George91

Loving the ingenuity of the lego!

Can't see that this has been directly covered, but I could easily be missing it! A thread to ask- which were the very, very first locos that appeared in blue, in 1966 and the first quarter of 1967? Leaving aside D1733- is it known which locomotive was the first to appear in BR blue- and when? My guess would be last quarter of '66, but could it have been any earlier?

Here's a shot I found this evening of a (possible) late surviving yellow wrap around 504 EMU- thoughts? https://www.flickr.com/photos/35891004@N05/38658983314/in/faves-63333186@N02/

A thought for Bootle: you could model the junction on a day where, for whatever reason, the line via Ormskirk is closed, so expresses and semi-fasts are diverting via Southport and Burscough North Junction, as definitely happened a few times in the late 1960s. In the 1967-68 period, this would give you a combination of... - Classes 104/105/108/110/112/113 DMU. - Diesel classes 24/25/40/47/50 - LMS black fives, BR standard fives, Britannias. And that's just passenger services! Up until 1968 there was still a little bit of freight coming in from the lines around the Docks to Preston and Blackburn, which on a diversion day would also have run via Bootle/Southport/Burscough, so that allows for a few more BR steam classes. Liveries-wise, you have BR green and full BR blue with full yellow ends: plus various intermediates: blue with small panels for the DMUs and 502s, green with full yellow ends for the diesel locos, and various levels of grime for steam! Coaching stock would be a complete mix of maroon and blue/grey, predominantly mk.1, but with a few early mk.2s and some LMS and LNER survivors. Believe a few SR green coaches were also drafted up to the NW in about 1967 and survived a couple of years before repainting, for additional variety.

Looking good, Mike. I echo the comments made about Bank Hall shed up-thread: there's a layout I'd love to see. At some point my own aspiration is to do Ormskirk circa 1968, but given at the moment I know little more than zero about modelling it might have to wait another decade or two!

I'd just like to re-iterate what I said last year on this: wonderful!

Looking great, Mike. Like you, I'm very interested in the railways of north Liverpool (although my focus is the ex-L&Y lines) so I'll be eagerly keeping an eye on this project.

I have a photo of a Britannia (Cromwell, I presume) approaching Croston station on the Ormskirk-Preston line at the top of nearly a full rake of mk2s. A quick query that someone on this thread might be able to answer: is there any evidence of blue/grey coaches or mk2s turning up on the GCR in the final months of the London Extension? I've seen plenty of photos of corporate blue DMUs on the line in 1968/69, but never blue/grey coaching stock: or blue locos, for that matter. Any evidence for it?

Hi Peter For further photos of Ormskirk, check this Flickr photostream. http://www.flickr.com/photos/rsclague/ George

Peter At this stage I lack the skills to build Ormskirk (or anything at all, really!) but at some point I'd love to do a layout of Ormskirk set in the 1967-68 period, as this was steam's very last route for regular passenger traffic. A layout at Ormskirk in 1968 could happily feature all of the surviving steam classes, in addition to diesels of class 24, 25, 40, 47 and 50, plus a variety of DMUs and of course the 502 EMUs. There's operational interest in that the goods yard was still in use until 1969, as were the carriage sidings to the north of the station. The Skem branch was still down at the Ormskirk end until 1968, although long since disused. So, it'd be a brilliantly interesting layout to do. Do you by any chance have plans of the station buildings? George

Lovely shots: you're planning a pre 1930s period model of Ormskirk, I presume?

My local line, Preston-Liverpool, saw the last steam passenger working of them all, the Liverpool portion of a Glasgow express on the evening of Saturday 3rd August 1968.

Lovely thread: will Apollo be updating it any time soon? Any shots of the lines running out of Liverpool Exchange? The Preston-Ormskirk stretch is my local route, so I'm always interested in photos from this part of the world!