Peterborough North

[LNER4479]

I didn't think they closed railways in London. Too politically sensitive. They either re-open old railways (Thameslink) or build new ones (Crossrail).

 

Does the 2ft gauge post office railway count?

[jwealleans]

43 minutes ago, LNER4479 said:

Does the 2ft gauge post office railway count?

 

I thought that still ran for tourists?

[LNER4479]

Yes, but the poll is about lines that shouldn't have closed in the first place, for their intended commercial purpose. Re-opening as a tourist railway doesn't necessarily prove that point (although in the case of the Swanage railway and Paignton-Dartmouth it probably does. There's arguably others.).

[2750Papyrus]

Another vote for the GN/LNER Northern Heights.

 

I may have previously posted my recollections of lying awake as a small child listening to (goods?) trains struggling up the gradient from Stroud Green to Crouch End.  Later, an essay option in my GCE English paper was "Problems of Transport in My District".  The 14 year old me solved these by re-opening and electrifying the Northern Heights branches, gaining a grade 1 pass (the only one in my year)!  

 

Unfortunately, the BRB did not then have sight of my reasoning, so I will attempt a modern justification. I believe that routeing HS1 to St Pancras has subsequently resulted in a shortage of paths for trains to traditional Midland Railway destinations, contributing to the need for HS2.  In the 60's, there was apparently a proposal to link the Midland main line to the GN Mill Hill branch, presumably near the Hale, and divert Midland trains into KX so that St Pancras could be closed.  Fortunately this did not happen but if the link had been constructed and the branch retained, a useful diversionary route would have been established.  The recent transfer of much GN short distance traffic away from KX surface station to Thameslink, and the current  re-opening of bores 5 & 6 of the tunnels from KX, would then present the opportunity to run trains to Midland destinations via Finsbury Park and Mill Hill from the old KX suburban platforms.   (I wonder what could have been done with some of former goods facilities in the KX and SP areas to improve passenger terminal capacity.)

 

And of course, retention of the branches would have enabled running the preserved N2 and quad-arts to Ally Pally for model railway exhibitions!

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Mallard60022]

PO Railway. Did a visit once courtesy of a School Teacher I met doing whilst some Road Safety work for his School!!!!!!! I was the second  'appropriate adult' seemingly. Them were the days. No rides as it was still operational. Why they shut it, with the surface restriction on vehicles, is beyond me.

P

[Clive Mortimore]

London?

 

North London Railway lines, Dalston to Broad Street and Victoria Park to Poplar.

[Clive Mortimore]

Quite surprised Dudders hasn't gone for Nunhead to Crystal Place or Greenwich Park with the lack on Underground lines South of the Thames.

Edited March 17, 2021 by Clive Mortimore

[Metropolitan H]

 

My recollections of the Northern Heights line are really limited to the bit from Finchley Central to Park Junction (Highgate Depot - LT) and through the tunnel to Highgate (BR) station - in the mid 1970s, when we were starting on LTs "Fully Automatically Controlled Train". The FACT project was to go the next step on from the Victoria Line, to enable the full driverless train.

 

In the end we moved the work to Hainault Depot (Central Line) on the original ATO line to Woodford. We got the system to work with a fully automatic reversal at Hainault and station stops at Grange Hill, but we never overcame the problem of obstacle detection which was needed for surface line running and there were even more intransigent trade union issues, which didn't get sorted till the Docklands Light Railway was built.

 

But around Highgate Depot there were some very good blackberry bushes which cropped well - and we had a right to be there and not a lot to do other than harvest the fruit!

 

Regarding the PO railway, I did get a couple of days consultancy work following retirement reviewing the initial proposals for the conversion of a very small part of the whole to tourist operation at Mount Pleasent as an adjunct to the Post Office Museum. It is worth a visit, but the train ride is only from the old train maintenance depot down to the Mount Pleasent Station, round the reversing loop back to the station and back up to the depot. It is an easy walk.

 

So my vote goes to The South London Railway - from Victoria to London Bridge - as originally electrified by the LBSCR circa 1905 on the 6.67kv AC overhead system. A bit of a shame the SR settled solely on the LSWR 660 v DC third rail system and did away with the overhead system by 1929!

 

Regards

Chris H

[Clive Mortimore]

I was very lucky to see the Post Office Railway in action before it closed.

 

At the time I was working for the National Blood Service, we used to do a blood donor session at King Edward Building , Post Office. One of our team while looking after a donor got chatting with him and he told her he worked on the railway. She in turn said I was a puffer nutter. He then invited me to visit the railway during my lunch time. They chaps at the "station" were very busy loading and unloading the trains which seemed to arrive faster than those at Clampham Junction.

[jazzer]

5 hours ago, Mallard60022 said:

PO Railway. Did a visit once courtesy of a School Teacher I met doing whilst some Road Safety work for his School!!!!!!! I was the second  'appropriate adult' seemingly. Them were the days. No rides as it was still operational. Why they shut it, with the surface restriction on vehicles, is beyond me.

P

 

I did a tour of Mount Pleasant P.O.  when I was about 7 which included the station underneath They occasionally did guided tours for the public in those days, and being the only child on the tour I was allowed pull the lever to start the train . Such a thrill at 7 !

 

Anyway to get to the important matter of the poll my vote is for Palace Gates- North Woolwich , or if that is disallowed on the basis that the Seven Sisters section is still open, then Stratford -North Woolwich including the Silvertown Tramway and sidings at Royal Victoria Docks. N7’s and L 1’s on passenger trains,, all kinds of PLA tanks, and anything from Black 5’s to J39’s collecting vans from the docks to Temple Mills, plus WD 2-8-0’s taking sugar beet trains to Tate &Lyles at Silvertown slipping like mad as they struggled out of the soaking wet tunnel under  Victoria Dock . What’s not to like ?

[mullie]

Stratford -North Woolwich including the Silvertown Tramway and sidings at Royal Victoria Docks gets my vote.

 

Martyn

[manna]

G'Day Folks

I have to vote for the Northern Heights, not only was it a short sighted decision to close it, ( well not all of it) it should have been extended ! The Barnet-Potters Bar, would have been a great help, in times of trouble, Southwards, it should have been extended to Broad St.

 

manna

[great northern]

Off went the Ivatt, but our photographer did not need to move, as it was closely followed by a B1 with the 3.58pm stopper to Grantham.

 

 

[Market65]

Well, for this poll, Stratford to North Woolwich including the Silvertown Tramway and sidings at Royal Victoria Docks also gets my vote too.

 

Rob.

[DaveF]

Northern Heights for me.

 

David

[thegreenhowards]

I’ll vote for the York Road/ Hotel curve connections at KX which have subsequently been replaced for Thameslink.

[Oldddudders]

17 hours ago, Clive Mortimore said:

Quite surprised Dudders hasn't gone for Nunhead to Crystal Place or Greenwich Park with the lack on Underground lines South of the Thames.

CP High Level was a dead duck long before widespread closures, and that tells me demand was never there. A suburban railway without demand is a useless thing indeed. As for Greenwich Park, the closure beggared absolutely nobody important. It was a terminus far too close to Inner London. 

[great northern]

All the action is on the Down side at the moment, during the lull between the lunchtime and afternoon departures from KX. There is even a path for some WD hauled empties on the main.

 

 

 

[great northern]

Poll won by the Northern Heights, which got 5 votes.

 

And that, I think, means that we have just about covered everything, though I await a post from deepest darkest Lincolnshire telling me that I have missed out a very significant county.

 

So, what next, if anything? How about the best designs of locomotive engineers over the years? An easy one to start with. What was the best/most successful loco designed by Raven?

[Welly]

I nominate the Q6 0-8-0

[New Haven Neil]

Oh, well.....temped by the Z Atlantic, and the P3/J27 (Raven locos were superheated and had piston valves)......but maybe the Q6 wins out?, No, it's the P3/J27, the last steam locos in the north-east. Tough, powerful, reliable.

[jollysmart]

Got to be either the Q6 or the J27, tough but the Q6 just edges it, so Q6 for me today.

[Mallard60022]

Q6; better wiggle than (choose suitable person's ar$£). Consett cuddlies.

P

[Clive Mortimore]

17 hours ago, jazzer said:

 

I did a tour of Mount Pleasant P.O.  when I was about 7 which included the station underneath They occasionally did guided tours for the public in those days, and being the only child on the tour I was allowed pull the lever to start the train . Such a thrill at 7 !

 

Anyway to get to the important matter of the poll my vote is for Palace Gates- North Woolwich , or if that is disallowed on the basis that the Seven Sisters section is still open, then Stratford -North Woolwich including the Silvertown Tramway and sidings at Royal Victoria Docks. N7’s and L 1’s on passenger trains,, all kinds of PLA tanks, and anything from Black 5’s to J39’s collecting vans from the docks to Temple Mills, plus WD 2-8-0’s taking sugar beet trains to Tate &Lyles at Silvertown slipping like mad as they struggled out of the soaking wet tunnel under  Victoria Dock . What’s not to like ?

We use to do a donor session at Tate and Lyles. After the donors gave their blood they would be given a drink, if they liked sugar in their tea it came out of a British Sugar Corporation packet. 

[Clive Mortimore]

1 hour ago, great northern said:

Poll won by the Northern Heights, which got 5 votes.

 

And that, I think, means that we have just about covered everything, though I await a post from deepest darkest Lincolnshire telling me that I have missed out a very significant county.

 

So, what next, if anything? How about the best designs of locomotive engineers over the years? An easy one to start with. What was the best/most successful loco designed by Raven?

ESSEX !!!!!!!!!!!!

 

Sir Vincent Raven's very useful S3 class (B16 to our uninformed readers).