Murican

I wrote up a fictionalized history of what a S&D Heritage railway could look like:

Despite a tepid reputation during its time as an revenue rail line, being called the "Slow & Dirty" by detractors, the Somerset & Dorset Joint Railway had endeared itself to both locals and rail enthusiasts with the unique variety of traction on its rails, the wonderful landscapes in southwest England or its eccentricities. This meant that by the time it was listed for closure by BR even as the 1950s Oil Crisis finally died down, enthusiasts almost immediately pounced to turn the line into a heritage railway. Among those were MP Robert Adley, who had already helped save Bath Green Park Station as part of the Bristol Suburban Rail Society [1]. This would prove a big help as Adley was able to assist with saving the yards and sheds at Bath. However, the Somerset & Dorest Preservation Trust soon realized that keeping the entire line active would be impractical, and so they settled to an initial line from Bath Green Park to Masbury, with preparations being made to open as far as Templecombe in steps.

Starting excursion operations in 1967, the line started off small with LMS 4F #44123, and three of the ubiquitous Bulleid coaches. Despite these humble beginnings, the excursions from Bath Green Park to Masbury were successful enough that the railway bought another two Bulleid coaches to meet with the demand, and the line was extended from Masbury to Cole. However, five full coaches did prove to be a bit much for a 4F on the infamously steep line, and the S&D went looking for a larger engine in 1969. Their call was soon answered by famed painter and rail enthusiast David Sheppard, who himself had been looking for a place to store the two BR Standards he was able to negotiate the purchase of: 4-6-0 #75029 "The Green Knight" and 9F #92203 "The Black Prince" [2]. It was a deal that the S&D couldn't refuse, further helped by the fact that the classes they belonged to had been staples of the S&D during the 1950s and 60s. As part of accomodating for these new engines, the S&DHR carved out part of the old goods yard to build a turntable large enough to accomodate locomotives like The Black Prince. The next two years would see another few locomotives purchased straight from British Railways, among them Standard 5 #73050 and West Country Pacific #34039 "Boscastle" [3].

1972 would prove to be a milestone year for the S&DHR, as they finally reached the goal of reactivating the line to Templecombe and its connection to the West of England Main Line. However, this would not come without a fair number of changes to the yards and North Station. The most important change would be the replacement of the original turntable with one that could handle larger locomotives for the trip back to Bath Green Park, as well as the inclusion of a passing siding to let locomotives run around their trains. These upgrades were carried out over the course of the year, with work being finished in 1974. Also during 1974 the railway would acquire more locomotives and rolling stock, among them the grand prize of S&DJR #88, one of the original 7F locomotives.

1976 would see the beginning of the railway's most ambitious project yet. The restoration of the branch line from Evercreech Junction to Highbridge and its connection with the Bristol & Exter mainline, on to the coast at Burham-On-Sea. Although able to initially reach Highbridge, the leg to Burnham was found to be in a state of decline and in need of renovation that was carried out over the next year and a half. The line to Burnham would see its first excursion from Templecombe in June 1978, with #44123 at the head of the first excursion.

While the line has not extended beyond Templecombe in the years since, the S&D still has the idea on the backburner. Particular focus is on collaborating with the Spettisbury Railway, a shorter line which runs industrial tank engines from Broadstone to the namesake town. Some feasibility studies have already determined some of the steps that would be neccessary for reunification, the most notably of these being the reconstruction of the viaduct through Blandford, which was partly demolished due to neglect making the crumbling structure a borderline public hazard [4]. However, the high costs of this has meant that the chances of this happening are unlikely for at least the forseeable future, although the restoration of the Shillingstone station does show that progress takes many forms. Nonetheless, the idea of restoring the entire Bath to Bournemouth line has led to people raising the idea to bring back the Pines Express to its original route.

In the meantime, the S&DHR is praised by the public as one of England's most cerished heritage railways. Excursions from Templecombe north to Bath Green Park then Mangotsfield keep the railway plenty busy, with the line to Highbridge being popular in its own right. The locomotive collection is loved for being an immaculate celebration of the line's mixed Southern, Midland, and slight Western Region heritage. This of course is on top of mainline excursions and railtours that regularly come through the line from either the West of England Main Line or from the Bristol to Bath Green Park line.

[1] Per real life aside from the obvious difference that the Bath line survived in full, and also inspired by @Devvy's ideas for an alternate BR that rose anew.
[2] The bad news is that this butterflies the East Somerset Railway as it exists in OTL.
[3] In this AU, the oil crisis meant BR steam lastest until 1974. One consequence is that 73136, which was also considered for preservation by the city of Peterborough, would be the locomotive that said city preserves (more on that another day).
[4] That said, much more of the viaduct than real life still exists, including most of what went through Blandford itself which is now a walkway for pedestrians and cyclists.

20 hours ago, John Besley said:

In my AU steam carried on onto the 90's due to the sky high price of diesel fuel coupled with economical coal extraction by NCB.

 

Indeed the AU I had for my BR Standard 4-8-2 was that the USSR failed to prop up Kim-Jong Un and Mao only managed to get the northern half of China. As a result, Mossadegh appeals to the Soviets to help fortify his poistion in Iran, with the Middle East and parts of Northeast Africa becoming communist.

The result is that not only do railroads here in the states end up having to use steam until more reliable oil sources are established in the mid-1960s, but British steam also lasts until the early 1970s. Furthermore, my idea would be that the demands of WWII would mean that intermodal transport was innovated a lot earlier than OTL and embraced by Britain.

I decided to revisit some of my older ideas for locomotives, and try to keep it tamer than I originally posted.

Here are some ideas I have for a BR Standard 10 Mountain: 

• Built to serve on long-distance express passenger and freight trains. Mainly intended to operate such long distances on such express freights with a minimal number of fuel, water, or maintenance stops. For instance, a theoretical run from London Euston to Glasgow would only see the engine stop for refuelling at Crewe and Carlisle.
• A 4-8-2 wheel arrangement, based on locomotives that'd exist in thus AU like the LNER Gresley/Peppercorn I series Mountains, Southern's Bulleid Merchant Navy 4-8-2s, and to a lesser extent the LMS Stanier 10MT 4-8-4s.
• Conventional 2-cylinder layout like on the other BR Standards.
• 5' 8'' Driving Wheels based on those of the Standard 4 4-6-0 to help reduce size to one acceptable for British loading gauge. I originally considered Standard 5 wheels, but worried that'd be pushing it. 
• Unique in that initially these locomotives are painted in BR Express Blue, which had been mostly phased out after only a few years before. However some members of the class are repainted in Brunswick Green.
• Continue the naming conventions of the Standard "Britannia" Class, leading to the nickname "Ultra Britannias". Some namesakes include Benjamin Disareli, Robert Louis Stevenson, Richard Trevithick, etc.
• Mainly see service on the WCML, ECML, and Southern Region due to said routes being acquianted to such large locomotives in this AU. Although some rarely venture on to the Western Region - rarely being the key word here.
• Among the last BR locomotives to be retired, the last ending BR steam in my AU when it ends in September 1974.

Another musing that crossed my mind was what things would be like if the Padarn Railway had been preserved as it originally was instead of being turned into the Llanberis Lake Railway (I'm from the states, so forgive me if I spelled that wrong).

5 hours ago, Northmoor said:

• if your scheme had taken over the railway soon after closure, there would likely have been no interest in what became the Avon Valley Railway at Bitton.  

 

Well I did imagine the Bristol - Bath Green Park link staying to eventually become a suburban line for Bristol.

For example, one idea I had was for the S&DJR between Bath Green Park and Templecombe to survive as a tourist railway at the cost of the East Somerset Railway existing as it does in real life.

An offshot of some discussions I had on the imaginary locomotives thread. This time, I'm taking inspiration to write up ideas for alternate heritage railroads, and what their existence would likely mean for certain railways.

On 27/09/2023 at 04:48, Niels said:

Where in UK is 5 times 15.5 tons adhession and flangeless driver better than 4 times 17.5 and a Zara truck up front?

This wonder could better all B1,Black fives and clans and Britaniasas well

And be 10% more frugal and pleasant to man if built as Two cylinder compound with External balance ding

 

Yeah, this was what I had in mind when writing up the idea for the Standard 8 2-6-0.

13 hours ago, westerner said:

Are'nt alot of the recent psts straying onto the Imaginary RAILWAYS thread rather tha imaginary locomotives?

Probably right. My bad.

24 minutes ago, Flying Pig said:

 

Unless the designers did something radical, a BR Standard 8 would be very similar to a Stanier 8F or an Austerity.  What were the complaints about the 9F that a loco like that would remedy?

Never mind I just realized that if my idea for a Standard 2-10-2 were to come about, the easier solution would be to just relocate 8Fs to the Western Region. Or even without said imaginary locomotives do that. To say nothing of the possibility of having a few USATC S160s stay in the UK.

Going back to the subject of Imaginary Locomotives, how well would have a Standard 8 fleet of 2-8-0s worked on the Southern Region? My idea behind them was to rememdy complaints about the 9F on the Western Region, but I figured such a locomotive would also work for the Southern Region.

2 hours ago, Murican said:

An alternative scenario: would the Devon and Somerset from Dulverton to Barnstaple be viable as a tourist line as well?

UPDATE: Apparently, Devvy had written up his idea that the Severn Valley Railway is longer than in real life. The post explaining this says that since in his alternate timeline more BR lines remain open, the heritage railways that do exist are much longer.

To that end, I could see the equipment of the West Somerset Railway being used on the SVR since both are Great Western lines.

18 hours ago, Murican said:

UPDATE: Apparently, the alternatehistory.com story that inspired many of my ideas here has the Taunton to Morehead line remain a part of BR. So in such an alternate time some if not most of the WSR stuff could end up at this hypothetical S&DHR.

 

An alternative scenario: would the Devon and Somerset from Dulverton to Barnstaple be viable as a tourist line as well?

For the record, this is the map that was created by Devvy, the create of the alternatehistory.com TL which I've been using as one of my main sources of inspiration (it's called 12:08 - Redux for those interested). The user basically took this map of the proposed cuts under Dr. Beeching and played around with it. The lines colored in black are the routes that Dr. Beeching tried to close, only for the lines to remain anyway. 

Right off the bat, I noticed that the NYMR as it exists in reality would be butterflied. However, I could see an  LNER heritage group still run a few locomotives over that line. Plus, other lines are closed and taken over by heritage groups as the alternate TL goes on.

2 hours ago, rodent279 said:

I guess a preserved S&D of any reasonable length might come at the expense of another nearby real-life preserved line. Would there be room for a preserved S&D and the WSR, and the ESR, within an hour's drive of each other? Would they be able to compete for footfall, funding & volunteers?

UPDATE: Apparently, the alternatehistory.com story that inspired many of my ideas here has the Taunton to Morehead line remain a part of BR. So in such an alternate time some if not most of the WSR stuff could end up at this hypothetical S&DHR.

In such a scenario, I could easily see the two class 33 diesels end up on it. They do have Southern heritage after all.

1 hour ago, rodent279 said:

I guess a preserved S&D of any reasonable length might come at the expense of another nearby real-life preserved line. Would there be room for a preserved S&D and the WSR, and the ESR, within an hour's drive of each other? Would they be able to compete for footfall, funding & volunteers?

I suppose in the case of the West Somerset, it does raise the question of if it could have remained a viable line under BR had someone more competent than Beeching been put in charge. I know someone on alternatehistory.com who could have an answer.

9 minutes ago, rodent279 said:

None of it. It's not especially scenic, not in the same league of the S&C or the Cotswold line, just average southern England green fields,woods and rolling hills. Enthusiasts are attached to it, but its a Railway that never really served a purpose that couldn't be fulfilled by other routes, even if they are a little less direct.

Fair enough if it pertains to real-life. But I have wondered what a S&D heritage line could be like if it were an analogue of sorts to the Great Central heritage railways in a reality where the GCR is still active as a mainline mostly for fast freight and occasional passenger trains.

3 minutes ago, rodent279 said:

S&C

Settle & Carlisle, right?

If not the S&D, what other pull-up lines could be good tourist railways?

Loosely related to some of my locomotive ideas: what parts of the S&DJR would have been best as tourist lines?

If I wasn't concerned abour plausibility, I'd want to go for preserving the Bath to Bournemouth line as a whole, but I want to try and maintain some degree of realism, which is also why most of my pre-nationalization ideas were based on locomotives that were actually proposed.

3 minutes ago, DenysW said:

What I believe the attached chart shows is that we may be over-gloomy in our expectations of what can (and can't) be achieved with the introduction of larger locomotives. Thus the LNWR started introducing 4F engines (coincidentally 0-8-0 compounds) and reducing its fleets of 3F-and-under 0-6-0s, and its receipts per loco-mile increased by 50% company-wid. Not shown is that its receipts/ton were essentially unchanged. A relatively small number of bigger locomotives seems to have made a big difference on what could be achieved in costs.

 

That's another reason I thought of my ideas for what proposed locomotives I would have bought into reality. The idea of several stronger engines doing the work of more smaller engines.

33 minutes ago, Murican said:

Even so, I still feel pleased with my ideas for locomotives. Even if I'm aware I'd need to be rewriting the history of UK rail infrastructure 

OR rather, I underestimated just how much of UK rail history would be rewritten.

I mean, I already knew that UK loading gauge can be pretty unforgivingly small, but I originally thought it was fairly exaggerated to some degree.

For example, one idea I had in mind when creating the Standard 9 Mountain, beyond Gresley and Bulleid getting their chance, was for if the LMS then BR really went full-throttle with intermodal-esque concepts for their non-mineral goods traffic. Meaning trains that go far longer distances with much fewer stops.

7 minutes ago, rodent279 said:

Oh I think the idea of a Hughes-inspired 4-8-2 thumping along the WCML with a nice hefty payload is fascinating. But I guess the lesson is that it wasn't small locos that was the problem, it was our restricted infrastructure, and that extends to more than the physical bulk of it, it's the length of passing loops, radius of curves etc.

It's a 4-6-2, but yes.

Since this thread is about purely imaginary locomotives, I figured it wouldn't hurt to discuss what would need to be changed with infrastructure another day.

22 minutes ago, rodent279 said:

Even if we did have the larger loading gauge of our European friends, if we still retained the short goods loops and multiplicity of collieries, good yards etc., with sharp radius curves, and a large private owner wagon fleet wedded to the short wheelbase 4 wheel open or covered wagon with no continuous brakes, there's still little point in evolving impressive beasts like the French 4-8-2's, German Br01's, Br44's etc.

Even so, I still feel pleased with my ideas for locomotives. Even if I'm aware I'd need to be rewriting the history of UK rail infrastructure 

6 minutes ago, The Johnster said:

Make that a 4-8-8-4 Kitson-Meyer tank, with 4’ driving wheels, and picture a pair of them blowing holes in the sky moving simultaneous 120-wagon drags of ‘Ocean’ 7-plankers across from Cadoxton yard onto the docks, or simultaneously blasting up the bank with the empties.  They’d have looked good in the dark red Barry livery, too!

 

Loosely related side note, but many of my ideas ARE loosely inspired by users on alternatehistory.com who are more knowledgable about British rail history than myself. As well as what I've read in this thread about locomotives that were proposed in real life, or mostly have some degree of historical plausibility.