Compound2632

The issue is really about avoiding unconscious bias (or indeed, conscious bias) in interviews. Ideally an interview should be conducted in such a way that the interviewers are unaware of the candidate's identity in terms of protected characteristics such as gender, age, race, etc.

Although sea level rise in consequence of global warming is a greater existential threat to the city as a whole. So one might think it is a case of enjoying it while it's there.

And they support vast piles of stone architecture with apparently few problems to do with settlement - although the campanile of St Mark's did collapse in 1902. For that sort of money, you could employ a cook.

At least two. One series in 1903 and one on 1920 or so - I think the one i used is from the 1903 series; the 1920 series included a lot of 'foreign' wagons, reflecting the common user arrangements. The thing is, I've not found any publication that makes use of them - except for one that made its way into the Great Western's General Appendix.

Note the archaic spelling "waggon" - also much used by HMRI up to this time.

Erm... Isn't that the test?

I learned to drive when I was in my mid-30s, the great motivation being the impending need to get my wife to the maternity hospital. I do think that's quite a good scenario for training careful drivers!

Perhaps what's needed is the vacuum loo, ensuring a good seal between derriere and porcelain.

Optimally, 85% - 90% of a school's budget currently goes on staffing. The school at which I am a governor is in an affluent area, so gets minimal additional funding through pupil premium. We have an experienced staff, which means that we get excellent results, but they are relatively high up the pay scale. It's a smallish primary, so the leadership isn't on vast salaries. We're looking at 100% of school budget going on staffing next year, without making any allowances for future pay increases. We are in the good position of being full for next year, unlike other schools in the area which are facing falling rolls. The staffing cost problem is directly the consequence of government action, in not fully funding teacher pay increases, increasing employer NI contributions and pension contributions without providing matching funding, and imposing the apprenticeship levy, funding a scheme from which schools do not benefit. So there's very little headroom for spending money "wisely" or otherwise. I suggest you volunteer as a School Governor!

Like I said, 1:36 scale would be spot on. There's precedent, with the one-time vogue for 3 ft gauge models at 5.5 mm/ft, but the problem with introducing a new scale is always lack of compatible scenic items - though 1:35 is an established military modelling / wargaming scale.

She (or perhaps any males in her life) achieves 100% accuracy, then?

Some will be aware of the LMS's use of old covered goods wagon or parcels van bodies to provide additional warehousing at goods stations. Just yesterday whilst looking for something else in the Midland Railway Study Centre's online catalogue I came across a drawing for the concrete foundation structure for such bodies. Equally, examination of any medieval or Tudor timber-framed building will show that they are built on a foundation wall of stone or sometimes brick - effectively a damp course. There are a surprising number of such buildings surviving in smaller towns, often disguised behind an 18th or 19th century stone or brick frontage. Do not take Midland signalboxes as your model for building a timber-framed structure - they weren't designed to last. In fact I have the impression that along with much else on the Midland they were designed for renewal after about a quarter-century. The only reason so many do survive is that the renewal fund ran dry in LMS days.

Happy birthday (?) D299:

Today, 18 April 2024, is the 142nd anniversary of the entry of Drg. 550 in the Litchurch Lane C&W Drawing Office register. This is of course the the drawing for the single most numerous design of British railway rolling stock prior to the BR 16-ton all steel mineral wagons of Dia. 1/108, the Midland's standard 8-ton high sided goods and coal wagon with side and end doors, of which 62,000 were built at Litchurch Lane up to the end of 1902, along with an unknown quantity, almost certainly well over 10,000, at Bromsgrove wagon works over the same period. One can also count in the end door version, of which 9,000 were built at Litchurch Lane in 1890-1901, and probably some thousands at Bromsgrove. When the wagon diagram book was compiled, these wagons were assigned diagrams D299 and D351 respectively. (It's my belief, based on the allocation of diagram numbers, that the wagon diagram book was compiled no earlier than c. 1907; extant copies all seem to be the same edition of c. 1914/15.) I suppose one could consider today as the anniversary of the conception of the D299 wagon, though Drg. 550 was the fruit of several years of development of high-sided wagons. The first lot of high sided wagons to Drg. 550 in the Litchurch Lane lot list was Lot 82 of 1 Oct 1882. Whilst that appears to imply a gestation period of getting on for six months, I think the very first wagons to this drawing were 600 built by Ashburys, ordered in May 1882. Dumb buffer wagons had originally been ordered but this was quickly amended to sprung buffer wagons "which would be available for the general traffic of the Company". Ashburys were slow to deliver, with only 364 wagons delivered by early December 1882; a representative of the company was invited to attend the next meeting of the C&W Committee; he, presumably suitably grovelling, promised the rest by the end of 1883. So I don't think one can say whether the very first D299 was born at Litchurch Lane, Ashbury's Openshaw works, or even perhaps Bromsgrove.

My late father bought a Citroen Berlingo with my late mother's arthritis in mind. I have it now and, although in no way stiff, I do appreciate the extra seat height getting and and out!

it's not really a question of prioritisation* as of legal obligation. *Not that any of us would prioritise road maintenance over social care, schools, libraries, etc.

Equally, less wear at lower speeds - justifying reduced maintenance. Several 30 mph roads round here have been resurfaced in the last couple of years - I feel sure this has made them less safe for pedestrians by increasing the proportion of vehicles going at 40 mph!

Yes, but, as @Reorte reiterates, both are insignificant compared to the damage done by HGVs. I agree it is hard for the lay person to be confident that they are reaching the right conclusion, on account of the insidious propaganda put out by the anti-environmentalist, climate change denying, anti-EV lobby.

"In your chair"? Hence the decline in in-person interviews.

Myth. See: https://www.theguardian.com/business/2024/mar/25/are-electric-cars-too-heavy-for-british-roads-bridges-and-car-parks#:~:text=Extra weight from electric cars,add to road maintenance costs. From which I take that the additional wear from heavier private vehicles is small compared to the wear from commercial vehicles such as HGVs and PSVs. Before condemning EVs, consider the trend towards larger ICE vehicles such as SUVs.

They should have called it LE9!

Per my suggestion that they might have 14 mm gauge wheelsets up their sleeves. Just my bit of fun. They can call their stuff what they like. But Graham Farish is not 2 mm scale, it's 2.06 mm scale. (It's that teminology committee background again, I'm afraid.)

That is to say, NG-7 is their 0-16.5 brand. Perhaps they'll rebrand other ranges as SG-4 and SG-2.06?

But seriously, the whole system of scale / gauge description is a mess of different conventions so adding one more makes little odds! 009 and 0-16.5 are absurdities, because they both tell you that it's a gauge (16.5 mm or 32 mm, respectively) but actually another gauge (9 mm or 16.5 mm). Although to be more precise, both 00 and 0 represent scale/gauge combinations - 4 mm/ft scale on 16.5 mm gauge, 7 mm/ft on 32 mm gauge. On the other hand, one has P4 and S7, where the letter implies a set of track and wheel standards and the digit the scale, in mm/ft, but the gauge is not specified - these standards can in principle be applied to models of prototypes in any gauge - witness a number of fine Irish models to these standards. Then there's the utter nonsense of building kits sold as "00/H0 scale" or worse "00/H0 scale"! Excuse my rambling, but I used to be on committees that concerned themselves with terminology, nomenclature, and symbols in the physical sciences.

i look forward to the metre-gauge 7 mm scale range. OMG!