Coaling tower

A coaling tower or coal stage is a facility used to load coal into railway steam locomotives, usually provided at motive power depots.

In almost all cases coaling stations used a gravity fed method that allowed coal to slide down a chute into the waiting locomotives coal storage area. The method of elevating the bulk coal above the locomotive varied, in some cases facilities were provided for raising coal trucks or wagons above the height of the locomotive tender or the bunker to facilitate re-fuelling, this was either done by means of a 'coal stage' or a 'coaling tower'.