woodenhead

There won't be more trains using the Stalybridge-Guide Bridge route after electrification - As I understand it TPE services to Liverpool mostly if not all via Victoria (again), Airport services routed via Victoria and the new Ordsall curve to remove the bottleneck around Ardwick.

I was up at Ashton yesterday at Evans Halshaw, the issue as I see it in making Guide Bridge a Park and Ride is that to attract punters off the commute into Manchester is first it's situated on the new leg of the M60 and not the old M62 so if you are attracting people from the North East of Manchester they are going to have to divert away from the natural route into Manchester M62/M60/M602 and secondly the actual junctions around Audenshaw are not really designed to get traffic near to Guide Bridge station which puts more cars A635/A6140 junction. It doesn't naturally draw traffic from the M67 either without pushing more traffic through Denton.

Perhaps these are the reasons Guide Bridge remains like it is, the cost to the local populace is too great.

On the Metrolink they are to build a park and ride in Sale Water Park on a piece of land that looks like it is currently used by people who are attracted to nocturnal gatherings involving steamed up cars. It is right next to a decent sized M60 junction and doesn't put any traffic onto local roads. What do people of Sale think to this, they are complaining about blight to the land and extra cars in Sale when the whole point of the exercise was to pull traffic off the motorway and Chester Road and onto the tram avoiding locals. The area being used is currently scrub and there are no houses nearby to be affected by light or noise.

I know they don't currently stop, I think it was Arriva when they were bidding for the contract that suggested Guide Bridge become a parkway. But with more TPE services going Stalybridge to Vic under the Northern Way initiative it will take potential traffic away from Guide Bridge returning it to something more akin to what it was after Woodhead closed and before Trans Pennine were diverted via Piccadilly.

That potentially leaves space to bring Metrolink through the station and up to Dinting using the space from the old 4 track formations to allow heavy rail to continue as far as Hyde North and still have traffic from Stalybridge to Piccadilly. Of course such a move might not be too popular with 'disgusted of Glossop' and would finish off any re-opening of Woodhead as a through route again unless train-trams come on stream.

And with more Trans Pennine services using Victoria again after the wires go up there could be less trains passing through Guide Bridge to extract any potential park and ride other than commuting to Manchester Piccadilly.

What I love about this model is that it has been about for years and it is still developing, I can see the beginnings of Kings Cross goods in the pictures about.

It was a nice station to visit even back in the 70's as it was a signing on point so lots of station activity (peoplewise) even though the only trains stopping there were locals.

I think even if the Woodhead route had remained open by now Dewsnap, the stabling point and the 4 tracks would still be gone - once industry left Manchester the railways were no longer needed in the form that they were.

Guide Bridge still has some of that old infrastructure hanging around and it needs to be cleared and the land around developed then it will look better no doubt although still sad that was once there has gone.

Found this new link today: http://www.table38.steamrailways.com/rail/Dukinfield/dukinfield.htm

Making it as a modeller will be when others seek your advice and welcome your input without you having to shove it down their throat.

Sounds cynical but there are plenty of people out there (in all walks of life not just modellers) who are self appointed experts and will give their opinion very freely especially when it is not wanted.

Going back to your personal perspective, I agree, having a layout in a magazine is a good pointer, but I think to be really respected down that route you would need to appear in something like Model Railway Journal - there have been some epic models in there. It's not how big something is, it's how good it looks.

Get em built so you can get onto the N gauge versions please.

Hi Pete,

 

Totally agree.........it's picking up these comments and repeating them that can hurt a models rep even before it's been produced.

Nothing I have said or I think that Dapol have done have indicated that they will be "as rare as hen's teeth", so I'm not sure where this has been picked up.

 

Sorry Woodenhead, you've been led up a proverbial on this.

Cheers

Dave

Sorry guys, misunderstanding, I was trying to intimate that the Dapol version will be so popular that they will likely sell out quickly not that there won't be many.

That and the fact Heljan Westerns are easy to come by and by all accounts the Dapol models will be like hens teeth quite quickly after release.

Stand in front of any well built finescale railway holding a Hornby Railroad Warship and some set track proudly telling any viewers that you built the that railway that they are looking at - the track, the stock, the electrics - you did it all.

How about all exhibitors wear a camera flash on their heads that constantly go off in the faces of viewers without warning.

Doing a Copenhagen Fields in N with Poole Farish A3s, A4s and that generic 0-6-0 they had plus generic Farish coaches, plonk on lots of folded cardboard buildings and then take it to a 2mm finescale exhibition.

That will really upset people.

That first link spawned other links and I've just spent an hour looking at the Tameside picture archive.

The Fallowfield Loop was another unfashionable bit despite it remaining steam to the end with plenty of traffic.

Seen maps but never an image of this route, went right under the stabling point:

http://www.flickr.co...in/photostream/

Maybe it will also come out in 2mm at the same time if it's a new moulding, not that the existing Farish is that bad.

Seperate cab moulding - does that mean token catcher versions (with/without the equipment) as the side windows differed.

I struggle with N gauge so you must be a masochist to want to model in T.

But I think that in order for T gauge to have any future other than as an obscure 'look how small it is' object then points and slow running mechanisms are a must.

Must have been one hell of a failure, the station lights are out and it's blown out all the oil lights in the signals.

Then my next suggestion would be a fibre optic, can't really get thinner than a hair - though many women have tried.

LEDs arranged in a line should provide a look of a white neon light

One could claim you are as closed as you believe we are when it comes to opinions on railways.

Just because we have an interest does not mean we don't accept the reality of life, not every railway line was ever needed - duplicate routes occurred not necessarily because of need but because of the fierce rivalry between companies. Woodhead had a primary purpose - the transport of coal from Yorkshire to Lancashire to fuel the industrial revolution, carrying passengers was a side benefit. When it came to electrification it was to move the coal more efficiently, the passenger side was a test of electric services which might have borne fruit had 1500 dc not quickly been overtaken by events.

When it came time to prune passenger services and with the loss of the GC routes through Nottingham to London the Woodhead route never had a chance, local politics also had a hand and that was that. By 1981 the equipment was becoming life expired and with a new Conservative government asking for more trimming and who was to say not some fore knowledge of what was to come in 1984 the line was closed and it's remaining traffic diverted.

With limited resources in today's climate, why should we believe the line which is almost removed from the landscape, with little raison d'etre and no growing villages/conurbations between the principal cities to serve would be re-laid.

I love reading about the line, I enjoy walking and cycling it, I have an interest in railways but I make no apology for applying a sense of realism, it's not 1955 anymore.

Aren't Merseyrail looking to procure replacements for it's 508 fleet, these are based on the same bodyshell design as a 313 so perhaps these could be modified for use under wires.

In times of austerity it's a hand-me-down world.

And therein lay DFTs difficulties on stock procurement - more diesels even though really we don't want them or sign off electrification schemes which has extra infrastructure costs over a simple order of diesels.

Now that it's been made clear that a rolling programme of electrification is policy then it makes procurement a whole lot simpler, DFT knows what it needs, the builders know what is required and the ROSCOs can take a punt.

What we will see from here is a cascade of electrification across the North East, West and South Yorkshire and onto the MML.

As has been picked up a few times, having teams of people available to do the work and trained up it makes sense to keep them employed, it looks like the days of building diesel MU stock might be at an end.