The introduction of electric services made Hawkshead Street much busier. By 1909 electrics ran between Hawkshead Street Junction and Meols Cop Junction and also Roe Lane Junction. Some electric services ran directly between Crossens and Southport, using the western side of the triangle, but most ran via Meols Cop station where they reversed. These services used the south and east sides of the triangle.

In preparation for the opening of the electric car sheds on 23 December 1912 alterations were made at Hawkshead Street. The signal box frame was enhanced to 32 levers. Just beyond the junction, on the Meols Cop line, a set of points was installed that led into the car sheds. A crossover was also installed at the junction so that traffic coming out of the shed could run ‘right-line’ to Southport.

On 7 September 1964 the former WLR line to Preston closed as a through route. A section extending to Hesketh Park remained open for a daily coal train, but the western side of the Meols Cop Triangle closed with effect from 28th of September 1964. The junction towards Preston was disconnected on 28 September 1964. Hawkshead Street box closed 11 October 1965. Following its closure various track alterations took place which included conversion of the former western side of the triangle into sidings accessed from Roe Lane Junction. Buffer stops were placed on each of the lines just north of the junction’s site. The access points to the car sheds were also removed and, to facilitate shunting operations, one of the shed shunting necks was extended through the site of the signal box. The line to Meols Cop became a basic double-track railway. The original box, which had been converted into a platelayers’ hut, was still standing in March 1967.

MEOLS COP ELECTRIC CAR SHEDS
By October 1911 the LYR had a substantial network of electric lines that radiated from Liverpool Exchange and extended  northward to Crossens (via Southport) and Town Green on the Liverpool to Preston (via Ormskirk) line. Day-to- day repairs to the electric rolling stock were carried out at the former East Lancashire Railway Company’s Southport ( London Street) station which had been electrified in 1905 and fitted out as a carriage shed with cranes and machinery.  For more major works the rolling stock had to be towed to Newton Heath in Manchester. The situation was not ideal, and, with further extensions to the electric system planned, a better arrangement was required.

The land in the centre of the Meols Cop Triangle was considered to be ideal. All sides of the triangle had been electrified by 15 February 1909, and the LYR owned the land. Approval for the construction of electric car sheds was given on 15 December 1910, and the cost was estimated at £30,976.30s. Sidings were laid in 1911, and a contract for the construction of a shed building was let to E Taylor & Son for £11,483 on 20 June 1912. The car sheds were opened only six months later on 23 December 1912.

The sheds consisted of a large brick building adjacent to the western side of the triangle (the Hawkshead Street to Roe Lane Junction line). It had large windows along the sides and skylights in the roof. At its southern end it had five access doors all served by sidings, three of which were dead-end inside the shed whilst two exited at the northern end. At some stage the door at the southern end on the western side was bricked-up. There was also a boiler-house and stores area that extended beyond the main building towards the north.

Inside the shed was light and roomy, and it was fitted out with all of the machinery and lifting equipment required for the maintenance of the electric train sets. There were also service pits.

To the west of the shed were two sidings located between it and the main line on the western side of the triangle. They were connected to the shed at both ends. To the east of the shed were sidings used for the storage of stock, but there was no physical connection from them to the shed until 23 June 1968. To the south there were lines that aided shunting movements.

At the time of opening the electric car sheds were responsible for the maintenance and repair of 38 motor cars and 53 trailers that had been introduced from 1904 and which formed 50 individual train sets. There were also two baggage cars that operated independently. They were multiple unit trains, the electrical equipment built and supplied by Dick Kerr and the bodies built by the LYR at Horwich and Newton Heath.  There were also eleven cars built to facilitate a service from the LYR system onto the Liverpool Overhead Railway. Additional cars had also come into use in 1911.

In 1927, during the LMS era, new rolling stock in the form of eleven three-car compartment stock EMUs was introduced and also became the responsibility of Meols Cop.

In August 1939 the first of what would become a fleet of 34 three-car and 25 two-car EMUs (later under BR to become class 502) arrived at Meols Cop from Derby. The new sets were revolutionary, with wide bodies and automatic sliding doors. They would remain in service as passenger trains until October 1980 and were the last class of EMU serviced by Meols Cop shed.

EMUs from other systems including the Lancaster and Morecombe overhead network also came to Meols Cop for attention. They also returned upon their withdrawal in 1966 for breaking up.

The Re-Shaping of Britain’s Railways report of 1963 recommended the complete abandonment of the former LYR electric network radiating from Liverpool Exchange, including complete closure of the Liverpool and Southport line, and beyond to Crossens. There was an outcry over the proposal and, in the end, only the service between Southport and Crossens was axed.

The electric car sheds continued to service the class 502 EMUs until 14 February 1970 after which they were closed and demolished. The site of the shed building had become wooded by July 2011, and the eastern storage sidings had been developed as a school.