XC to Brighton via KO

[Bloodnok]

I'm throwing layout ideas around in my head at the moment, and am considering whether something inspired by Purley would fit in my space. Purley is one of my earliest 'trainspotting' memories - sitting on Platform 4/5 with my mum for 25 minutes the same time each week, waiting for a train home. I think it would have been about 1987 or 1988.

 

What I'm trying to do is figure out, from my memories of that time, what the various stock that passed was.

 

There was the usual CIG/BIG/CIG mainline fare that went rushing past through platforms 1 and 2, the odd Gatwick Express mixed in with it, and maybe a VEP or two as well. Plenty of VEPs and 455s (and some EPBs if I recall correctly) on the slow lines, and the aforementioned 319s (which I recall being very new and interesting) terminating in platform 6, which should date it pretty precisely, as I think this arrangement didn't last long...

 

However, two trains clearly stood out to me as different. One I recall as a pair of 101s (though as I was only 7 or 8 at the time they could probably be any 1st gen DMU...), running ECS northbound through the station. They normally got stopped in the platform for a signal check, and there was an announcement not to join the train. IIRC it was platform 3. Does anyone know exactly what these were? They were coming from the Redhill direction, and heading towards Croydon.

 

The other I later discovered was the XC service from places remote via Kensington Olympia to Brighton, which was loco hauled. It looked to me like a bit of a mixed bag of anything goes - but that's a 7 year old kid who is used to multiple unit trains which are very consistent within set. I don't recall it to be made of Aircon Mk2s - I'd travelled on those to Norwich several times, and of course seen them on the Gatwick Express which passed every 15 minutes. So I would hazard a guess it was pre-AC Mk2s or even Mk1s. I'd also call it as being 47 hauled, but again, locos (other than 73s) were rare down there. I'd say they were in Blue/Grey livery, when the rest of the world around me had mostly gone NSE (aside from the GatEx, which was InterCity livery). I remember the flashing red tail light as very unusual (being far more used to the two red blinds on SR EMUs).

 

Does anyone have formation or timetable information for these trains?

[Oldfield_Park]

The excellent http://1s76.com/ should cover all your formation and timetabling needs regarding the CrossCountry workings.

 

As for your 1st gen DMU, was this a regular occurrence? I half wondered if it could have been stock from a Reading-Guildford-Redhill/Gatwick working making it's way back to the WR the long way round?

[Oldddudders]

As for your 1st gen DMU, was this a regular occurrence? I half wondered if it could have been stock from a Reading-Guildford-Redhill/Gatwick working making it's way back to the WR the long way round?

I'd guess you were right about it being Reading-Tonbridge stock (maybe this was before they went to Gatwick?) but wonder if it was a quick trip to the fuel point at Selhurst Depot?

[Bloodnok]

The excellent http://1s76.com/ should cover all your formation and timetabling needs regarding the CrossCountry workings.

 

Okay, looks like I was wrong about it not being AirCon stock, and not being in InterCity - that page suggests that Mk2D and Mk2E in Executive livery was firmly in evidence.

 

As for your 1st gen DMU, was this a regular occurrence?

 

Yup - same time every week. I was there for something like 8 weeks in a row, and only one time did it not appear on cue.

 

I half wondered if it could have been stock from a Reading-Guildford-Redhill/Gatwick working making it's way back to the WR the long way round?

 

It did have 'Redhill' on the destination blind on the inner end. I'm not sure if this means anything though...