runs as required

At about 05.35H this May Bank Holiday (2nd May 2016, weather overcast with a blustery SW wind) I heard THE FIRST CUCKOO OF SPRING LOUD AND CLEAR in the Borough of Gateshead - for the first time this century ! I have often wondered whether I have heard the call of a cuckoo in the distance amid the constant backgound grumbling noise of Ring Doves. But there was no mistaking this call, repeated loud and clear 5 times, about 100 yards away from our house in the woods towards Peth Lane crossing on the N&C railway. Lying awake, I haven't heard it since. dh

Mmm...Interesting.... But it seems modern UK decision making has to be 'short-termist'. A hundred years? Forget it! Lets focus down onto forseeable cashflow.... ...oh! And (to self) will I still be in this job in two years time? dh

I hadn’t really thought about this. As an old style guy I can understand Scott’s point about the contractor’s/contractors’ POV. But the NR position seems a total gamble: It is costing a known amount per day So has someone like Sir Peter sat in his Routemaster and done an overall calc on his iPhone: 2 year closure cost? 18 months closure cost? 12 months closure cost? So what can we risk against those losses? £xxxm ? If so, lets find a contractor who is willing to meet that risk - with bonuses or penalties for meeting or exceeding the deadline to complete. (But with no clear idea yet what the detail complexities of the task may entail) Unlike Dawlish, soluble chalk is a lot less predictable than Devonian sandstone. Might a closer precedent about unknowns be the Fenny Compton landslip? I'm glad I'm just an owd git peering through a knot hole in the site hoarding. dh

exactly.... So! Which way do you think you might be heading Sir? The points are set for carrying staight on, rather than veering off to the left. From one Mr Toad to another (looking across a room full of different hobby projects) - does it matter so long as you feel you are getting a good run for your money? dh

A minor observation - prompted by the Bristol paraquat versus vinegar spat on controlling May dandelions and weeds : For a remote Norfolk early 1900s village, Castle Aching presents an extraordinarily pristine cobbled streetscape - not even dust and horse dung demarcate usage patterns, let alone 'plants in the wrong place'. But, J.E's threads Minders interject: "think yourselves privileged to be shown a preview - a mock-up of the village once all the variables are resolved" "So where will the railway run?" The RMweb readership shout back en masse. erm... ?? dh

That's obviously what happened. James Ed has aready suggested that the West Norfolk was always being pipped to the post about its ambitions, in this case perhaps it simply fell back on inheriting its contractor's p.w. alignment and stock, accepting C Aching as a provisional terminus - which ossified into permanence. A more positive take on this is that we merely act as 'minders' spinning plausable arguments to protect his back while J.E. continues to indulge his whims.

Interesting to find that just three years separates Aylesford station 1858 (Caen stone) and Hillington Schoolhouse (carstone) 1855 both listed Grade II and I agree that both are a delight - ideal subjects for our host's modelling skills. A Pedant (heaven help it would be me) could question how the West Norfolk a railway that might inhabit a station who's cottage orne style dates from an earlier more carefree era following the Great Exhibition. By the 1870s Queen Victoria is now deep in mourning for Prince Albert, but acquired Sandringham House (just over the hill) the year after Albert died 1861 at the request of her son the Prince of Wales - the future Edward VII. Perhaps there is a more complex backstory waiting to be researched that leads to the WNR eventually being forced to compromise with cheapskate street running to a BLT terminal turntable outside its lavishly conceived station building? dh

The style of the signboard reminds us that it was the LMS who owned the Shropshire Union - and presumably found it worthwhile maintaining because its two arms ran deep into GWR territory. In 1936 the Welsh section down to Welshpool suffered a breach and temporary isolation. Then in wartime the LMS threw in the towel and closed this section with the London Midland and Scottish Railway (Canals) Act, 1944. dh

For me that would be a lastingly memorable glimpse of a plodding Black 5 compared to yet another commonplace 'digital lineside' shot. My most memorable occasion was unexpectedly hearing the sound of a Gresley chime whistle while we had a number of visitors in our garden. I shouted "Listen!". In the ensuing hush we heard the A4 a couple more times whistling for the crossings down on the N&C as it passed on its way to Blaydon. All those visitors still tease me about my astonishingly 'selective' hearing. dh

I've turned this issue over a lot in my mind while driving Britain's B roads (wife's and my 'Nuts in May' Mike Leigh game, with her in my rear view mirror doing the map reading). It is mostly b&w photographs or sketches that we have of the pre colourfilm era a century ago I reckon it is due to Farrow and B#### (gosh that was rude!) influence that lots of old cottage house owners are now using their browns greens and creams colours to be more authentic. I think the true answer is more to do with researching the old lead based paint specs - and the colours those specs. delivered. I scraped down to the oak some 1795 12 pane sliding sashes on the back of our house some years ago; their original coats of paint appeared to be white lead based. If oak or elm (the trad wood for coffins) was used for a cottage, I doubt the joinery would have seen a coat of paint. dh

I do agree about a detailled inspection locating the image - that is one of the challenges about such a posting. Perhaps the objector to the Clee radar post feels that 'the Devil is in the detail'. And Andy Y's point about long range views [intervisibility] always fascinates me. Intervisibility drove a lot of the 18C landscape gardeners, such as Capability Brown's 'improvement' schemes - the prelude to the big earth moving projects of canal and railway buiding It is the year of that canny Northumbrian's tricentenary ; I'm always reminded of his skills in the Shropshire/Montgomery landscape. dh

Yes you are right. I thought at first two (about 24/25 metres) then I wondered if I'd seen one cylinder 'chopped' down. So I left it to the more gimlet eyed. Whatever, it is still an impressive depth to sink with this auger/cylinder liner procedure. To my eye, reality, as it is unfolding, seems quite at variance to the CAD animation previously posted by the CEs dh

Looks pretty icy this am. brrrrr dh Ed So, fellow saloon bar idlers spectators: what do we estimate the piling depth to be?

Phew! Twenty four hours without a Castle Aching thread posting from our sharp witted host. The peasants are truly revolting, all manner of wantonly suggestive material has been posted for all to snigger over. Time for that cane with the horses head 'andle to be switched around a few peasant calves. dh

Moreton on Lugg anyone? a booking office in a hollow tree or or more ambitious head office and station facilities within the castle ruins? dh Edit I knew I'd ripped this off somewhere - it's the S&M again. I used to take my lunchtime butties down to watch shunting at Abbeyforegate from the Salop CC offices

To ease this thread back into 'straight and level' mode - may I, on behalf of Edwardian's many followers, post a request for a mock-up (perhaps allied to an imagined narrative) of how the light railway tracks into Castle Aching? Wil it have the usual tin buildings - or perhaps does it, thanks to its titled sponsor, avail itself of some partially unused structures of the once grand castle and its baileys/outworks? dh

Spending too much time recently lurking on RMweb rather than working, I've only recently clicked on this marvellous thread. Though the station still existed when I worked on BR(E), your photographs of it with the A4 passing through makes it seem a lot more anachronistic than I recall. Can I ask: are you a purist, refusing as a matter of principle, to tweak your pics with something like Photoshop? For example your disappointment at the cabside number or the over intrusive Pullmans? Both are details that might easily be rectified. (Also just in passing: is your choice of 'avatar' of consequence, such as HA Ivatt's daughter - Mrs Bulleid perhaps? dh Ed: I've only just thought to click on your profile and see from your thread about photoshopping magazine images that you are prepared to try to anticpate and manipulate what the camera 'sees' before opening the shutter but are against modifying anything afterwards.

The Shropshire and Montgomery connecting at Llanymynech might be an exemplar, given the Colonel's famously impecunious aproach - as well as the Tanat Valley Light Railway. And not strictly Cambrian, but geographically close, I once managed to travel back to Manchester from work at Boston Lodge via Afon Wen and Caernarfon. There were some standard gauge slate branches adjacent to the Lleyn off that ex LNW tentacle that were pretty rudimentary. Sadly I only learnt of them afterwards... although, before they closed, I did see the LNW branches into Snowdonia off the Irish Mail main line dh

Lovely pics Very envious of your Dover weather today. We had to endure some particularly icy short sharp hailstorms up here 'on the dry side'. dh

agree - and my grandchildren's fave too. try this link to some almost Edwardian poignent images dh

I've heard Amsterdams canals may be turning a rather nasty male urine colour during King's Day today dh

And while I'm applying DD to this thread: which is about as absurd as Edwardian purchasing a ticket from Aberystwyth to Camarthen intending to travel the length of the Manchester & Milford Railway. dh

Groningen? and to think Edwardian was trying to pass the picture off as being the Fens. dh

Thank you 10800 Rod for your answer to my question about brick colouring and types. Use of my PrtSc key on martin_wynne's beautiful video above seems to me to demonstrate that the general run of bricks seems to be red/blue russets with the blue tending to predominate on the headers in the English bond. As I recall from my grandfather living down in Sussex after retirement, that colouring is characteristic of those Wealden clays. Looking back at your original posted brickwork pics I can see clearly where you say the engineering blues have been used. Most interesting! dh

And why not a great Italianate Catholic family? After all 'Wot is the Duke of Norfolk?' - (and however did the family get away with it over a few hundred years until the Catholic Emancipation Act?) We had a grand one in Blaydon who (in addition to hosting the Blaydon Races) also secretly funded Garibaldi's Red Shirt campaign with gold concealed in frequent consignments of firebricks to minor ports in the mezzogiorno. dh Edit to post proof - this could well be the start of the Italian Futurist movement.