Scottish Region TV train

[Steamysandy]

On 02/05/2019 at 13:36, Marly51 said:

Hi Argos and SteamySandy, I was one of the pupils on a TV Train in 1961. We boarded at Balgreen Halt, Edinburgh, which was right by our primary school, and travelled to Glasgow where a boat trip took us ‘Doon the Watter’ (River Clyde) to Dunoon then returned from Glasgow by TV train. Our teacher was a retired missionary, who disapproved of Cliff Richard, who was singing on the TV, and insisted we sang our own Scottish songs to drown out the pop music!! We were totally embarrassed, but the trip was a great adventure! Sorry I had no knowledge of locomotives back then, but most of the boys spent their lunchtimes with their Iain Allan trainspotter books at the Haymarket depot.

Thank you belatedly for your  story.

I also visited Balgreen Halt on another school trip but it was to a rugby international at  Murrayfield using the North Berwick - Corstorphine service train.

Apart from the obvious highlights of seeing what could be seen on Haymarket and St Margaret's sheds,there were a couple of Steam locos of interest.The first was a York B16/1 smokily hauling a goods past Wallyford and the second was Maude on the Ferry goods!

The Rugby. ---- i can't remember a thing !!!!

Edited May 25, 2019 by Steamysandy
Error

[03060]

Very late to this thread but I thought it worth pointing out that there is a B&W 'whole train' photo in Neil Caplan's 'The West Highland Lines' Railway World Special, p.11.

 

An 8 coach formation hauled by 73108 and 73072 plus BG, BSK, SO, RMB, SO, SO, SO, SO is shown skirting the shores of Loch Etive 24/5/60 heading for Oban.

 

Hope this is of use.

Regards,

Ian.

[Michael Hodgson]

Never heard of this one before.  The circular says it is "wired for the reception of television on a closed circuit".

 

I would usually interpret reception as relating to a broadcast signal, in other words contradicting the closed circuit, but it was clearly the latter.  Reception would require an aerial, which would have been technically very difficult with the technology then in use, and wiring would have been necessary for operation of a closed circuit, presumably also a 240v mains supply from equipment in the BSK.

 

Use for schoolchildren suggests programmes would have been broadly educational, indeed TV would have been a novel concept to many kids in rural Scotland in the 1950s.  Would the kids be shown this high tech equipment - Camera/recording equipment in the "Studio" in the BSK?

 

Who would have financed this - BR, BBC, Scottish Office ?

[keefer]

See the posts on page 1 of this thread.

A BR mk1 BG had a generator to supply power to the system and the adjoining coach was fitted out as a 'live' studio, from which live performances of singing/speaking etc were transmitted to the rest of the train.

 

[keefer]

By complete chance, I found a small article about the TV Train at RAILSCOT:

https://www.railscot.co.uk/articles/The_TV_Train/

[luckymucklebackit]

Found this on Facebook and remembered this thread

[keefer]

Certainly getting the most of a 'day out' - just shy of 23hrs!

[03060]

2 hours ago, keefer said:

Certainly getting the most of a 'day out' - just shy of 23hrs!

 

And nearly 12 hrs drinking time in Blackpool .... glad I'm not a Glasgow carriage cleaner !