Peterborough North

[great northern]

Did somebody mention Peterborough Crescent?

 

That's the one! Thanks Andy. I'll draw Gravy Train's attention to these photos - it will make a nice challenge for him eventually, and a very nice backdrop to the view South looking under the bridge.

[andyrush]

That's the one! Thanks Andy. I'll draw Gravy Train's attention to these photos - it will make a nice challenge for him eventually, and a very nice backdrop to the view South looking under the bridge.

Tell him I've got plenty more taken at the same time. I don't have a date, but I'm pretty sure that the guy who took the shots had a lineside permit and was recording the building prior to demolition (date of that?)

 

Andy

[great northern]

Many thanks to those who spoke up in favour of the everyday and the mundane. I entirely agree with you. I guess there is a bit of a contradiction in terms when trying to portray a mundane scene which inevitably involves frequent appearances of what are generally regarded as glamorous locos and trains. If one was fortunate enough to be anywhere alongside the ECML you would have seen plenty of them, so you do in my photos too. I must be doing something right though, as Jeff P is complaining about the lack of cops. Well, I remember doing that many times as the years passed by and the number of things on my wanted list diminished, so that's pretty realistic too.

 

Anyway, for all you lovers of the grime and the decrepit. here are some images of an N5 station pilot moving a few vans, probably down to East station. This particular engine has been laid up for quite a while awaiting repairs, but is finally back in service. I sometimes wonder what the New England shedmaster must have thought when he got these to replace withdrawn C12's. They were even older than the locos they replaced, and as they came from the CLC I suspect many of them had been in store for rather a long time. They lasted a further two years at most before they too expired......

 

 

 

 

[coachmann]

In steam days, the everyday and the mundane is what most of us saw in our little towns and villages and is what fired our interest in railways. Must admit though it must have been something to live beside the East Coast mainline.....

Edited December 12, 2012 by coachmann

[fishytrains]

Great photos as always. Each one of the N5 has something special about it.

 

Mike

[New Haven Neil]

You're welcome Gilbert, and I see you have done it again with the N5! As much as I love the pacifics etc, that little tank is actually my favourite of all the locos I have seen appear in this thread!

 

Neil, a lover of the nitty gritty ordinary!

[Mallard60022]

Off subject a bit - sorry.

Yes Coach (and G); the 'everyday' scene.

My 'local' (to my sec school) shunter was 30183 and at North Road it was 5511. They were there almost every day....and then, quite suddenly they were gone. Oh so many times we swore at them and bellowed "scrap it".

I even moaned when I went to Exeter Central and saw the same old 'Packets' as I had seen the previous summer and then they were gone

I think the 'pilot' chuntering about in your pics is brilliant; sort of comforting as if rearranging things and tidying before the next important visitor appears.

I didn't live anywhere near the ECML in those 'heady days' and this is probably why I just love looking at the pics of this layout.

I have to be content with a few hazy mind images of Kings lurching around the curves at about 60, just east of Laira shed, Bulleids shuffling out of Devonport Kings Road and a gleaming Isambard kingdom Brunel (5069, not the man - I'm not that old) on an Ocean Liner special waiting to race off to Paddington. You could see your face in the boiler paint of that Laira 'pet' that day - beautiful (the loco, not the reflection).

Happy, happy days.

Now I'm going to have to have a large brandy as I'm feeling sad

P @ 36E

[great northern]

I have decided that today should be christened "Unco-operative inanimate objects day". For this reason, there is, literally, only one shot of the day, and it is somewhat surprising that I still have an intact PC with which to post it. So, after much cursing and dark mutterings, here is a Top shed V2 on the Down main with a KX- Dringhouses Class C.

 

 

You will see that the loco, as it should be, is nicely balanced and parallel to the ground. Can anyone then tell me please why in this attempted shot it appears to be trying to dive forward?

 

 

It wasn't derailed, it got there under power, and it moved to where the going away shot was taken under power.

[landscapes]

Hi Gilbert

 

Your photos and layout of Peterborough North keep raising the bar every time you add to your thread.

 

Please keep the photos coming.

 

A Merry Christmas and a very Happy Modelling 2013.

 

Regards

 

David

[60027Merlin]

In steam days, the everyday and the mundane is what most of us saw in our little towns and villages and is what fired our interest in railways. Must admit though it must have been something to live beside the East Coast mainline.....

 

It certainly was Larry, mundane never came into it! For those of us where the ECML was on our doorstep we innocently took it all for granted. Oh happy days.

[landscapes]

It certainly was Larry, mundane never came into it! For those of us where the ECML was on our doorstep we innocently took it all for granted. Oh happy days.

 

I fully second Eric's comment, I use to live a few miles from Finsbury Park Station on the ECML and the amount of times my friend's and I said boo scrap it as a pacific locomotive we had seen many times before thundered through the station never thinking that one day it would all be gone

 

What I would give to go back to those days and see them all again, even A1 60130 Kestrel.

 

Regards

 

David

[Brian D]

I have decided that today should be christened "Unco-operative inanimate objects day". For this reason, there is, literally, only one shot of the day, and it is somewhat surprising that I still have an intact PC with which to post it. So, after much cursing and dark mutterings, here is a Top shed V2 on the Down main with a KX- Dringhouses Class C.

 

 

You will see that the loco, as it should be, is nicely balanced and parallel to the ground. Can anyone then tell me please why in this attempted shot it appears to be trying to dive forward?

 

 

It wasn't derailed, it got there under power, and it moved to where the going away shot was taken under power.

Dear Gilbert,

I can only suggest that it is an optical illusion caused by the adjacent trackwork configuration. There appears to be a crossover just alongside the V2 creating a false impression of converging lines.

Regards,

Brian.

[coachmann]

That V2 looks deformed to me. Draw a line though the running plate above the wheels and it runs upwards into the air instead of parallel through the vans as per the bottom yellow line.....

Edited December 14, 2012 by coachmann

[Dr Gerbil-Fritters]

Coach beat me to it - the loco running plate isn't parallel to the rest of the loco - probably not so noticeable from side on. Is it kit built?

[westerner]

I would agree, even in the 1st photo it appears to have slight downward slope to the front of the loco.

[JeffP]

Might have, and Gilbert's zoom lens has brought it out.

 

Somewhere I have a photo taken off the footbridge at Kirton in Lindsey station. The tracks run SLIGHTLY downhill.

The 300mm zoom I used makes them look like they are on a 1 in 10....

 

however, the first photo of the v2 going away is so remiiscent of tons of photos of the real thing.....

Edited December 14, 2012 by JeffP

[great northern]

I fully second Eric's comment, I use to live a few miles from Finsbury Park Station on the ECML and the amount of times my friend's and I said boo scrap it as a pacific locomotive we had seen many times before thundered through the station never thinking that one day it would all be gone

 

What I would give to go back to those days and see them all again, even A1 60130 Kestrel.

 

Regards

 

David

 

Living in Lincoln, I certainly experienced the mundane. There was very little else, or so it seemed to us anyway. I think back now, and remember D11's, Clauds and Compounds, and that was just at St Marks, in our eyes the vastly inferior and boring station. So, off we went to Grantham or Newark or Retford, to experience the glamour, and soon enough, as David says, we were shouting "scrap it" at most of the Pacifics we saw. Of course it must be said in our defence that we were very young, and even then I think I did realise that I was seeing and experiencing something very special and magical. Why else would I still be completely hooked now, and spending so much time on this project?

 

Would we have been more appreciative had we known that it was soon to end? Maybe, but then even the early days would have been tinged with sadness,so on balance I'm glad that in the mid to late '50's it seemed as though it would go on for ever. I have very few memories from back then which are as powerful and nostalgic as those of the steam railway. Yes David, what would we give to be transported back just for one day. Although of course, that is really just what we are trying to do through our models, isn't it?

[LNER4479]

Of course there are those of us who never saw the heady days of the steam railway first time round at all. That's where models such as Peterborough North have a very special additional/alternative purpose, being to show what it was like to us young 'uns. Yes, you can still occasionally experience the thrill of steam at speed on the mainline; but the everyday freight train or decrepit station pilot engaged in desultory shunting? Only a well-executed model can truly bring scenes such as those back to life. Great inspiration - keep 'em coming!

[coachmann]

Mainline steam rarely turns me on even though the present day locos sound and smell no different than they did in the steam age. However, there was one brief moment when it came as close as it gets to a 'time-machine'. It was dusk and a Black Five with four blood & custard coaches had been slowed outside Abergele. It crawled slowly towards the station when the next signal cleared and the driver opened up. The overall scene did not exactly replicate Abergele as it was in the 1950s, but the BR lined black loco and early livery coaches picked out by the station lamp light was enough to warm the cockles of the heart.

Edited December 14, 2012 by coachmann

[great northern]

Some years ago now I stood with Tony Wright on Grantham station and watched Bittern roar through on the Up line. She appeared to be going very fast, leaning into the curve just as we remembered. Gone all too soon of course, just a pall of drifting smoke remaining for a minute or two. But for that brief moment we were transported back 50 years. It was a thrilling and very moving experience that I shall never forget. Perhaps it was the station environment that did it - standing looking North at Grantham from the Down platform the view hasn't changed all that much, but I think it was more the fact that the locomotive was doing what it was designed for, hauling a good load at speed. The tight confines of Grantham station always accentuated speed back in the old days, and still did on this occasion, though the modern stuff doesn't give the same impression, even though it is going much faster.

 

I enjoy preserved railways, but I always think the locos are like caged beasts, never given their head. And usually far too clean.....

[great northern]

Back to that V2. Tony W knows it well, though he did not build it, and confirms that it does indeed lean forward. The effect has however been exacerbated, ( I love that word), by the zoom on the camera, as both Brian D and Jeff P have pointed out. The track to the left of the loco is also distorted. It looks far worse than it actually is. If it really did look that bad it wouldn't be on the layout, nor I'm sure would it have run on Stoke Summit, which it did for years.

[landscapes]

Good morning Gilbert

 

I fully agree with what you said regarding preserved steam.

 

Despite all the skills and dedication these people put into running preserved steam on both the main line and on the heritage railways they will never replace those days back in the late 1950's and early 1960's.

 

I use to do quite a bit of railway photography, photographing steam where ever I could, I also attended many photographic charters where we hired a loco and rolling stock for the day just to recreate what we now do in modelling.

 

Since I retired I took up modelling to replace my photography as the cost of charters and fuel has increased quite a bit, also you cannot rely on our weather to get nice photos in the sunshine.

 

With modelling I do not have to worry about the weather outside, but on some occasions with the charters we did come very close to recreating the past.

 

I enclose one such photo that's a favourite of mine taken on a charter at Barrow Hill MPD a few years ago.

 

I hope you do not mind me putting it on your thread.

 

What a line up.

 

Regards

 

David

[Mallard60022]

Several of us are getting a bit dewy eyed about days past - must be our age. I can spend hours and hours in 1958/9/60/1/2/3/4 & 67 (missed out on two as I was living where no 'real' steam ever trod after 1964). In May 1967 I met a girl in Weymouth - say no more......

Poor old V2; must have suffered a prang somewhere. Mr. Townend will have that into works pronto on arrival.

Now I'm going to start the rolling stock appreciation club for P Nth. Any chance of seeing a bit more of the stock as earlier with those lovely Pullmans? Wagons as well if you can please.

P @ 36E (still no progress on 36E GC plans except for finding the allocation lists for 1960 and 1963 )

Edited December 15, 2012 by Mallard60022

[JeffP]

Closest I've managed to get to the days of steam was my first and only visit to the Bluebell Railway, back in 1983.

 

In those days you could waqlk round the engine shed. I wandered round, and to be again surrounded by huge locos in various states of repair took me back to Doncaster carr loco in the early 60's.

 

Sadly, ANOTHER experience you can no longer have.

[Anglian]

I can remember freely wandering around the Bluebell engine sheds… but my most evocative memory was the winter of 1991, my father had collected me from University and we made a detour to Horstead Keynes for a few hours while they were running Santa specials. By 4pm it was pretty dark and the station was bathed in the soft warm glow of lamp light. There was a coal fire in the waiting room and the last train of the day was expected. By then it was bitterly cold, and you could hear the engine working the train up to the station, finally after pretty much barking the last half mile or so a Q class brought her coaches into platforms 4 & 5 (double platform single road). It was utterly magical and I'm sure because it was so dark and cold that the senses were numb to anything beyond the immediate confines of the station and this gave a totally evocative sense of 'being there'.

Edited December 15, 2012 by Anglian