62613

1 hour ago, C126 said:

 

Another factor I have heard quoted often is the explosion in the number of higher education students, when the Polytechnics were 'liberated'.

My first train journeys on my own were from my home to South Shields Technical college. In the 1970s. I then (mostly) used the train to get to or from various airports to fly off to join, or return on leave from, various ships.

2 hours ago, BachelorBoy said:

 

The increase begins before privatisation. In fact, it was in 1993. There were fewer passenger journeys in 1947, when the railways were nationalised, than when the "Big Four" were formed, in a market, post - World War 2, that favoured rail travel (for various reasons) If that's not down to nationalisation, what caused it?

4 minutes ago, BachelorBoy said:

 

 

BR was initially profitable. But that changed after a few years of state management.

 

Nationalisation of the railways, the canals, buses, haulage, etc was supposed to create an integrated transport system. That never happened. The British Transport Commission was a failure.

 

The Big Four's plans for dieselisation and electrification were killed by Riddles. Riddles built one thousand steam locos that were scrapped long before the end of their working lives. A massive waste of public resources. 

 

1955 Modernisation Plan: BR squandered resources by commissioning loads of poor quality diesels. 

 

In 1968, the government wrote off £1.3bn of debt that BR had accumulated in its first twenty years. That's about £25 bn in today's money. BR's own accountant, Stewart Joy, estimated BR had absorbed about twice that amount of public cash as for a while, the Treasury simply wrote cheques to cover annual deficits.

 

APT.

 

Spending public money on patenting designs for flying saucers wasn't a great idea too.

 

Passenger numbers fell while the railways were nationalised, and only started to rise again (quite sharply) after privatisation. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

No! Passenger numbers were rising from about 1992, as the UK came out of the big bang - induced recession, which started in 1989 (the recession even affected my place of work at the time, as work on most investment projects was deferred). You have to take other factors into account, such as increasing congestion on the roads, increasing motor fuel costs, and so on. On the subject of locomotive building policy, hidsight is a wonderful thing; given the financial position of the UK in 1948, the more pressing need to replace the housing stock and so on, and the investment required to switch to a different form of motive power, you'd have gone ahead? I submit that you could hardly blame BR for the failure of privately - built locomotives; they had to be given a chance!

9 hours ago, BachelorBoy said:

 

Nationalisation was disastrous. The Big Four were profitable just before the state took over. BR did make profits for a year or two after it was created. But then it was lose, lose, lose, with the Treasury picking up the bill for the People's Railway. 

 

BR built 2,500 steam locos (including 1000 to its standard designs) that were scrapped long before the ends of their working lives. What a waste of resources. The 1955 Modernisation Plan was botched. Etc, etc.

 

Here's an interesting graph of passenger numbers.

 

 

And yet , pre - WW2, one of the big four wanted to raise money to invest in electrification on some of its suburban lines, and on one of its major freight routes. They were so profitable that no - one would make the loans until the government of the time guaranteed them (if the company defaults on its repayments, we'll take over). During and after the 1929 crash, which hammered their freight revenue, the same company virtually ceased replacing old rolling stock with new. I don't know what returns shareholders in the big four companies were getting between the end of the war and nationalisation, but I bet it wasn't  much!

Have you noticed that passenger numbers had started increasing during the last few years of the nationalised railway? They fell in the late 1980s because there was a severe recession in the city at that time (fewer commuters into London)? A good example of there being more factors than who owns what being responsible for social and economic trends.

1 minute ago, woodenhead said:

I think the old ones went a long time ago, before this scheme was even announced.

Talking of which, does anyone know if the Guide Bridge East - North curve is part of the scheme? Looking at the rails it isn't much used, but it seems daft to me to leave it off.

21 hours ago, Phil Bullock said:

Agreed can see that but how would an ejector in that location be controlled I wonder? Would need to be linked to the brake valve in the cab… is there any linkage? Seems to be a small diameter pipe following the line of the boiler hand rail from the cab which could be a lubrication feed ? With atomisation down to the cylinders via the smaller pipes going under the smoke box . Tricksy things steam locos!   Where would the boiler water feed be if not in that location? 

Control linkage runs behind the pipe along the boiler, through the handrail stanchions

3 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

 

The operating department people would not be very happy with that! 

Indeed! They wouldn't be happy with the CME's department taking a loco and set of coaches away from revenue - earning service (their main function, surely?) so that they can apparently "Play trains". And that's in fact what happened, isn't it, on at least one occasion.

15 hours ago, tythatguy1312 said:

They do. They typically have better structural integrity and smoother running compared to spoked wheels.

I was thinking more along the lines of air resistance. I suppose there might be some sort of flywheel effect as well

1 hour ago, rockershovel said:

The 20th Century Ltd was an exemplar of streamlining applied to carriages, as seen here

 

Looking at those drivers, do solid wheels have any advantage over spoked ones. I think Porta mentioned somewhere that they did.

10 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

 

Really, for virtually all of the time, the 70 mph - 90 mph range. 90 mph+ running was always the exception, and certainly not planned for on a routine basis.

I read somewhere (O.S. Nock, so might not be entirely correct) that pre - WW2, speeds on the ECML were restricted to 90 mile/hour maximum for normal service, and if you exceeded that, you needed a good reason why. Something to do with the signalling.

2 hours ago, montyburns56 said:

This looks like a 128 and half of a 127.

 

Ely 1987 by Crewcastrian

 

 

Thinks I, "That doesn't look like the fens", then I realised.🤔

Well, how often do you see a hat - trick from three set pieces, and scored by a full back at that? It happened in about 15 minutes in the second half at Stalybridge yesterday, two direct free kicks and a (soft) penalty. Turned the match on its head. The ref. still had time to overrule an assisitant's offside flag to make it 4 - 1, and for Liversedge to score a second, and make for a nervous last 10 minutes. Cracking game!

On 31/12/2022 at 19:59, martin_wynne said:

Why, indeed!

On 01/01/2023 at 09:11, t-b-g said:

One of the great "what ifs" of railway history is how the ECML might have looked had Robinson accepted the offer of the CME job for the LNER rather than decline it and recommend the young man Gresley instead.

 

 

Gresley was as conservative as most CMEs of his time; as originally built, his pacifics had 180 p.s.i. boilers and short - travel valves. It took the exchage with the GWR Castle in 1925 to convince him of the advantages of a higher steam pressure, and a great deal of persuasion by Spencer and Bullied for him to adopt long - travel valves. I suppose the good point about the original A1s was that they could be upgraded reasonably easily.

2 minutes ago, johnd said:

 

Ashton U Lyne West it was, obviously not paying attention to the road or just plain stupid driving.

Quite common around Ashton, though. Near IKEA?

2 hours ago, SHMD said:

 

..corrected it for you.

 

 

Kev.

Well, part of Metrolink was closed, again, when someone drove onto the tracks. My understanding is that it was near Altrincham

38 minutes ago, t-b-g said:

 

It is interesting and not uncommon for recollections from those who were actually there to be found to be faulty later. I would think it highly improbable if the appointment was not discussed with Robinson at some point. There would have been talks and succession planning before the date when things actually changed to ensure continuity.

 

It is interesting to read Robinson's account, which has been disputed on the grounds of his great age. For somebody supposedly struggling with his mental health and memory, he writes beautifully. He was still writing very lucid letters later than that.

 

What I don't understand was what had Robinson to gain from inventing such a story? He and Gresley were good friends and he only had to say that he had decided to retire and that he suggested Gresley would be the man for the job. Why say he had been offered it and declined it?

 

So my view is that we may never really know exactly what was said at the time, whether Robinson was actually asked to take the job or if it was just proposals but I would be quite shocked if there had been no discussions with Robinson about who should have the post on the LNER.

 

 

Time for someone to go delving through the records

8 hours ago, 30801 said:

 

A thing I saw today was a solar farm floating on a lake. Considering that in many parts of the world reservoirs are covered three-deep in floating plastic balls to reduce evaporation it makes sense to cover them with solar panels instead.

A reservoir near to where I live has had floating solar panels for quite a few years now. On the water turbine generators in rivers and streams, a local impounding res. has had a turbine fitted for a while, as has a tiny stream. These things are beginning to happen.

5 minutes ago, APOLLO said:

I read somewhere that Hydrogen is defined as a store / carrier of energy rather than an energy source.

 

 

Brit15

 

Bit like steam, then!

16 hours ago, DaveF said:

It's time now for my Christmas card to everyone who looks at this topic.

 

 

Pendennis Castle at Market Overton in December 1973.

 

Market Overton was part of the British Steel network of quarry lines, latterly connected to the High Dyke branch.  Originally the connection was with the Midland Railway's line from Saxby to Bourne.  After that line was closed and lifted a short section of it was left in situ to allow access to the line through Sewstern to the High Dyke branch.

 

David

 

Very happy Christmas to you Dave. Keep 'em coming!

20 minutes ago, corneliuslundie said:

Surely with such a long load there should have been some special procedure for moving it? At least the railway company should have known about it and given approval for use of the crossing.

And not related to the accident, but that is a very unusual pedestrian crossing (if that is what it is) at an angle to the road. I would have thought that would also be a hazard.

Jonathan

Like the company transporting the beam reconnoitering the route for hazards, and informing the relevant authorities of their route and timings, so that they could liaise together? That was one of the recommendations of the Hixon inquiry, and it seems strange that such proceedure aren't implemented elsewhere.

Maybe reposition the traffic signals to lessen the chance of such a thing occurring again, as well

6 hours ago, polybear said:

 

I often see posts like those you mention - some are glaringly obvious even to me (such as a Triang Princess being slightly too short 🤣), yet many other posts I see, such as "Smoke Box Door Profile all wrong" (is it really - looks ok to me), or "Boiler is 0.5mm too short" (only discovered after measuring every dimension with a Vernier a against a known 100% accurate drawing) I can get less concerned over if it can only be discovered after hours of careful measurement or looking at dozens of photos.  For me if it looks like a nicely constructed and finished V2/A1/Hush Hush/Jinty etc. and runs well then I'm a happy bunny.  This is in no way a criticism of those who do like to aim for everything to be "spot on", however.

 

What's one of them?

23 minutes ago, John M Upton said:

I had the misfortune to visit my local M&S Food Hall and Waitrose this morning.  The usual pack of dithering old people, blocking aisles and seemingly taking forever to decide what to buy, were even worse today with the Christmas Ditherers now prevalent, blocking out the entire cheese section in Waitrose whilst they tried to compile a mental list of who is visiting and when over the next week and what cheese they like.

 

Arrrrggghhh!!!!

 

Me, I have list, go in, buy and get out as fast as possible!!!

Remember that old age comes to us all!

3 hours ago, john new said:

You mean you had a road? You were lucky we had to machette through frozen grass 20ft high..... etc.

Luxury!

1 hour ago, montyburns56 said:

 

I'm wondering whether the train is actually from a carriage repair shop as the first Siphon look suspiciously shiny as if it has just been repainted.

The nearest repair shop was Wolverton.......