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The council rep knows that there isn't much he can do about bus service except write to the company concerned and say "What are you going to do with these complaints?", which said company can ignore, since they have been accountable only to themselves since 1986

Footex off to Old Trafford?

There looks to be a bit of construction activity going on at the Piccadilly end of TPE's Ardwick depot; extra berthing sidings?

C16997; that 153 don't half look lonely!

So; if they manage to stay in business, probably National North. If they have to go bust, probably North West Counties top division. Correct decision, by the way.

You've started so you'd better finish!

I know one swallow doesn't make a summer, and it was only Morecambe, but three points is three points, you can only beat what's in front of you, etc., etc.......

Are they neccessarily GWR wagons, given the almost universal common carrier arrangements?

Modern management, innit!

Dino might do something for you, you never know!

Perhaps if the powers that be hadn't hammered local authorities so hard for the last 9 years, they could still be subsidising services. As it is, they are struggling to fund services they are legally obliged to run, e.g. adult social care. In Greater Manchester, First have just withdrawn from running bus services, and Stagecoach haven't taken up all the slack; so, for instance, one service which used to run from Ashton-under-Lyne, to Marple has been so cut back that it only runs from Ashton to Stalybridge; and direct bus services between there and Hyde now no longer exist. Of course, buses are a vital service for, for instance, schoolchildren, or elderly or disabled people who can't run a car. The bit about tax touches on a fundamental philosophical point ; you may be alright, Jack (I don't know) but millions in this country aren't. Are you prepared to abandon them, or pay not much more tax to aid them.

Deliciously old-fashioned lifeboat there!

No, it actually brought the wires down.

In believe that shortly before or after the Shenfield electrification was energised in 1949, a B1 in Liverpool St. station went into a slip on starting, and the resulting blast brought the wires down

True! I've just looked at the 1956 signal diagram on The Signal Box. No sign of the underpass; indeed, all four lines to Huddersfield diverge on the flat. Nor is there any sign of the New Line. When were the underpasses constructed? Or was there another junction for that somewhere else. Update; just looked at the map; the underpasses were constructed for the New Line. Never knew about the sidings at all.

I'm pretty sure the Heaton Lodge underpass originally had two tracks?

Bridge replacement through Ashton-under-Lyne was done two or three years ago. There was a fair amount of disruption (one of the bridges was that carrying Oldham Road), but proper precautions were taken, so the disruption wasn't too bad. On another note, I noticed, around Ashton station, what look like survey points marked on the pavements. I'll attempt a photo tomorrow.

Way, no?

Perhaps not communism; but as many people have pointed out the UK was run, from 1940 to 1945, as a centrally-controlled "command" state, with stuff like food and fuel rationing, and manufacturing companies virtually being told what to make. Conscription for single women as well as men was pretty universal by mid-war.

Nope!

On the one I saw yesterday, the loco was at the Liverpool end. Is that the 'correct' way?

Motorways don't really go anywhere either, do they?

I would say that there was a 'filter' between his ideas and what actually saw the light of day, called H.N. Gresley. When the filter disappeared, those ideas finally surfaced, for better or for worse.

Caught a brief glimpse of the 1041 Scarborough-Liverpool through Ashton-under-Lyne yesterday. I do#n normally pay much attention to the trains, one 185 is pretty much like another; it was the noisy diesel that gave it away. Looked, and sounded, most impressive!

Just noticed the photos of St. Wendreda's church; did you manage to visit the inside? If you didn't, you missed a treat. The hammerbeam roof has carved angels at the outer ends of the beams, uniquely with their wings open.