Reorte

Not if they're making the assumption that you will anyway.

This'll be (hopefully only a minor) annoyance for me. Don't have a mobile anyway (and have absolutely no need or desire to have one), and the mobile reception's poor around my way in any case. Even if I did have a mobile if I'm going to need it maybe once every few years is it reasonable to expect me to remember to keep it charged? I get why it's happening and to be honest I wouldn't have too much of a problem with it if the response to such issues wasn't little better than a shrug. Even just admitting that there are downsides would be fine, what isn't to me is pushing things in a mobile dependency direction and pretending there's nothing wrong with that.

On the subject of Bugsworth basin there is a surviving wagon, in the NRM. I ended up having to ask the staff to find it, they seemed a bit surprised and weren't sure and had to look it up themselves. I can't imagine it's a common request! (I was interested because I live there - Buxworth, not the NRM!).

The few rails in place were restored there, but I believe they're originals dug out of the undergrowth. Plenty of blocks of course, most obviously in the basin but also in some places further along the tramway (don't know about the non-publically-accessible parts but some of those are probably even more likely to be there, buried under what's grown over them over the years). There's a rebuilt wagon sat in the basin, AFAIK it's using an original set of wheels but the rest's recreation. Coming down the inclined parts apparently they were braked by someone perched on the front, throwing a chain in to the wheels. Now that's a job that sounds like it's constantly an inch from disaster.

Doesn't stop the big companies trying sometimes - they can often rely on the small business going along with stopping rather than risk fighting the multi-billion business with loads of expensive lawyers.

On the preservation front and the sheer number of them I expect time will weed them out. Better to start with too many and work down than the other way around, and as unpopular as they were a few do deserve to be preserved - they have their place in history, both as a representation of the railway at that time (shouldn't just be the nicest bits!), and because they probably saved numerous minor lines.

I'd have thought that most Cornishmen would regard having to live in Devon as worse than any taxes!

So my Fiesta is faster than a fighter jet (if it's parked in a hangar)? :D

Hadn't realised they were Mk4s!

I just wondered when I saw the Manchester - Cardiff train pass by yesterday, from a not-very-detailed glance the doors looked pretty much like I always remember them being. Odd-looking train though, appears to have been cobbled together from whatever was lying around, 67, four coaches (IIRC) and a DVT.

There's a racehorse stables near my parents and for quite a while all these fancy racehorses were accompanied by a donkey because apparently being rather more intelligent they end up leading the herd and help keep them under control and behaving themselves.

I'm guessing the few remaining Mk3s still going around in regular service have had the doors converted to power?

Whether something's newsworthy or not is down to how unusual it is at the time, and these days horses running around central London out of control is pretty unusual. Seeing a car would've been newsworthy once.

Last time I used trains with slam doors semi-regularly was early 2000s, when Manchester - Scotland services were still loco-hauled (then replaced with shorter, more overcrowded Voyagers, which in turn were replaced with even shorter, even more overcrowded 185s). I'd have been in my 20s then. At any rate I assume they were slam doors, I can't remember the doors but AFAIK no-one had converted any loco-hauled stock then, but I couldn't even tell you if they were Mk2s or 3s.

And from what I gleaned Twitter is the company he's about the most hands on with. Rumours going around that most of the other companies he's involved with have people devoted to keeping him out of the way.

When did all the Mk3s end up with it? I didn't think they were built like that and it was quite a late add-on, but I'm probably completely wrong.

That's why you have to gauge the general level of sentiment and consult the experts about how that can actually be achieved in reality. Public opinion should rarely decide the details, but there's no other acceptable way of assessing what the appropriate general level of risk acceptance should be. The alternative is a small number of people imposing their own opinions on where the lines should be drawn on everyone else (there's no such things as an objectively correct answer to this). The way that's done is by governments coming up with appropriate legislation. If the public doesn't like the legislation, whether they think it goes too far or not far enough, there's the opportunity to vote for someone who'll change it. I'm not talking about consulting the public over every rule.

Considering quite a few of my posts I think it's fair to assume that there's zero chance of me ever buying a Tesla.

Unfortunately the BBC seems to have gone rather tabloid in its headlines these days.

Come to think of it I'd be more nervous about doors not staying closed on modern Boeing planes than on old BR coaches... I'll get my coat.

Several years ago there was one of those in the news not far from here. It got in the news because the perpetrator was a bit of an idiot and kept crashing outside the same office, making the people in the office rather suspicious.

Agree very much on touchscreens in cars, and not simply because of my dislike of excessive electronics everywhere. They're a very bad idea for exactly the reason you say, can't operate by touch (there's an irony there I suppose). Haven't some manufacturers started to move away from them?

I wouldn't go that far - a ship losing control when passing under a bridge that ships routinely pass under is a more foreseeable risk than someone deliberately flying a plane in to the building. There's also considerably less you can practically do with a building for the latter. Personally I'd argue that it depends on the frequency of sea traffic too - if a ship large enough to cause this much damage passing under was a once in a blue moon event vs a regular occurrence then things may be different.

Manchester had its big, spikey piece of "art." Unfortunately the spikes started falling off...

On the first one I don't fear an incident enough to feel a need for one. There's always the chance of course, the risk isn't zero, but I hate the idea of going through life with a "but what if? Better protect myself!" attitude. There's a time and a place for that but the concern has to be rather higher. On two, well, that's sort of the point. We shouldn't want to be getting more like Russia!