines comprised:- 69 4-6-0s, 7 2-8-0s, 4 0-6-0s, 14 2-6-2Ts and 68 0-6-0Ts, also 5 BR Standard 4-6-2s. The Depot closed to steam on 22/3/65 and a much modified Depot was retained for Diesel locomotives, later becoming a Traction Maintenance Depot, until 2009. The photograph features the preparation roads, with 57XX 0-6-0T No. 8763 heading a row of mainly goods engines; on the left cranes are loading ashes and one side of the coaling stage is visible; the roundhouses are ahead.