York Historic Environment Record

History

The North Eastern Railway had long recognised that York’s original 1840s passenger and
goods stations suffered from a cramped site within the city walls and in 1866 an Act of
Parliament was obtained enabling the stations to be moved to a spacious location outside the
walls. This move was implimented in the 1870s when the NER made a major capital
investment in York’s railway infrastructure with the construction of both new passenger and
goods stations outside the walls to the west of the old station. In February 1872 a contract was
let to construct the new railway lines to serve these projected new stations. It included the
construction of new coal depots because the pre-existing coal depot stood in the way of the
lines to the new passenger station, and also a new mineral manager’s office to deal
predominantly with the administration of transportation of coal, but also lime and stone. At this
time Thomas Prosser was the NER Architect and was responsible for initial drawings and
handling of the new buildings and structures for the York project. In January 1873 Prosser was
joined by Benjamin Burleigh who was appointed Deputy Architect: he was based in York and
Prosser was based in Newcastle. Burleigh’s role was to handle most new jobs originating in
Yorkshire and also to deal with routine matters in York. In May 1874 Prosser resigned after a
long period of ill health and Burleigh became NER Architect in overall charge.

Work on the coal depots was at first delayed, but appears to have been completed by October
1873, when compensation over the delay was agreed with the contractor. The contract had
allowed for the coal depots to be built to twice the extent originally planned, which happened,
and the associated office to not be built if it was not required at that time, which also appears
to have been the case. In January 1874 the York Board of Health, the Urban Sanitary
Authority of York Corporation, approved NER plans for the deferred office and a house on
Thief Lane, now called Leeman Road. Whilst the office was envisaged by Prosser when he
was in charge, the revised building, which combined an office and attached house for the
manager, was designed in its final form by Burleigh, and forms part of Burleigh’s Goods
Station complex. The two-storey building is angled with a rounded outer corner occupying the
angle between Leeman Road and the Goods Station entrance. It was completed in 1876,
when work also began on the actual Goods Station; the latter was completed in 1877. It is first
shown, along with the Goods Station (Grade II, National Heritage List for England: 1407453),
the weigh office in front of the Goods Station (Grade II, NHLE: 1407456), the coal depot
(undesignated), and the nearby Passenger Station (Grade II*, NHLE: 1256554) and Station
Hotel (Grade II, NHLE:1256559) on the 1:2500 OS map, surveyed in 1889, published in 1892.
The gate piers and gates to the Goods Station (Grade II, NHLE: 1407468), which abut the
boundary wall of the building on their northern side, were also present by this time.
Plans, sections and elevations originating as the NER file copies (copied as microfilms in the
1960s by Railtrack, at which time the dates and signatures on the original drawings were
missed off) show the original layout of the mineral manager's office, also known as the coal
manager's office. The ground floor had an entrance hall containing a staircase and stores and
offices, with equally-sized offices for the foreman and the collector located in the rounded
corner; the mineral manager had a spacious D-shaped office above on the first floor, with
good views over the coal depot, and there was a large clerks’ office separated from the
manager’s office by the staircase landing and a lobby. The house had a central staircase
separating a sitting room and kitchen, with a scullery beyond and a narrow row of single-storey
outbuildings, including a pantry, coal store and WC. On the first floor were three bedrooms.
The yard to the rear of the house was enclosed by a boundary wall and a cross wall divided
the space between the office and the house. The office yard contained a bicycle store, WCs
and coal stores, with a doorway in the boundary wall. A section of the house yard is walled off
and contained WCs and urinals which could only be accessed via a doorway in the boundary
wall opening into the gated yard in front of the Goods Station.

By the early C20 the building was used as the locomotive superintendent’s office. In 1907
sections and an elevation drawing by the NER architects’ office show proposed alterations to
add first-floor extensions to the rear elevations of the house, clad in timber with lean-to roofs.
It was also proposed to alter the two doorways on the south side of the office to form windows,
add a ground-floor window to the far-left room and instate an actual window in place of the
blind ground-floor window in the rounded corner where a cross-wall had previously separated
the space into two equal-sized offices. This suggests that at this time the two original rooms
were altered to form a single D-shaped room, like that on the first floor.
The 1:2500 OS map revised in 1907, published in 1909, shows the single-storey mess room
attached to the west gable wall of the house for the first time. It was constructed for use by the
Goods Station workers.

Between 1999 and 2008 the building was used by a homeless charity. It has been unused
since then. At an unknown date the first-floor timber extension built against the gable wall of
the rear range of the house was removed and replaced with a metal external staircase. The
house’s narrow row of single-storey outbuildings was demolished, as were the yard buildings
containing WCs and urinals used by the office and the Goods Station workers.

Details:
Coal manager’s office and house with attached mess room. Office and house 1876 built for
the North Eastern Railway as part of the new Goods Station complex envisaged by Thomas
Prosser, NER Architect, and designed by Benjamin Burleigh, NER Architect following
Prosser’s resignation in 1874 due to ill health. Mess room early C20 built by NER for use by
Goods Station workers.

MATERIALS: orange brick, brick and ashlar stone dressings, slate roofs.
PLAN: the coal manager’s office and house are of two storeys, built on a triangular site. The
office faces onto Leeman Road with a rounded outer east corner and an angled return on the
northern side of the entrance to the former Goods Station (now the National Railway
Museum). Inside, an entrance and stair hall separate the D-shaped east-end rooms from the
other rooms. On the ground floor a long corridor runs between the entrance and stair hall and
the yard to the west, with rooms to each side. On the first floor the D-shaped room (former
manager’s office) is separated from the large clerks’ office by the stair landing and a lobby on
the north side which interconnects between the two rooms. The L-shaped house faces onto
Leeman Road and is attached to the west gable wall of the office. It has a central doorway and
staircase, now removed. A sub-divided angled yard in the south-west corner is enclosed by a
high boundary wall.
The rectangular, single-storeyed mess room is attached to the west side of the house.

Historic England Consultation Report July 2019

Formerly nominated for inclusion on the Local List of Heritage Assets. Listed December 2019.

Reasons for designation:

The Bullnose Building (former coal manager’s office and house), Leeman Road, York, of 1876 by Benjamin
Burleigh for the NER Railway, is recommended for listing at Grade II for the following principal reasons:

Historic interest:
* the Bullnose Building, built in 1876 as the coal manager’s office and house, is an integral component
of York’s new Goods Station, a complex which, together with the contemporary new Passenger Station,
demonstrates a major investment in expanding the city’s railway infrastructure at this time;
* the movement of goods, particularly coal and other minerals mined in the north-east of England, was
a lucrative stream of revenue for the NER with the building providing a dedicated office and also a house for
the coal manager, who was seen as a key employee.

Architectural interest:
* the building was designed by Benjamin Burleigh, chief NER architect, who also designed the
contemporary Goods Station which it served;
* the layout of the Goods Station intentionally provided a secure environment with the Bullnose Building
deliberately placed in a visually prominent location beside the entrance gates;
* the building has an aesthetically pleasing rounded outer corner and careful attention to detailing,
being ingeniously designed to stand on a triangular site adjacent to the road and the angled access road to
the Goods Station entrance.
* the office interior retains its layout, a good-quality staircase, fireplace and other original fixtures and
fittings.

Group value:

* the Bullnose Building has a functional, visual and designed relationship with Benjamin Burleigh’s
Goods Station, the weigh office in the forecourt, and the adjacent gate piers and gates, all of which are listed
Grade II.

Dr Bill Fawcett, John A Ives and Alison Sinclair, 2013, YORK CENTRAL AUDIT OF HERITAGE ASSETS,NOVEMBER 2013 (Report). SYO1457.

Historic England, 2019, Historic England Advice Reportt (Unpublished document). SYO2335.