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C126

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Everything posted by C126

  1. I am no fan of politicians, but reading again From milk churns to Merry-go-Round, I remember the author commenting one freight flow on the E.R. was changed by the B.R., yes B.R.'s own, bean-counters to need two sets of wagons instead of one, so making it unprofitable and transferred to road by the company. B.R. was quite capable of destroying itself.
  2. Looking forward to this, the first exhibition of the year for me. Hope 'Kevin the Kite' and his chums are in attendance in the area again. Fingers crossed against rail strikes...
  3. Just to report Crecy's web-site is now saying April for publication: https://www.crecy.co.uk/british-railways-freight-terminals Sigh...
  4. If only! 'The Man in Coach A on a Voyager'.
  5. I had better raise my hand to the same failure of civil engineering: Sorry! Lovely layout, by the way. Look forward to reading more.
  6. Let's re-open it to Lewes, then! 😀 Retrieves hat, coat, gloves, umbrella, ...
  7. Not at all, @Oldddudders . The older one gets, the more one values 'life' and 'others' lives'. Please feel free to give some 'typical days in the life of...' as well as discrete projects. History needs to record how one chased carriage cleaners as well as closing a railway line. E.g., I still have no idea how a 'Link' works, or what loco or crew rosters look like and how they were interpreted. Sorry for the alarming thread-drift.
  8. @Asterix2012 thanks for that. As you will have guessed, I had no idea.
  9. Does anyone know what 'armour plate' looked like with which this wagon would be loaded? I assume 3" plate sheets (so 1mm. thick in OO), perhaps two side by side loaded along the wagon-length (with a few more on top with laths between for un-loading)? Thanks.
  10. If you are looking to buy, the librarians' choice at my place is: www.justbooks.co.uk ... which is the U.K. edition of www.bookfinder.com
  11. Alas, there is the paradox: those who desire ever more detailed models which involve higher prices (I lost track of those contributing here who said they were appalled at the standard of U.K. models compared to those seen overseas, and so stopped modelling) and those happy with the 1980's releases at cheaper prices and made in the U.K. U.K. manufacturing is not to return, and was not a factor in keeping prices down anyway, if I understand correctly, so what does one do? Having two ranges ('Railroad' and something more detailed) for varied depths of pockets is a good solution, I think.
  12. There is Squires of Bognor Regis (no connection, but a contented customer at a few exhibitions). http://www.squirestools.com/
  13. I was listening to the B.B.C. Asian Network radio station yester-day after-noon, and the presenter was getting very excited about his collaboration.
  14. Just came across this selection of amateur movie clips on the 'That's T.V.' station (the web-site of which refuses to load this morning to provide a link). https://railway-dvds.com/acatalog/Midland_Publishing.html Scroll down to 'British Railways Vol. 3: Vintage Southern'. I am no fan of steam, but was bewitched by 1930's film of an un-rebuilt L.B.S.C. Baltic, and the colour shots of the East Grinstead and Uckfield lines of particular interest to me. Also (briefly) Lewes Goods Yard flooded. If you do not know it, l recommend looking out for it on the T.V. station, and perhaps even buy a copy. The past looked a different world, up on the High Weald anyway.
  15. Are you quite sure? According to the O.N.S., it is 62.5%, (15.5 million) in 2021, if I understand correctly: https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/housing/bulletins/housingenglandandwales/census2021
  16. What a delightful, heart-warming tale that is, @The Johnster . Perhaps you have not depleted your sources for more tales yet...
  17. Sorry to drag this way off topic, to the subject of the English teaching and learning (or not) foreign languages, but I found trying to retain my language lessons very difficult when not using it every day. Quite apart from the difficulty some find of the language learning itself - do not get me started on the two years of forced school Latin - it is hard to retain what little aptitude one has unless one devotes one's entire existence to this single goal. And I would rather spend time on other interests as well. Working with those whose entire existence is their foreign language/culture (even after retirement they return!), I do not think it would be healthy.
  18. But was it not also the case that the firm made a 'profit' out of that low-wage trainee during the duration of her/his training? Also, there were not always jobs at the firm for the apprentice to move into upon qualification.
  19. I work with them. Trust me, many are. Also arrogant, self-entitled, thoughtless, and selfish. But the nice ones out-weigh them. As to nurse education now being degree-level, this was owing to professional rivalry with doctors. British industry's investment in training for its workers has been neglected for decades. See the several books on the nation's economic decline and short-termism.
  20. May I thank you all for your interest and postings thus far. I am sorry not to have contributed as hoped - Christmas was not as planned, as I should have anticipated by now. As well as believing we should have a dedicated thread to the subject, I wanted to learn from others here how the programme is progressing, now what I assume the easier targets of station re-openings have been met and the more difficult projects of line re-openings should be happening (or not). In the June 2022 Programme Update document, the line-reopenings are in two tranches: (A) 'Schemes Developing to Strategic Outline Business Case' and (B) 'Schemes Progressing Past Strategic Outline Business Case'. Under (A) we have: 1. Reopen lines ... Bolton-Radcliffe/Bolton-Bury. 2. Reopened lines ... Consett-Newcastle. 3. Reopened lines ... Gainsborough-Barton. 5. Reopen line ... Wareham-Swanage. 10. Reopen the Gaerwen-Amlwch line, Anglesey to passenger services. 11. Reopen the Ashton-Stockport line to passenger services. 12. Reopen the Askern branch-line. 13. Reinstate the Beverley-York line. 15. Reopen the Darlington-Weardale line to passenger services. 16. Reopen the Middlewich line to passenger services. 17. Reopen the Oswestry-Gobowen line. 18. Reopen the Rawtenstall-Buckley Wells line to pasenger services. 19. Reopen the Don Valley line to passenger services. 20. Reopen the Stoke-Leek line. 22. Reopen the Tavistock-Plymouth line. 23. [Reopen the Mablethorpe-Louth and Firsby lines.] Under (B): 26. To reinstate the Fleetwood line. 28. To reintroduce passenger services on the Leicester-Burton (Ivanhoe) line. 32. To reinstate rail access to Devizes via a new station at Lydeway. (Scheme Nos. as document.) Thanks to @HillsideDepot for relating their interesting experiences of 32. Nothing much appears to have happened for nos. 26 and 28, and these are the ones that have a 'business case'. For those still to prove a 'business case', there appears much excitement about the Newcastle-Ashington reopening for summer 2024, but little said about improvements to Consett/Newcastle (2) and Gainsborough/Barton-on-Humber (3), and reopening Darlington-Weardale (15). The York-Beverley line (13) appears to be waiting for funds from H.S.2 cancellations before anything happens, as does Stoke-Leek (20) and Oswestry-Gobowen (17). Sorry, I have lost the will now to comment upon every one of the above. Railways do need to be run to cater for a demand, but sometimes I wish I lived where a more Chinese attitude prevailed to national infrastructure (but with a liberal attitude to compensation). Like @The Stationmaster, I wonder how many of these schemes will have 'shovels in the ground' before yet more programmes and policies come along to subsume and reappraise them (e.g., 'Network North' and the scrapping of H.S.2's northern legs). Meanwhile, construction costs continue to rise... Hope this thread might be supplemented soon by more positive news. Thanks again for your contributions and consideration.
  21. And was used by B.R.'s own "InterCity" for a while! 😀
  22. Please let us know the bibliographic details of both articles a.s.a.p. Looking forward to reading them. Thanks.
  23. Trust me, there are many of us eager to model inter-dependent railway networks/systems, but lack the space, time, and money so to do. 🙂 What I have in my garage, and what I doodle over a glass of port after dinner, differ massively in scale and operational interest. We have to work with what we have.
  24. Just wanted to say thank you @montyburns56 for the diligence and perseverance in taking such a comprehensive survey. I have no connection with the area, but like many others here, I hope, your hard work is much appreciated in creating this record.
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