when did day to day transport become boring for you? (was: main line railways)

[KeithMacdonald]

2 hours ago, Chris M said:

And there are strange leftovers from a bygone era still around, albeit in ever shrinking numbers. I first thought this was the remains of a signal box but on further thinking I reckon it was the wall that supported the down platform building at Dawlish Warren. The great thing is that it is still there. 

 

I remember seeing that many times c.1960 to 1972 when on holiday and then me & my mates playing on Dawlish Warren. Also the signal box, manned by Mr Morris, who was happy to show us lads how all the signalling worked. Initially with the last of steam, then Westerns and Warships wizzing past, and then a  transition to boring Brush 4s and Class 50s, which even to us lads felt like a sad thing.

 

2 hours ago, Chris M said:

The first time my interest waned was when I discovered girls.

 

And then I discovered girls as well, in Dawlish and Teignmouth. After which, strangely, trains became invisible. Until my son was born, then TTTE and then reassembling all the model railway left in a suitcase from Dad.

[The Johnster]

Much that was interesting has gone, but a 66 or a tug thundering under Pengam Bridge with a loaded steel train or 2,000 tones of oil still makes the ground shake and raises the hairs on the back of my neck.  Heavy freight is awesome, even if I’d prefer it with 9Fs!

[DaveF]

I've never lost my interest but it has changed over the years.  In the 60s I thought the end of steam would end my interest, but I started to enjoy seeing diesels and electrics.

 

That process of adapting my interest as things change has continued.  It just takes a few months to start to enjoy new classes until I get used to seeing them.

 

I have become much more interested in the history over the years, I am fortunate to live in a place with a lot of railway history - for example if I travel about 1 mile from home I cross at least 4 locations where there were once railways or waggonways.

 

As a railway photographer I long ago decided to take a photo of anything that comes along, as well as infrastructure and now looking at my photos since the early 60s and Dad's from around 1947 gives me immense pleasure.

 

David

Edited January 16, 2023 by DaveF

[Halvarras]

When I first became interested in 1966 I found Westerns, Warships (both shapes) and NBL Type 2s in charge at my local station, Truro, in a variety of livery styles, together with a Class 08 pilot, which provided excellent entertainment from the public footbridge spanning the west end of the yard between main line movements which included parcels, milk and coal traffic as well as general freight. The following year the occasional Hymek and Brush Type 4 added variety although the 08 departed at the end of that year, its duties taken over by mainline locos so the entertainment continued. I saw the 22s and Warships replaced by 25s and Peaks before I left Cornwall but I remained within WR territory near the GWML - the loss of the Hymeks, my favourite class, in 1975 was a blow but 2 years later the demise of the Westerns brought the curtain down on the entire hydraulic era and that really did leave a hole - it wasn't quite the same for me after that, even though I had coped with the 1973-5 TOPS renumbering tolerably well, but there was enough going on in the railway scene to maintain an interest. The bold eye-catching liveries which emerged in the mid-80s (except NSE, not my thing, sorry) were interest-boosting but by then I was married with a young family and my last notebook entry was a solitary LLB 50036 on Swindon SP on 18th December 1990.

 

After that my only lineside visits were during holidays back on my old Cornish stamping ground, or whenever the restored D1015 Western Champion was out and about. Following retirement, three years ago I moved back to Cornwall but despite living within walking distance of St Blazey depot I don't feel particularly motivated to go and watch the trains as there is so little to see compared to the busy railway I remember, and 66s do little for me. Nor do the 800s although they do provide the strange sight of roof-mounted pantograph equipment in Cornwall, something I never thought I'd see in my lifetime! I will go to see any 'proper' motive power if I find out about it in time (and it's not raining - I'm that fickle these days), and a recent visit by 37688 was a must, although its late running stretched my patience........but hey, four 66s turned up while I was waiting!

 

This year the contraction continues with the removal of Par's semaphore signals, along with those at Lostwithiel and Truro, and by the end of the year GWR's 'Castle' HSTs will have gone too - I witnessed the prototype in action on the GWML in 1975 and introduction of the production trains the following year, so I'm facing a test - can I be bothered to make the effort to obtain my own photographic record of the end of both the HSTs and semaphore signals, or am I content to let the active contributors to the Cornwall Railway Society's website do it for me? I suppose the question comes down to, how bothered will I be this time next year if I do nothing? After all, those semaphores at Truro are not the same ones I saw Warships and Westerns roaring away from over 50 years ago.......

 

While my interest in the real thing has wound down over the past three decades, my modelling activity has increased as I seek to recreate the railway I remember, assisted by all the lovely models we have these days. And no doubt that applies to most of you reading this!!

[Reorte]

48 minutes ago, The Johnster said:

Much that was interesting has gone, but a 66 or a tug thundering under Pengam Bridge with a loaded steel train or 2,000 tones of oil still makes the ground shake and raises the hairs on the back of my neck.  Heavy freight is awesome, even if I’d prefer it with 9Fs!

 

In my case it's the sight of a train coming down from the Peak District quarries, with enough dust blowing off sometimes that it almost looks like a steam hauled train has passed.

 

I might not really like the modern railway much at all but it's certainly not completely devoid of interest.

[colin smith]

From a modelling perspective 1922. After that there was just too much standardisation.

[Nearholmer]

I certainly think you have to work harder to find the interesting bits these days.

 

To me, the “journey experience” declined significantly once air-con and the “sealed box” travel experience became near-universal. I’m sure “normal human beings” like air-con, quiet etc. , but I enjoyed things much more when one wasn’t so totally separated from external reality. Being a southern region bod, I particularly liked travelling on the quieter lines, and quieter times of day, on trains like BIL, HAP, SUB, Hastings unit, Mk1 coach etc, especially in summer with the windows open. The same routes are nothing like as pleasant from inside a sealed box. 
 

In the 70s and even the 80s, a lot of the southern was wonderfully retro too, semaphore signalling, and some very quirky sections away from the main lines. All gawn!

 

 

Edited January 16, 2023 by Nearholmer

[newbryford]

Bucking the trend of the majority of posts in this thread.

 

I'm still as interested in the current scene, as I was from about 11-12 years old.

Edited January 16, 2023 by newbryford

[SM42]

Sometime between the arrival of the  class 66 and full scale voyager takeover as far as the trains were concerned. 

A passing class 37 is an unexpected pleasure nowadays. 

 

When I started on the railway, I was told my attitude to trains would harden and it did, but the interest  remained 

 

My main interests have now moved on to signalling, but even that is on borrowed time as more and more is turned into a video game. 

 

30 years ago, I would never had believed a filament lamped colour light signal would be something I would point a camera at. 

 

Perhaps I just feel that the mundane needs recording and I missed doings much of that in the 70s, 80, and 90s.

 

Who knows, in 20 years I may have an interest in Dorman LED signals

 

Andy

[wombatofludham]

Never has.

A couple of years back, pre pandemic, I had just over an hour to kill in Rugeley before meeting with friends, so I parked up at Rugeley TV and with the aid of RealTime Trains, watched the amazing stream of traffic passing the station.  The fact they were no longer the 86s or87s of my youth didn't matter, the continuous stream of Pendolinos, Voyagers and intermodals was really impressive.  Even more so was the fact RTV - a station barely clinging to life when I was at school in the town with a barely useful three or four trains a day, variously over the years the awful Class 304s (the use of non corridor stock on a service calling at unstaffed stations being utterly stupid), ragtag dmu or Class 153 bubbles - now had hourly mainline trains in each direction and the service to Cannock, Walsall and Birmingham, each arrival dropping off real passengers in decent numbers.  It was a really great, entertaining and impressive sight.

I enjoy watching busy trains doing what they are there to do.  They are not a theme park, we should stop wailing about how the past was better and take interest in and be stimulated by a railway which is more relevant today than it has been for many decades.  I'm more impressed that Fairbourne, population 700, has a two hourly service to Birmingham for most of the day, than the fact it's always a 158.

['CHARD]

My 'relationship' with the real thing changed the moment I started work in the railway industry in 1988.  I've never lost interest in it, but my interests have certainly shifted. 

 

Partly it's a case of 'never meet your heroes,' by which I mean that without exception every train manufacturer and leasing company (I can't think of any that I've not been involved with in some way) has been in one way or another underwhelming (spoken like a politician!), and when you 'know where the bodies are buried' - so to speak - you never see that organisation in the same light. 

 

The same tends to be true of the post-privatisation operators; my impression of the last years of BR was that it was a rather better and more credible organisation, and as the real railway has become more diluted and further from BR in appearance and outlook my respect for it has dwindled.  There are outliers that I have a fondness for, GBRf and DRS being two (old-school, the two of them!), I was partial to the late Adrian Shooter's Vivarail, and I still love certain non-electrified journeys - not least the reinstated portion of the Waverley route (and that's not without its hideous shortcomings born of contemporary construction standards). 

 

I have no time for the mega-fleets such as Thameslink and the hideously encroaching IETs, modern electrification tends to the grotesque, and Class 66s are still 66s even if each specimen is painted a different colour, they are just fodder. I cannot abide the slipping in appearance standards: graffiti, palisade fencing, rampant foliage and weeds in the four-foot.  Just NO. (And don't start me on the inevitable impact of the unquestioning headlong rush for Net Zero).

[Forward!]

I'm lucky enough to work in the former drawing offices of the GWR at Swindon, completely surrounded by the modern railway. I always thought the modern railway was rather dull. But actually, it's surprising just how much variety you see when you spend 8 hours a day, 5 days a week staring at the same stretch of the GW mainline!

[brushman47544]

Interest in railways generally - never. But the main line railway as in travelling by train for pleasure as a means in itself, then sectorisation. Once locomotives were allocated to sectors and the remaining loco hauled passenger trains saw the same small sub-classes of locos, the fun of bashing and getting unusual haulage effectively ended except for a limited number of specific summer Saturday trains and diversions, which you had to go for specifically. Dropping onto something unusual and unexpected was most of the fun. I cannot see myself travelling by train for the sake of it, rather than to get from A to B, again.

 

 

[Hal Nail]

1 hour ago, Nearholmer said:

I’m sure “normal human beings” like air-con, quiet etc. ,

i must be incredibly unlucky then as i cant remember the last time I didn't have to put up with someones TV broadcast on their phone.

 

As for visual interest, the rot set in during the late 70s when they started plating over headcode panels! 

Edited January 16, 2023 by Hal Nail

[melmoth]

I have never lost interest in the railway as a whole, but my ongoing awareness of how things were lapsed considerable when I stopped using it on a daily basis in around 2005. I would probably be happy to model any period between about 1980 and 2005 on the basis of personal observation.

[Chris M]

12 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

 

In the 70s and even the 80s, a lot of the southern was wonderfully retro too, semaphore signalling, and some very quirky sections away from the main lines. All gawn!

 

 

There are still semaphores in parts of the country, even on main lines. I love seeing the class 800s under control of semaphores because it just looks so wrong. This happens at Worcester and Ledbury for the Paddington - Hereford trains but for how much longer?

[Reorte]

3 hours ago, Chris M said:

There are still semaphores in parts of the country, even on main lines. I love seeing the class 800s under control of semaphores because it just looks so wrong. This happens at Worcester and Ledbury for the Paddington - Hereford trains but for how much longer?

Quite a few semaphores around my way, for now (not far from both the Furness Vale box and the New Mills South Junction box, the latter of which seems to have had some semaphores altered with added sighting boards and incredibly bright lamps). No 800s though, think I'd decide that I need to give up drinking if I ever thought I'd seen one on the Buxton line!

 

Their ongoing disappearance is one of the more significant facts of lack of interest for me, probably more so than the change of trains.

Edited January 17, 2023 by Reorte

[wagonman]

My loss of interest in the 'real' railway started  when diesels appeared on the West of England line, while the Beeching massacre was the coup de grace. That it also coincided with a burgeoning interest in 'cigarettes and whisky and wild, wild women' is of course purely accidental...

 

It probably explains why I model pre-group exclusively.

Edited January 18, 2023 by wagonman

[SouthernBlue80s]

For me the 80s were the last interesting railway decade. BREL, marshaling yards, a wide range of British built traction all serving an industrial base, all be it in decline. 

40, 25s, 46s, 45s, disappeared then even the 33s and 50s began to be decimated.

So by 1987-1988 it had become less interesting. By 1990-1991 I had lost interest completely. 

 

I can see why people were still interested in the 90s at least there were 37s and 47s trundling about but compared to what had been it was very boring.

 

Apart from 60, 66, and 70 today I don't even know any of the class numbers are. 

[rogerzilla]

68s are quite distinctive, and in some nice liveries too.  The "did you spill my pint?" loco.

[KeithHC]

Railways are constantly evolving take the ecml. From A1/3 to A4 then Deltics on to HST etc but even now with the 800’s. What will come next it will be another change. I hope I will never tire of looking at railways. The changes are also being reflected in the preservation scene. The Bluebell have bought a 3D and will have a full set of former BR(S) classic traction including one slam door EMU. I think it is right to do that. 
 

Long may railways go on and evolve 

 

Keith

[CloggyDog]

Early/mid-90s for me. 

 

The interesting traction (20/25/40/45) had mostly been withdrawn, older units and rolling stock likewise and the simplification of the railway just didn't grab me the way it had when I started taking a proper interest in the mid-70s.

 

Same as the airshow scene, once the Lightnings, Bricks, Shacks, Phantoms, Vulcans and Victors had gone, my interest in attending airshows died. 

[Reorte]

2 hours ago, rogerzilla said:

68s are quite distinctive, and in some nice liveries too.  The "did you spill my pint?" loco.

They're a Jekyll and Hyde locomotive. I think they look quite decent from the side, and horrific end-on.

[woodenhead]

1 hour ago, CloggyDog said:

Same as the airshow scene, once the Lightnings, Bricks, Shacks, Phantoms, Vulcans and Victors had gone, my interest in attending airshows died. 

Planes, especially the 737-100/200, made a decent racket back in the 1970s, and then you had Pan Am, TWA and Braniff.  If you weren't from London and wanted to see something decent you needed to make a trip to Heathrow multistory car parks to see the exotic likes of Alitalia, Air France (only 1 late night service back at Ringway in those days), Middle Eastern, Saudi and KLM (there might have been one in the afternoon at Ringway).

[PaulRhB]

I’m still quite enjoying the variety, here’s a few from the last three years

 

 

 

 

 

 

Still regularly get these on one of the test trains and my second favourite 37 is common. 
 

Eastleigh still gets quite a few interesting visitors to the works. 
 

and then I got paid to do this occasionally too until they let my tickets slip in lockdowns. 
 

 

So still quite interesting.