Historic Building Details

HB Ref No:
HB26/50/339

Address :
Belfast Electric Light Station 6 Chapel Lane (and 9-13 Marquis Street) Belfast BT1 1HH

Townland:
Town Parks

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Survey 2:
B2

Date of Listing:
28/09/2023 00:00:00

Date of De-listing:

Current Use:
Store

Former Use
Power Station

Conservation Area:
Yes

Industrial Archaeology:
Yes

Vernacular:
No

Thatched:
No

Monument:
No

Derelict:
Partially

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OS Map No:
130/13

IG Ref:
J3360 7433

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Owner Category

Exterior Description And Setting

Relatively small, utilitarian, double-height, former electrical generating station of 1895, sandwiched between Chapel Lane and Marquis Street, but largely obscured from sight by its densely grouped neighbours. Belfast’s earliest power station, and possibly the oldest surviving building of its kind in Northern Ireland, it is an unassuming structure of irregular plan, the western end of which was rebuilt in 1923 when the building was converted to a sub-station, with several other more minor changes carried out to the eastern end several years prior to this. It was decommissioned and had its plant removed c.1990s[?] and has remained largely unused ever since. SETTING The building is located in an urban
setting within Belfast City centre, set on an approximately E-W axis between Chapel Lane and Marquis Street. The gable of the western end (the only fully exposed elevation) faces directly onto Marquis Street, whilst the main Chapel Street end is set back from the thoroughfare within a small, enclosed – and slightly sloping - yard. The long S elevation is directly abutted by various buildings which back on to it from Castle Street, with its N counterpart similarly backed on to by the relatively recently built (c.2018) parish hall of St Mary’s Church and another building within the church grounds. GENERAL The plan is irregular with the two main portions of the building - the larger (original) engine room section to the E and the rebuilt 1923 section to the W - joined at an angle. The former is of irregular plan in itself, its S wall being splayed so that the W end is considerably wider. The whole is brick built, but with the exposed part of the N elevation now rendered. Both sections have a double-pitch (i.e. gable-ended) roof which are both slated with large central ridge lights. E ELEVATION As stated above, this fronts on to a small enclosed yard. The yard wall itself, which appears to have been rebuilt c.1960s, is brick with a concrete parapet and large vehicle access with metal roller shutter. The exposed N side of the wall does not have the parapet whilst the wall height itself lowers to the W end, where it is now butted by the parish hall. Within the yard is the E elevation of the building proper. This consists of a double-height brick gable with a single-storey projection to the left (S) side that stretches across the whole of this side of the yard. The projection is also in brick and in two sections. The slightly taller ‘inner’ section is original and once helped support a large cooling tank which spanned across the width of the gable and was supported on the other (right - N) side by another projection (removed, along with the tank, c.1903-20). The N face of the projection has two windows and a doorway, now all boarded over, whilst the roof is hidden by the tall brick parapet that directly supported the tank. The lower part of the projection was added between c.1903 and 1920. It has a concrete parapet, (behind which appears to be a flat roof), and a doorway, with timber sheeted double door, to the right of which is a window with six-pane frame. A large concrete header spans over both openings and beyond, suggesting that there may once have been a much larger opening here. The main gable itself has a parapet (in the form of another small gable) at the apex. Under this there is a roundel ventilation opening. Below this to the left there is a larger squarish ventilation opening with another to the right, the pair asymmetrically arranged. To right of centre at ground level is a large vehicle access with a concrete lintel and edges dressed in glazed (white) brick; this opening has timber sheeted sliding doors (visible from the interior.) To the right of the access is a brick buttress; the upper portion of a similar buttress is visible above the projection. To the right of the right-hand buttress there is a tall narrow opening. W ELEVATION Another gable with roundel ventilation opening near the apex, directly below is a large central segmental-headed window with metal frame (which incorporates vents). The window rests on a flush concrete sill course, and there are several small square metal plates around the opening (some of which relate to internal steel work). At ground level in line with the window is a doorway with recent metal door. This doorway sits within what was originally a much larger opening which appears to have been reduced c.1980s-90s. S ELEVATION Largely obscured. The only section is the upper level of the W (1923) section which is in brick and featureless. N ELEVATION A small upper portion is visible. This is rendered and featureless.

Architects

Historical Information

There are reports of public demonstrations of electric lights in the Belfast area dating from as early as September 1851 when lamps (powered by a chemical battery) belonging to Rev. Dr. Cornelius Denvir, the RC Bishop of Down & Connor and a keen amateur scientist, were lit at a charity fete on Queen’s Island. Dynamo driven lights were first demonstrated in the town at a Belfast Sailor’s Institute bazaar in the Ulster Hall in December 1878. Fittingly, it was also in the Queen’s Island vicinity, at the Harland & Wolff shipyard, that in 1881 that the first permanent system of electric lighting in the town was introduced, an innovation which at one point was reputed to be the world’s largest private electrical installation. In the same year, a more public scheme was undertaken when the town’s Harbour Commissioners installed lamps on ‘a number of poles were erected along Donegall Quay…from Queen’s Bridge down to Clarendon Dock’, powered by an engine and boiler placed in a temporary shed opposite the Custom House. This all proved expensive for the Commissioners and was discontinued in spring the following year, but advances in both the cost and efficiency of the technology prompted its reintroduction on the opposite side of the river in November 1893, with lights from Queen’s Dock to the Hamilton Graving Dock run by a generator sited on the south-east corner of the Abercorn basin. As these examples demonstrate, early instances of the use electric lighting were undertaken by private groups or businesses, as well as a small handful of individuals who could afford generating apparatus. During the 1880s, however, successive Acts of Parliament were passed in order further encourage the introduction of public power supply systems by companies or local authorities and in 1890, under the ‘Belfast Lighting Order’, Belfast Corporation obtained permission to generate and sell electricity within its jurisdiction. Matters progressed slowly for several years whilst plans were formulated, but in the course of 1893 a scheme for the laying of a network of mains, fed by a ‘central electric lighting station’ between Marquis Street and Chapel Lane had been finalised, the need for such a power source highlighted by problems with the gas supply experienced during November of that year when for several evenings the city was plunged into ‘semi-darkness’. Work appears to have commenced in spring 1894 and the grid, which stretched west to east from Chapel Lane itself to Custom House Square, and from the junction of Royal Avenue and York Street in the north to Glengall Street in the south, was ‘turned on’ on 23 January 1895. The design for the Marquis Street / Chapel Lane plant was the work of Charles Stanley Peach (1858-1934), a London-based architect who set up his own practice in 1884-85 specializing in power stations, tramway offices and other commercial structures, but who was to become best known for designing Centre Court at Wimbledon. In its original form ‘The City of Belfast Electric Light Station’ was fronted on the Marquis Street side by a somewhat domestic-looking two-storey office, the Northern Whig reporting that ‘to right of the principal entrance in Marquis Street the ground floor is the engineer’s office, while to the left are the departmental offices. A flight of stone stairs leads to first floor, where [the] meter store and a meter-testing room occupy the front.’ Immediately beyond this, accessed via a passage to the south, was the single level battery room ‘a large apartment where are placed a set of [4] accumulators’, at the west end of which was the ‘switchboard gallery, 32ft long, fitted with the all-important connecting apparatus.’ Beyond again and taking up the bulk of the site, was the ‘engine and dynamo room…a handsome lofty space, eighty feet long, lighted from the roof, which is supported by iron columns.’ Attached to this at the eastern end was the fitting shop and ‘driver’s room’, two small single-storey projections over which there was a large cooling tank, these latter structures all grouped within a gated yard accessed from Chapel Lane. Initially serving around 40 - overwhelmingly business / commercial – subscribers, without provision for street lighting, and with a generating station limited in capacity and room for expansion (and, ironically, also subject to the vagaries of the gas supply), the whole enterprise was tentative in nature. Calls were soon forthcoming for the expansion of the system to include not only street lighting, but provision for new private customers and for the electrification of the city’s trams, all of which the ‘toy’ station at Chapel Lane – though acknowledged by many contemporaries as a success in its own right and which was eventually able to cope with the extension of the network further into the north and south of the city centre – was inadequate to deal with. And so, by February 1897 the Corporation had ‘unanimously resolved’ to build a new much larger station in East Bridge Street, ‘with power to take more ground as the growth of the demand for electricity in the future might require.’ The new East Bridge Street plant or ‘Central Station’, designed by the Corporation’s Electrical Engineer, Victor A.H. McCowen in conjunction with architects Graeme-Watt and Tulloch, was officially opened in October 1898. Hailed as ‘one of the most commodious and best-equipped electric stations in the United Kingdom’ it was, like most of its counterparts throughout the UK, steam-powered, the neighbouring Lagan providing the means of easily supplying both water and coal. The ‘Belfast Evening Telegraph’ report on its opening envisaged that the gas-fed Chapel Lane station should remain in operation as additional capacity for the network, whilst it was also thought that a combination of both steam and gas-driven generation would ‘get economical results’. This proved not to be the case, however, as it appears to have proven more cost-effective to increase output at East Bridge Street rather than run it in parallel with its smaller predecessor. An additional boiler and engine were quickly installed at the new station in 1899, with its capacity (and footprint) later doubling with the eventual electrification of the trams in 1905, with output further increased in subsequent years. Chapel Lane, meanwhile, is noted as ‘at rest’ and ‘vacant’ in the valuation books in 1900 and 1901 respectively, with the Corporation’s Gas and Electric Committee reporting in November 1902 that ‘they had been endeavouring to sell the machinery in the old electric station, but no offers had been received. The best thing would be to break it up for scrap.’ In April 1903 the equipment was put up for auction, with later reports indicating a loss of between £5,000 and £7,000 on the plant due to depreciation. Some of the plant does not appear to have been sold off (or failed to find a buyer), for one of the engines was temporarily installed in the County Asylum grounds in September 1905 where it was used to power test runs of the new electric trams along Falls Road. After closing, the former station building itself was retained by the Corporation. It was proposed to use it for ‘testing [gas] meters and other purposes’ in May 1903, but whether it was ever utilized as such is uncertain, and in a note of 1912 in the valuation book it is simply listed as a ‘carhouse, stores and yard’ with ‘offices’ fronting on to Marquis Street. The Marquis Street section was rented to a Michael Hamill in c.1916 and is recorded as ‘offices and motor garage’ (which may have entailed changes to the building) for several years after this. In 1918, as part of a general expansion in local electricity generation centered around the building of the new ‘Harbour’ power station at East Twin Island, plans were put forward to adapt the Chapel Lane Site ‘as a sub-station for converting the high-pressure electricity to the low-pressure system that is now in use’. Much of the machinery and other equipment being stored in the building was auctioned off in 1919, and the Chapel Street section is recorded by the valuers as an ‘electric transforming station and yard’ in 1920. However, it does not appear to have undergone actual conversion to its new role until 1923 when the ‘offices and a large part’ of the original building [i.e. the Marquis Street structures] were demolished and the ‘new sub-station for the central area of the city’ constructed. Cabling linking to the new Harbour plant (which became operational in August 1923) was completed in 1925, but a ‘tender for building alterations’ advertised in May 1926 suggests that the revamped complex may not have been fully functional until some point after this. The Northern Ireland Electricity Board took control of the country’s power stations and distribution infrastructure in 1949, although Belfast's three generating plants and sub-stations appear to have remained in actual Corporation ownership for some years after this [see 'Northern Whig' 6 Mar 1957], and the Chapel Lane sub-station itself is listed as part of the ‘Corporation Electricity Department’ in street directories up until the at least 1967. The same directories suggest it remained operational into the early 1990s. It seems to have been decommissioned, and its plant removed, at some point before 2002. Since then the building seems to have served at times as an informal car park or storage space, though for much of the time it appears to have been left unused. It is currently in private hands and has been advertised for sale [June 2023]. References – Primary sources 1 ‘Belfast Mercury’ – 9 September 1851, p.3 2 ‘Northern Whig’ – 18 December 1878, p.5; 2 January 1890, p.6; 14 June 1890, p.7; 30 November 1893, p.4; 6 December 1893, p.3; 25 July 1894, p.5; 18 January 1895, p.6; 24 January 1895, p.8; 7 December 1895, p.5; 2 February 1897 p.3; 16 July 1897, p.8; 12 January 1904, p.9; 20 June 1907 p.12; 10 September 1910, p.12; 10 September 1913, p.8; 11 March 1918, p.6; 2 January 1923, p.6; 7 October 1924, p.8; 7 December 1928, p.3; 30 July 1932 p.7; 9 August 1933, p.3; 23 December 1933, p.23; 6 March 1957, p.2 3 ‘Belfast News-Letter’ – 12 April 1893, p.3; 5 February 1897, p.3; 4 November 1902, p.5; 9 May 1903, p.10; 2 June 1904, p.5; 30 May 1905, p.9; 26 May 1908, p.5; 20 September 1918, p.4; 16 August 1923, p.10; 24 January 1924, p.10; 29 December 1925, p. 10; 1 September 1937, p.63; 5 February 1951, p.6; 7 May 1955, p.6 4 Plan and sections of electric light station, Chapel Lane – c.1895 (source unknown) 5 Belfast and Province of Ulster Street Directory – from 1895 (-1995) 6 PRONI VAL12B/43/E14, 21, 23 Annual valuation revision books, Smithfield ward – 1897-1930 7 ‘The Ulster Echo’ – 13 May 1898, p.4 8 ‘Belfast Evening Telegraph’/ ‘Belfast Telegraph’ – 17 October 1898, p.4; 5 May 1899, p.3; 6 June 1919, p.2; 14 August 1923, p.8; 5 August 1924, p.7; 18 September 1924, p.12; 17 May 1926, p.2; 28 November 1934, p.13; 21 October 1938, p.10; 7 November 1941, p.5; 23 January 1945, p.2; 9 December 1960, p.5; 27 March 1962, p.7 9 ‘Irish News and Belfast Morning News’ – 27 September 1905, p.8; 29 September 1905, p.4 10 Aerofilms Collection XPW008414 Aerial photograph of central Belfast - 1923 11 ‘Ballymena Weekly Telegraph’ - 23 October 1937, p.7 12 Photos of former Chapel Lane station – 2002 [in private hands] Secondary sources 13 ‘100 years of electricity in Northern Ireland – A short history from 1883’, (NIES, 1986) [This book was not able to be consulted.] 14 ‘100 years of electricity in Belfast 1895-1995’, (Belfast City Council, 1995)

Criteria for Listing

Architectural Interest

A. Style B. Proportion D. Plan Form H-. Alterations detracting from building I. Quality and survival of Interior J. Setting

Historic Interest

T. Historic Importance V. Authorship Y. Social, Cultural or Economic Importance Z. Rarity W. Northern Ireland/International Interest

Evaluation

Completed in early 1895, this building is Belfast’s earliest power station and is thought to be the oldest surviving civic structure of its kind within Northern Ireland. It was built as something of an experiment, the then Belfast Corporation being uncertain whether the provision of electrical power, even on a limited scale, would prove popular. In consequence it is a relatively small, functional and unassuming structure, that was - and is - largely hidden from view. Its importance lies not so much in its size or aesthetic qualities, however, but in what it represents in terms of late Victorian technological progress and the continuing growth of Belfast as a major industrial centre; it also reveals much of the attitudes of the City fathers towards innovation and diversification in the face of their ongoing (and heretofore, lucrative) investment in the local gasworks. Due to its limited size and lack of room for expansion, the building itself had a fairly short lifespan as a generating station, the growth in popularity of both domestic and street electric lighting added to the calls for the electrification of the tram system, leading to it swiftly being superseded by a much larger, and architecturally more impressive plant at East Bridge Street in 1898. It was subsequently adapted as a sub-station, with a large portion of the eastern end replaced in 1923. Despite this, the larger eastern - engine room - section, though stripped of the machinery, has survived largely intact and retains the gantry crane system that would have hauled the apparatus into, (and eventually out of), place. With the demolition of the East Bridge Street complex in the 1980s, the Chapel Lane station has become the last tangible piece of the Belfast’s late Victorian electrical infrastructure, and notwithstanding the changes noted above it remains an important, albeit currently discreet, remnant of the city’s economic and social history.

General Comments

Previously HB26/LQ336

Date of Survey

27 March 2023