Edwin_m

The penny doesn't seem to have dropped generally that OOC only has 6 HS2 platforms and Euston is being built with 10.  So some destinations in the north will have a much worse service if Euston isn't built.  As should be obvious to anyone who's been near the west side of Euston recently, construction is well under way so it's probably going to cost more to cancel than to complete.  The opposition could hire advertising space on the hoardings to point out that behind them lies a huge example of government ineptitude...

2 hours ago, Wickham Green too said:

Probably thought they were in charge of a guided bus ........................................................... sorry, wrong St.Ives ! 🥴

Maybe the seven wives were giving him grief.  

2 hours ago, jjb1970 said:

On tank crews I found this story on the BBC website quite disturbing:

 

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-64294653

 

I won't get into the pro's and cons of sending main battle tanks to Ukraine. However, assuming the story is reasonably truthful and this is a front line tank crew, it begs the question of casualty rates if old men in their 50's are serving as tank crews. The article side stepped that question but I find the implications profoundly tragic.

I've seen several similar stories, and this one mentions he drove the same tanks 40 years ago (possibly a little exaggerated for a 55-year-old).  I guess they're re-enlisting those that served with the Soviet army in Afghanistan or wherever, rather than training up new recruits of that age.  Combat experience may be more valuable than youth.  

19 hours ago, OnTheBranchline said:

I was just reading about it and man, the balls on the pilot to do fly around London on his own accord especially under Tower Bridge (in the name of protesting political cuts to the RAF). 

The casual observer might conclude that if they have the time to do things like that, they probably don't have enough to do and perhaps the cuts are justified.  

Is it an older house without a proper lintel?  In that case the window may be trying to support the brickwork above - usual sign is a triangle of brickwork that has settled above the window, leaving a crack in the mortar in the shape of an inverted V.  

The photos suggest the closed window isn't seated correctly on the draught excluder in the frame.    

But what you see is a meteor, it only becomes a meteorite later on...

I wonder what is says for "pedant".

49 minutes ago, Wickham Green too said:

Coal ?

That would require the energy lost in burning the previous coal to be restored somehow.  

A quick search has turned up the link below.  When pumped into basalt, CO2 reacts to produce solid carbonates.  

https://news.climate.columbia.edu/2020/02/19/solid-carbon-macarthur-foundation/

8 hours ago, Andy Hayter said:

CCS - Carbon Capture and Storage - is the answer to a maidens prayer.  But if you look at what is being done with CCS it has severe limitation and little or poorly understood information about long term consequences.  Best option seems to be to pressurise the CO2 and pump it down into the holes we created to extract oil and gas - but what then? 

How long will the gas remain trapped?  forever?  Really?  What happens if there is a geological disturbance?

What do we need to do to maintain these underground reservoirs?  How do we cap them permanently when full?

At least in theory, in some geologies it reacts within a few years to form a solid.  If that can be replicated on a large scale then those concerns may go away.  

Much of the point of the S&DR seems to have been for the Midland and LSWR to avoid putting traffic onto the GWR, so there wouldn't have been much interest in a curve that relied on the goodwill of the GWR to be useful.  And in later years when that was less of an issue, the Midford and Kelston connections would have had the twin advantages of avoiding Coombe Down and letting a Bristol train call at Bath without reversal.  

With the marginal nature of the S&D, I doubt they would have wanted any of the through passenger trains to miss the important traffic objective of Bath.  It was also a convenient place to change locomotives, considering the train had to reverse anyway.  I can't speak for freight.  

I read many years ago of a plan (1930s?) to provide a single integrated station in Bath for the Midland/S&D/LMS and the GWR, but can't remember any details.  Did it involve a connection at Midford for the S&D to approach on the GWR route via Bathampton?

35 minutes ago, Colin_McLeod said:

Happy 100th to LMS,  LNER,  GWR and SR.

While the other three were totally new, wasn't the GWR a perpetuation of the pre-Grouping company with some relatively minor additions?  

11 hours ago, Arun Sharma said:

It's an interesting point Edwin - Putting a tram or some form of railway [perhaps solely for freight?] on the lateral side of a carriageway might present greater problems as it likely interferes with traffic leaving and joining the motorway whereas if it is in the centre then junctions could be much more like they are now. Perhaps the major use for such a central railway would be for freight - effectively an extension of the 'electric spine' so there would be no need for the railway to have an equivalent rail turnout at every motorway road junction. Basically I would be thinking of a railway linking DIRFT-like places.- to keep container traffic off the motorways.

Generally railways don't hug the sides of motorways, mainly for this reason.  Think of the long section where Eurostar runs parallel to, but 100m or so away from, the motorway in northern France.  But using the central reservation has its own problems, such as the geometry of railway curves being a bit different (with transitions) so it wouldn't be straightforward unless the motorway was designed with eventual addition of a railway in mind.  This would be less of an issue with freight at around 75mph as for faster passenger trains.  The reservation would also end up probably around 20m wide once allowance was made for the tracks themselves, necessary clearances, access walkways and sturdy barriers to guard against vehicle incursion.  This would probably mean any bridge spanning the combined route, even perpendicularly, needing intermediate piers - not now favoured because of the risks of an errant road or rail vehicle colliding with them.   

16 minutes ago, Arun Sharma said:

You might argue that right from the outset, when designing any new motorway, that the central reservation should have a bi-directional tram track and cycle lane added. Far cheaper to do at the design stage than once [junctions et al] built.

If you have to do that then please put it to the side - either cycling or waiting for a train/tram in the middle of a motorway is pretty horrible.  

Or just recognise that widening roads adds more traffic, clogging up other roads nearby, and isn't a long-term solution.  Isn't the whole point of HS2 to get people out of cars?  

1 hour ago, hartleymartin said:

A lot of trams would have used a balloon loop to allow continuous running. It is still done today. Avoids the need for the driver to secure the vehicle, walk up the other end and then throw points to switch over to the opposite track.

 

Also allows the use of vehicles with only one cab and doors on only one side, which is probably the case for the majority of trams in continental Europe.  But this sort of vehicle never caught on in the UK, I think only Rotherham had them.  Perhaps that might have been different if steam trams had been widespread and the necessary turning facilities had been built for them.  They are of course less flexible in that all stops have to be on the same side, and space has to be found for the loop anywhere trams are to be turned back.  

2 hours ago, woodenhead said:

it built, in Salford, Manchester Exchange.

The street entrance was in Manchester though!   

An office I often visit is about to move into one of the new buildings on the site, which someone mentioned upthread they worked in.  I've yet to work out if what is described as the Manchester office is actually in Manchester.  

Back on topic, 10+ years ago I was working on a project to add two platforms at Salford Central.  Seems to have died a death.  

7 minutes ago, Reorte said:

I wouldn't have thought it would've got electrified if the plan was to run it down.

The Bolton line carries the frequent service of longer-distance trains.  It was never four-tracked (except for short sections) as the L&Y built a connection off the four-track Walkden line to carry its fast trains towards Preston instead.  So each stopping train takes up scarce capacity, and of the local stations Clifton is particularly poorly sited.  So it's not really surprising that stopping trains are tolerated rather than encouraged, and I would guess most locals use the bus rather than the train.  

On 08/12/2022 at 17:33, Hibelroad said:

Our George is a regular mouse catcher, but once they are in the house he drops them and looses interest. We have a few humane traps which we bait with cat biscuits, if we fail to catch the mouse and it goes into hiding the traps are set out and we wait. Usually a trap catches the mouse within 24 hours, then we can release it outside. I’m sure some of the mice spread the word, if you want a free cat biscuit and a warm house for the night just hang around when George is about. 😆

I think if we did that Gizmo would just upend the traps to get the biscuits out.  

11 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

 

 

My piano teacher used to encourage me to play a much simplified version of this (Lizst, Second Hungarian Rhapsody) because he claimed it was used in Tom and Jerry.  Thanks, 45 years on, for proving him right!  

10 hours ago, jools1959 said:

I want to freelance my layout with the name ‘Elton Bridge’ and with the signal box of the same name, I want to put the identity as EB on the signals.  Does anyone know if that’s already in existence, and if there is, a suitable alternative?

These IDs don't have to be unique across the network, just sufficiently separated to avoid confusion.  

2 hours ago, CPW said:

I recently visited Madrid, Cuenca, Valencia and Barcelona. It is 3 1/2 years since I was last there. The following are points that might be of interest.

 

a ) On arrival at Barajas, I took the shuttle bus to T4 as I prefer using the Cercanias instead of the Metro. More spacious and less crowded. Fortunately the Renfe office at T4 was open so I could get my over 60’s pass Tarejta Dorada. Changed at Nuevos Ministerios for Sol. The rebuilding at NM appears complete and is now a very large station.
 

...

 

e) Madrid public transport uses a rechargeable plastic card. Ten trip ticket valid on bus or metro is currently discounted at €8.50. Transfers are separate journeys. A separate rechargeable Renfe & Tu card is required for the Cercanias network. 

In case anyone is heading from T1 to Atocha, there is a direct bus that's far less hassle than the Metro and takes cash so no need to bother with the card system (which I last used in 2018 and struggled to understand despite having passable Spanish).  

32 minutes ago, J. S. Bach said:

Actually it referred to the "cat-o'-nine-tails" stored in a red baize bag that was used by the RN (and others) to flog sailors as a punishment. As in "That let the cat out of the bag: he was awarded twelve lashes.".

Also I believe the origin of "no room to swing a cat in here".

55 minutes ago, melmerby said:

Such that a virtually standard Siemens ICE runs on HS1.

Same will apply to HS2. Captive trains could be Euro-sized but those that wander off have to be to UK gauge.

That was the original plan, but they later decided all the initial fleet will be captive.  Presumably having a separate subfleet for London to Birmingham isn't economic or doesn't allow for interworking.  I think the plan was to buy some captive sets later for Birmingham, Manchester and Leeds and cascade the original fleet to serve off-route destinations, but I'm not sure what they now plan after the amputation of various branches.  

1 hour ago, nightstar.train said:

 

Unfortunately for railways we often need a bespoke solution. The restricted UK loading gauge means we can buy very few products off the shelf from European manufacturers.  Everything has to be custom built. And that inevitably leads to a higher unit cost as the manufacturer is unlikely to sell that design to other countries, so needs to recoup all the design and tooling costs over the smaller British order. 

HS2 infrastructure components should be fully compliant to European specifications, with the exception of higher platforms, but you don't try to buy those in standard designs anyway.  

3 hours ago, jjb1970 said:

I watched a nice little YouTube video on the Chinese high speed railway last night (which I linked in the Asia railway part of the forum) from German broadcaster DW. It was a nice clip but it included some of the usual tropes that the reason China can do things we can't is because they don't have any regulations and they have limitless cheap labour. On the other hand, some important reasons the Chinese can build high speed railways so quickly and cheaply is they now have the expertise, production systems and capacity and standard designs to crank them out. In Britain the disjointed nature of government projects and a liking for bespoke solutions prevents getting such conditions in place with the result that every major program becomes a learning exercise and with much higher risk. I suspect that is actually far more important than trying to excuse the difference in delivery by pointing at Lax regulation and an infinite supply of cheap labour in China. China has really tightened environmental regulations and it is now a long way from the low-cost sweatshop many in the western world still imagine it to be. Their high speed trains are superb.

A British example is Metrolink Phase 3 in Manchester.  By having a clear plan, commitment to continued funding, and keeping the same contractors throughout, they were able to deliver a lot more tramway at lower unit cost than Edinburgh, which was building at the same time.  This is something of an oversimplification - there were some hiccups such as the abortive electrification of Werneth tunnels due to funding U-Turns - but having been involved in the programme it was interesting to see how the contractors made some mistakes early on but by the end they were delivering several months early.  

Probably mostly a case of Pendolinos taking over their passenger work, and their freight work diminishing to a very small amount for which a few of them remain.  86 and 87 had electromechanical control via a tap changer, and couldn't do regenerative braking, but could possibly have been re-engineered with a solid state traction package had there been a need for them.