NXEA!

Been reported that 60002 and three other 60's are outside Crewe DMD near the station at the moment, and visible. You might want to pop over and have a look...

I didn't even originally think Westerns were even cleared to Brum New Street, let alone had booked work there! Absolutely fascinating, thanks for that!

This may be stupid, but why/when did Westerns work off New Street to London? I didn't think they had any booked work, unless these were diversions or extra services vice the WCML on this particular occasion?

Personally I find the aesthetics of the 70's to pleasing. There's nothing quite like them running on UK metals, I think whilst they may be considered the ugly-duckling of the modern heavy-haul fleet, they have a lot of character and are very distinctive. Looks aside, the engine scream is one hell of a noise to witness! And as we all know thrash is key to how good a loco is...

It's a shame as allegedly South West MP's have formed a cross-party alliance to campaign for rail improvements - but any bickering/championing of their own schemes and desires is just going to sink the partnership and detract from any positive and well thought-out points they could be putting across as a team to the government, as one poster on another forum quite rightly remarked. Bearing in mind that if there's no agreement on what to do next, DafT and the Treasury will not commit funds, and it's going to be a struggle to wrestle any pennies for such investment away from the Treasury anyway. Add to that this alliance is threatening to vote against HS2 (please don't start on HS2 chaps, I don't want to drag the thread any further off-topic!) if they don't get any money to improve Dawlish or get a new route, the whole "alliance" is already looking farcical. With regard to the 3 hour can of worms, Plymouth already has two crack expresses from London which do it in three hours, running fast from Reading to Exeter leaving Paddington at 10.06 and 12.06, and in the other direction there's two taking 3h7, I imagine 7 minutes of that is slack along the course of the journey. Dawlish in tatters is not the time to push their own agendas - to get an hourly 3h service DafT would have to retain extra HST's for a new Plymouth semi-fast to call at intermediate stations to allow the fasts to go Reading, Exeter, Newton Abbot and Plymouth, a timetable re-cast in the West and possibly resignalling to boot to accommodate another train per hour. This is the perfect opportunity to almost back the Treasury into a corner for a new route, they need to go about it in the appropriate manner. Dick-waving and thrusting forward their personal agendas won't work unfortunately, they need to tread carefully and take one thing at a time before tackling any "desirable" schemes as opposed to necessities. I hope I'm wrong though! Finally thank you to the Captain for the shots. Keep up the good work, and make sure you're looking glamorous for those dates with the press every day!

And took 1700 tonnes up Upton Scudamore bank unassisted apparently... I should imagine Colas will be happy with their new toy already.

A question for Captain Kernow and Gary H - what is being done about the houses above the railway? I mean it's obvious that they will have been stabilised and assessed etc etc, but when/how will they be repaired? I imagine the most obvious time to do them will be now, but I must confess to not having a clue about how quickly insurance claims are paid out. If it were the case that it will take a long time for the claim to go through and the monies to repair the houses released, how will they be rebuilt with an active and running railway below them? I presume there is a way this can be done without affecting the railway below? I'm not trying to be pedantic on any of these points, moreover I'm genuinely interested in the logistics of these sort of things! And finally, is there any chance that the reopening date of the railway could actually be brought forward? Of course it's a huge job, I'm not underestimating that, but looking at it from the point of view that Network Rail effectively (apart from input from mother nature) have the site to do pretty much what they want with it when they want to as there are no trains over the next couple of months, is there any potential for the timescale to be sped up? I'm sure Devon and Cornwall would be delighted if they could get their railway back early! Thanks in advance.

I'll have a 303 EMU for my (in the very very very very very distant future) Glasgow suburban project I keep dreaming about, a CIG (think of the special commissions you could do such as 1497/98 Freshwater/Farringford), a 71/74 (you might be able to get some help from the NRM?), and if you were to make an 89 I would probably buy one to use in the future somehow... all in 00 Gauge please. Thanks Dave! EDIT: Just had a thought, how about Ready-made third rail track? I know it's easy to drill a few holes, do some spraying of the pots and rail and glue it down, but a small ready made range of third rail track in a similar vein to D***l's simple, robust but yet aesthetically pleasing catenary might be a good seller and boost Southern Electric modelling at the same time?

With all the disruption and train sets out of place, it appears 150124 did 1A77 Exeter-Reading today. Christ... Currently en route back to Exeter ecs as 5A77. Despite the Somerset levels being flooded, Cross Country are running a limited connecting service between Exeter and Bristol via Castle Cary, Westbury and Bath. I gather a Tamper has derailed itself at Largin and 43018, one of the power cars west of Dawlish set its alternator alight too. Really isn't going well at the moment in the South-West, I think FGW must have seriously p*ssed God off... But in all seriousness I must say I'm really impressed with everyone's response so far, the MDTR gets slagged off by a lot of people, me included, but all the gals and geezers at NR and the TOC's are showing a real can-do attitude in difficult conditions with diversions left right and centre, hand-signalling, as well as working in difficult conditions, I take my hat off to you all.

In reply to your posts Gerald, I know that you explicitly referred to capital costs as not counting, but I included that as a sign as a change in direction for the government, ie if they're spending more, surely they're willing to subsidise the railways more. You can't make such a sweeping statement as "no one will use a North Devon route", the market is obviously there for Tavistock with 30,000 people, and Okehampton may be on the back burner but it's an aspiration which will hopefully be realised in the future. Quite often with re-opening cases, the passengers projected useage is much lower than actual useage - look at Alloa and Ebbw Vale for example. Plus you're opening up more travel opportunities with a through line such as Tavistock-Exeter, and Crediton/Okehampton-Plymouth, flows which may not have existed before, or you may encourage these journeys to transfer by rail for example, and you're generating more new journeys than you thought as suddenly the train becomes really attractive. As for reversals, as I've already said, 7 minutes apiece, so you're looking at about half an hour to reverse at both Exeter and Plymouth as you say. What is the problem with that? It's about keeping the through opportunities. The people that catch the train do so because they find it easier than catching a bus or driving, and transferring to a bus is time consuming. If diverting and reversing to get to Plymouth at Exeter was that bad during the Whiteball blockade, surely they would've provided express coaches from Plymouth, Newton Abbot and Totnes to say Honiton for trains to Paddington because as far as actual travelling time goes, it's about half an hour quicker than reversing via Exeter. But no they didn't, they ran a service with a reversal and a longer route because it's easier on the passenger to have a longer through service than normal, than a transfer on and off with buses, which would actually take a similar amount of time after you factor in the transfer times and the coaches journey to the main trunk road. And finally that's the point about the LSWR. NR are obviously advocating it because it's cheaper. And the 1936 GWR land has been built on to some degree, and you're linking up two more towns via the LSWR. With regards to the DMU fleet I can't for the life of me find what I was on about - typical! I'll have another look and PM you tomorrow. But I too share your fears about the South-West being pushed down the pecking order. Priorities eh. I am sceptical that at the moment it's all hot air from NR. But if it isn't, it makes sense and it can work well IMO.

I wasn't going to post anymore on the Okehampton subject as I thought it best to leave the thread on updates about Dawlish, but a couple of points I'd like to make. Obviously the Western Route MD thinks the bean-counters in NR can persuade DafT to look at Okehampton, otherwise he wouldn't publicly come out and say such a thing as we support the idea of the old LSWR route. As mentioned before, the area where the 1936 GWR proposal were to leave the current route is apparently heavily built on in places as is Heathfield, so if you want a diversionary route, this is your only choice. The economics must at least be close to stacking up if NR are actively looking at it, and it looks like an ounce of common sense for once if they're tying it in with Tavistock's reopening. I'd imagine even if they haven't surveyed the other bridges in the region that their engineers will have some idea of the condition of the remaining ones. IIRC they're refurbishing bridges on the Waverley which have been out of use for a similar length of time. As I debunked in an earlier post, an uneducated guess suggests that they can make such a route 2tph capable to the tune of around £30million if they used basic passing loops as opposed to dynamic ones. With regards to reversals involved in diversions, a driver on another forum mentions 7 minutes to change ends on a HST and get the GSM-R up and running. What is the problem exactly? I don't understand, yes it's one potential hurdle to fall down on, but very small chances of it causing a problem I'd imagine. HST's have been reversing at Exeter St David's in both directions every 2 hours for the past couple of weeks, so if they can handle that, why can't they reverse at Plymouth again as well? As for DMU's, I don't *think* FGW will be losing much if any. The only things likely to go are 143's, as the 153's are being life-extended. A chap on WNXX who works for First seems to think that the 165/166's will go to Bristol and displace the remaining Sprinters to Exeter and bulk up the fleet for half-hourly Severn Beach, Portishead, longer Cardiff-Taunton's, Weston-Bristol Parkways and the Gloucester/Malvern to Weymouth corridor, but I can't recall off-hand what will happen to the 158's. So any 150's that are currently working off Bristol are likely to come down to Exeter, as I think Exmouth/Barnstaple/Paignton by the end of CP5 will probably warrant all 4-cars in the peak, maybe even a few 5 or 6 cars, and all the Cornish branches need an extra car. So it's likely there will be a couple of leftover 150's to do an hourly Exeter-Plymouth via Okehampton in any case. So as long as they're serious and any funding is actually there, it's good timing on the part of NR to start the ball-rolling now as that means they can look to the future a little more when they connect Tavistock up. IF this is all not hot air from NR of course. But as with others, I'd just like to say again good luck to the gals and geezers working at Dawlish, Crewkerne, and Athelney and thanks to Captain Kernow for informative behind the scenes posts, and The Stationmaster for some rational, railwayman insight into the logistics side of things, invaluable.

Point taken about the roads in the Borders and I respect anyone's opinion, but if poor roads were an excuse to build railways, why has East-West rail got funding committed, which (as someone who admittedly doesn't know the area well) I suspect has a half-decent road network around the line in question. Why was Alloa re-opened with a population of only 15,000 and has the A91 and is only 20 minutes drive from the A/M876 reconnected? Why was the Robin Hood line reopened? Because they all have merit and reasons to be served by the rail network, roads aside. Whether it's for an hourly passenger to Stirling/Nottingham or cross-country freight and regional stoppers, they are being reopened for a purpose regardless of what the road network may be like locally. Okehampton and Tavistock are served by decent A roads, but if that's the case why are Devon County Council and FGW going to run more services to Okehampton as you say? And why is Tavistock being reopened? Because the traffic is there and they think it can and will work and pay it's way. And *if* the bean-counters at DafT had common sense, with investment going into these two places not very far apart, why not link them and give a whole economic boost to Dartmoor and the tourism there, as well as boosting the whole of Devon and Cornwall with a second rail link. We can't deny the climate change that's going on at the moment, there's no use burying heads in the sand so to speak. We need another rail link in addition to a stronger Dawlish. I'm sorry Mike, I genuinely respect your opinion and viewpoint as a railwayman, but I must say that I disagree and think towns like Okehampton and Tavistock deserve to be put back on the map regardless of local road networks, and if more money was spent and joined the two projects up, it would answer the pleas of every MP and resident in Devon and Cornwall right now.

1. It is if Dawlish becomes impassable. Better to have two reversals and half an hour dolloped onto the journey time than no train at all if this becomes a regular occurrence. 2. I refer you to the Waverley project again. Galashiels has a population of 15,000 Eskbank for Dalkeith is 15,000, Newtongrange, 5000, Gorebridge 5000. These are the only reasonably populated places along the route. On the Meldon route, Okehampton has 7000, Tavistock has almost 30,000. If the Waverley can sustain around 45,000 people, (Stow has a population of 1000, Tweedbank 2,000, couldn't get the statistics for Shawfair) why is the LSWR route with a population of 40,000 including Bridestowe, Lydford and Sampford so unworkable, when it can double function as a diversionary route too, as well as opening up Dartmoor for tourism? 3. No one is advocating severing (well, I'm not anyway) Totnes, Dawlish and Newton Abbot from the network, more a second route is needed for resilience. The GWR route would obviously remain top dog, but the SR as a back-up when Dawlish is incapacitated. However, I think running a through service to Penzance via the SR in times of trouble serving Plymouth, St Austell, Truro and the rest of Cornwall is just as important as keeping the Dawlish route operable. It's not the end of the world if HST's were diverted temporarily via the SR in times of adverse weather that Newton Abbott and Totnes had a connecting train to Plymouth to get to London. That's what a second route would be for, not to divert traffic away from South Devon in times of normality.

I take your point about the loops and that's something I hadn't considered, but again, it doesn't need to be as expensive as that. IIRC Welshpool Dynamic Loop cost around £12m? IMO if the Okehampton route is ever reopened, it doesn't need to be something as fancy as that. A normal loop somewhere between Yeoford and Sampford Courtenay wouldn't need to cost more than around £5-7m, as would one between Okehampton-Tavistock, and a loop at Bere Alston. Looking at the projected timetable on the Kilbride website once Tavistock is up and running, a 150 should do Bere Alston - Keyham in 15 minutes (this is presumably after the line speed is raised which I assume must be the plan). If that's the case, that should about squeeze in 2tph in each direction, bearing in mind 1tph each way would be a non-stop diverted express which will take about 13 minutes for the above section. And in addition to that, any reopening would probably see Crediton-Yeoford remodeled slightly as a double-track section with the junction being at Yeoford, thus reducing the potential timetabling conflicts between passing services. So as an uneducated guess, in addition to reopening costs, you could make the route 2tph each way capable for around £30m. And may I just say, I am sceptical too about any reopening, but I think it'd be foolish to write it off - again, look at the Waverley, a rural area which the Scots deem to be worth £300m (including 5 refurbished/new bridges) with less benefits than a reopened Okehampton route IMO, which could act as a diversionary route too, in addition to it being a catalyst for regeneration and new opportunities, like the Waverley.

Very informative and interesting! Totally puts the kibosh on my inkling that Meldon may not be as bad as thought though haha!

I'd just like to say thank you to Mr Kernow for his updates in this thread, really invaluable. It's a right old situation what's happened at Dawlish, but one thing I can't help but worry about is the climate. Obviously we cannot say at this stage whether the climate will get harsher, but being a previous A-Level Geography student, it was generally taught that the climate will get harsher as a result of the current climate change, and very quickly as well, and as others have said previously, harsher, more frequent storms are on the cards, and to be honest, I'd put my money on that. Now, as we know Dawlish and the South Devon Coast are being braced for another set of storms, so it could be sometime before Network Rail can get any decent headway with repairing the damage, and there could be more of these storms for the rest of the month as the jet-stream is currently buggered. It could push back the current 6-8 week estimate for all we know, unfortunately. Forgive me for being a pessimist, but I fear that once Dawlish is repaired, the bout of storms are over and we're into Spring, the issue will be swept under the carpet - ie, no serious consideration for a second route. It will probably be the case that a programme of investment as others have suggested will go ahead in my opinion, so reinforced concrete walls, and other forms of sea defence and making the railway more resilient. Problem is of course that whilst it is undoubtedly the cheaper option, long-term it is of marginal benefit. If the government seriously wants to help the South-West, a second route is needed in addition to investment in the sea-wall. Personally, I don't feel that the 1936 GWR project would be the way to go. On WNXX one of the local drivers seems to think there's a fair few houses in the way if you were to re-use the junction and part of the Heathfield branch upgraded to reach Newton Abbot, as well as lots of tunnelling. There is a benefit though in that if you divert the WofE HST every hour and the XC to Plymouth/Penzance as well as any freight via the inland route, you free up paths for a half-hourly Paignton-Exeter/Exmouth all stations. However, I favour reopening Okehampton-Bere Alston, and can I just stress it's not from a rose-tinted perspective. Now if the LSWR route was reopened, it provides an opportunity for new hourly Exeter-Plymouth services via Tavistock, as well as opening up access for people on Dartmoor considerably - they're currently doing a similar thing with the Waverley line, a very rural area. The thing is as well is that a second route from Exeter-Plymouth doesn't have to be an all singing, all dancing, expensive 90mph tunnelled route. It just needs to be a way for direct trains to run through to Plymouth and Cornwall. As someone mentioned already, Crediton-Exeter can just squeeze in 4tph if done right. So if in times of disruption, why not have 1tph each way diverted HST's, and 1tph Barnstaple/Plymouth local which splits at Crediton - that way it saves paths on the bottleneck without anyone losing out and the scheme having to be more expensive. Obviously the line to Okehampton still exists, and I don't know what the line is like but I can't imagine it'd be too difficult or costly to undertake some drainage and improvement work for 60mph running - plus the space/track is there for a crossing loop at Okehampton. Now I must admit I cannot remember where I would've read such a thing, but for some reason I'm thinking I read somewhere that Meldon viaduct wasn't in as bad condition as thought? I haven't a clue how much it would to be able to fix it up, but again, it doesn't have to be so trains can run over it at 100mph - a 45/50mph speed limit would be ample, with maybe 20/25 for freight if possible. With Tavistock due to be reconnected to the rail network soon, if there was ever a time to make a realistic case for a second route, now is the time. And personally I think the only one with any real chance from my point of view (which I must stress isn't particularly knowledgeable, but from the way I perceive the two options) is the LSWR. And yes I realise that it entails two reversals, but in times of emergency in winter which is when it'll act as a diversionary route, the priority is running through trains and keeping Devon/Cornwall connected, not the journey time. Finally, to the people saying the South-West should be dumped off the rail network or that it should be singled, don't be so stupid. It's a poor area of the country as well as one of the fastest growing areas, (Exeter is the fastest growing city I believe, for example) and it is due to receive an influx of new stock, and if the South-West really was a pointless area to invest in, Tavistock wouldn't be getting reopened, and neither would a new station on the Exmouth branch. And stop being so insensitive to the people cut off in that part of the country. Rant over. Sorry for the long post all, thought I'd add me two-penneth an' all.

Fantastic layout, really stunning. It may be only 4 foot long but it oozes atmosphere, plenty going on without it being too crowded, just absolutely fantastic. I've currently lost my appetite for modelling at the moment and I'm taking a break, but this is seriously inspiring me to do a mirco-layout before I tackle my bigger one, which I've been stuck on for months and lost enthusiasm for as it stands. I mean, after all I still have some spare insulation sheets... I think the mark of a good layout is inspiring others, and it's even better that it's so small but yet operationally interesting. I think I'm going to go away and have a little fag packet doodle... Absolute corker of a layout Julian. PS, I'm presuming it's 49 inches including the fiddle yard? And more photo's with rolling stock pretty please!

074 is Teenage Cancer Blue as well. And another variation within the DB Red is 60007 with it's 'Switch on to Safety' logo on the sides.

Sorry!

RFM 10229 is already in GA livery... Not sure if it carries the same grey band at the bottom though!

The reason why 158s never venture to Cornwall is surely down to the way they're diagrammed, irrespective of leasing costs? The 158's are concentrated on the Cardiff-Portsmouth corridor and based at Phillips Marsh, hence why they very rarely stray. The furthest they get West is Exeter as Exeter crews still retain one 158 diagram to help with traction knowledge. I believe it does a Cardiff-Taunton, runs ecs to Exeter and then does a couple of trips on the Exmouth branch. Don't forget that 158's used to be commonplace in Cornwall up until around 2007 when FGW cascaded their ex-Wales & West 158's to Northern/EMT/Scotrail, in fact they regularly turned up on the Exeter triangle on stopping diagrams as well as the Cornish branches as they had so many of them when they initially received the TPE batch! The 165's/166's will not be enough to cascade any 158's away, unless they keep 150's in lieu, however if FGW is left with a 150/165/166 fleet, this means they have no relatively comfortable long-distance DMU's for Cardiff-Portsmouth, Brighton/Weymouth-Malvern for example. Of course, we don't know what the make-up of the West fleet will be, but I'd wager a bet on 153's (these are confirmed as being DDA modded by FGW, most likely based at Laira for the Cornish branches), 158's staying as now, with 165/166's doing Bristol/Exeter Metro, and anything in between, replacing the 143's and 150's. 16 HST sets works out about right - presumably 14 diagrams, hourly Plymouth services works out at about 8 diagrams, so the current 1tp2h extensions to Penzance should take it up to about 12 sets. Add in a few peak-time extensions to/from London, that seems to be your 14. Lastly, this just proves what I've always thought - HST's will last forever!

Indeed, most of the 165/166 fleet bar around 10-12 units for Greenford and Gatwick-Reading will transfer West. Expect to see just a fleet of 158's, 165/166's and a small batch of 153's with DDA modifications for the Cornish branches in my opinion. Pacers and all 150's will almost certainly have left.

The 171 thing is correct, the 170's automatically took the 1/2/3/4/5/6 series, so the 171's took 7 and 8, not forgetting of course that initially the 171's were initially 170's before the coupler and minor electrical changes. The 172's have kind of followed in this respect, ie even though the LM ones use the 2xx/3xx number series, they don't share the last two digits with the 170's of the same number series, the LO 172's are numbered in the 0xx series which isn't used by 170's (albeit though used by the original 168 batch) and there are only 4 172/1's which share the same last 3 digits as 170's. I am surprised they didn't number the 172/1's as 172121-124 for instance, considering they went to the same effort to avoid duplicating numbers in the LM batch with 170's.

Those shots of the 81 with the 76 just in the background and the 85 and the 506 EMU are bloody marvellous! I don't know about anyone else, but I don't automatically put/picture 76's alongside 81's/85's for example, when of course they rubbed shoulders everyday for years, so these photographs are a good reminder. Brilliant stuff, keep 'em coming!

The Southern 313's are all allocated to TSGN for strengthening out of Moorgate (even though they'll already technically be a part of TSGN, so it's an internal cascade), and so they'll be reversed back to dual-voltage capability. A poster on WNXX mentioned that even with the Welwyn stoppers going over to Thameslink, another 5 313's will be required, plus there is a frequency increase/extra services due to run into Moorgate with the new post-Thameslink set-up as it's impossible to lengthen platforms beyond 6 coaches, so I imagine all of the Southern sets will be required with none spare to go anywhere else. Size is also a problem as I believe a 313 is the only EMU cleared down to Moorgate as it's very restrictive, so it wouldn't surprise me if they actually got to their 50th birthday as it's not really cost-effective to replace them, at least yet anyway.