Morello Cherry

That just isn't true. He was being criticised in the 1930s. Whatever you may think of them - Lloyd George's memoirs were 1936, Liddell Hart's was developing his critique from 1930 onwards.

My memory is very hazy but I recall many years (late 80s early 90s maybe) ago a piece on one of the current affairs programmes where a rent-a-gob MP (someone like Jerry Hayes or Tony Banks) who had been critical of underground drivers was invited to drive a train on the underground system. I seem to recall that at the first or second station he managed to (or tried to - I don't know if it was even possible) open the doors on the wrong side and was given very short shrift by the people with him. (It was a very long time ago and the details maybe wrong but opening the doors on the wrong side (or at least trying to) was something that stuck in my memory from the story)

TBH - I don't think that it was seen as at all controversial. The Britannia names are a mix of things - people, places, things. The choice of names is far less political than say the choices of names made during WW1 ie Czar of Russia. And let's not forget that the LNWR had Napoleon running around for a while. There was a big thing for pagents around this time - just looking at the programme where I live from the 1950s it includes a scene about the civil war and another scene about the Monmouth rebellion, the general drive was the long arc narrative of historical continuity - hence why you get Boudica through to C20 figures in what is effectively the 'celebrate Britain class'. I'd also suggest that there was actually after 1945 (potentially reflect a broader shift left in UK politics) away from naming things after members of the royal family. Pre-1939 you couldn't move for engines named after obscure members of the aristocracy. There was no loco named after Elizabeth II. I tend to think that the first post-1945 loco to be named after a member of the aristocracy is probably 47712 in 1981 and then 47541 in 1982. I'd also suggest that the positive view of Cromwell in the war and post-war period is more connected to parliamentarianism in the context of opposition authoritarianism, and a narrative of Britain not slipping into dictatorship in the interwar period when many other states did. ie Cromwell as a defender of parliament, creator of the new model army etc etc is seen as a good thing in this period, and less seen as a regicide, genocide in Ireland etc etc I'd suggest that in 1951 there was probably far more public hostility to the person after whom 70044 was named than to 70013. I'd also add that there is this bizarre idea that only in recent years have people started finding historical figures controversial - pretty much all three Edwards I, II and III have been controversial for several hundred years. Edward II since the last 1500s. Various Henrys, Johns, Richards and Georges have been subject to criticism at the time and subsequently. I find it hard to imagine that any schoolchild of the 1930s would not have known about John II and the Wash etc etc I think I'd want stronger footnotes than Ian Dale for some of those claims as they really don't ring true. The Churchill and the Navy story seems to rely on one source which has absolutely terrible referencing and sourcing. Ironic really give that there were Cromwell tanks in WW2 and Cromwell was the code word for invasion imminent. I really don't think that there was any negativity surrounding Cromwell in this period.

There are similar systems elsewhere and I've used them (can't remember off the top of my head where - I think maybe in Austria or Germany) - although you hit the button before stopping, even if you stop at say a signal before the platform the doors don't open. I think they still have to be released by someone (the driver?) so there is no chance that they will be opened on the wrong side if a train were platformed into a different platform. I am pretty sure I do remember at least once hitting the button on the 'wrong side' and then remembering the platform was on the other side and the doors only opened on the platform side. It is a very useful system if you are travelling with a pram or something similar because you can hit the button and then get everything ready to get off and get off going forwards rather than backwards which is a pain in the arse to do on a crowded platform with a pram.

Finally found photos of Porthmadog in all its glory. Admire the fine station building. Correct weather Let us just pull back a bit to get a sense of the station as a whole. looking good I particularly like the artistic subversion of fence without a gate here, as we have a gate without a fence. Nothing welcomes the royal family like a load of demolition rubble.

I'd suggest Llandudno or Bangor as the base/gateway to Snowdonia. That it is about the whole package - castles at Conway, Bodnant Garden, Penrhyn Castle, Snowdon and the mountains, when it comes to the Conway valley line it is not just a get on and go to the end of the line but there is also Betws-y-Coed for Swallow Falls etc, ie it there are more than one destination. Maybe not connect into London services, but it should be viable from Manchester/North West. Ideally however, what we need is for the Ffestiniog Tunnel to become the new Glenfinnan Viaduct and to bring the tourists from far and wide. If only there was a mainline heritage operation at somewhere nearby like Crewe with locos, rolling stock etc. The Cambrian Coast line of course has the more obvious 'beautiful' scenery but well until there is a solution to ERTMS that isn't going to happen. Also I would argue that it is also perfect possible to have a nice station in North Wales. Criccieth looks quite nice tbh. Ironic really because I finally found some 1970s/80s photos of Criccieth which captures the vibe I was talking about. Admire with me the boarded up signal box and the station name which appears to have been stuck on the old one and the portacabins.

It is ironic given WCR's erm er, 'track record' that Riley's own website has this to say about 45212 https://rileysuk.com/our-locomotives WCR seem to be engaged in one long bout of petulant, entitled dummy spitting. I am only surprised that they haven't threatened to hold their breath or to scream until they are allowed to do whatever they want.

These photos are after TFW has spruced them up. Unfortunately I have been unable to find any photos of Blaenau Ffestiniog station under a slate grey sky with the rain coming in waiting for a DMU to come in the bus shelter that passed for facilities or indeed Porthmadog (BR). Most of the stations on the North Wales Coast line also fall into that category as well. The lines really do give an air of minimum effort, which when you consider the number of tourists in the area and it is a shame because they really could be so much more. I will say that Llandudno Jnc c1990 did have one of the best station cafes at that time and did a really good bacon butty. If there is one thing I do miss about the 1980s/1990s is the greasy spoon cafes that were at many stations.

I see that they have recently 'invested' in Tywyn but again it gives a sense of the line. Remembering that this is an interchange with a major tourist attraction. Nothing screams welcome to our tourist destination than a station like this. They have recently upgraded the bus shelters...

I'd like to nominate pretty much every single station on the Cambrian coast and Conway valley lines in the 1980s/90s. No stations were absolutely terrible but the journey was just grim and depressing because they all seemed so bleak. Tywyn by that point I think had all the windows bricked up. My guess is probably just Machynlleth, Aberystwyth and Llandudno Junction were staffed. Searching flickr unsurprisingly does not bring up many photos of the station but these ones of Llanrwst North captures the vibe nicely. Maybe my memory is playing tricks on me but pretty much this was the look for every single station on the line (which had a building still standing and not a bus shelter). It's not even like BR had the excuse that they were running the lines down for closure either.

I wonder if it is similar to this the container that the Quorn Wagon Group have just started to restore. I am not an expert on such things but it looks similar-ish. Might be worth a trip if you are interested in getting to see it close up. https://quornwagonandwagon.co.uk/2024/04/07/07-04-24-palvan-loaded/ More photos of the restoration: https://quornwagonandwagon.co.uk/2024/04/14/14-04-23-contain-ing-the-excitement/

Which ignores that Brighton beach like many other beaches has red and yellow flags telling you when it is or is not safe to swim. It also has lifeguards who can prevent you from swimming. A bit like if you had stewards by each door telling you whether it was safe to open them or not and could prevent you from opening them when it was unsafe to do so. Oh wait....

125 deaths and however many more injured in 5 years shows that this just isn't true. Those deaths were all avoidable. Far from being a nanny state, the railway and government is doing what any state should do, namely taking steps to protect its citizens from being killed in ways that could have been avoided. Just because you didn't die or weren't injured by a door does not mean that they were safe or that somehow people were smarter 50 or 100 years ago. It is a selfish indulgent, "I'm alright Jack" attitude. And guess what, CDL has absolutely zero detriment to your journey. I like my railway journeys to be as safe as possible whether that means continuous brakes (C19 rule change), interlocking signalling, restrictions on working hours to avoid fatigue, Steel rolling stock, AWS, TPWS, (C20). Almost all major safety changes have come from pressure from outside the railways - state, inspectorate or unions. Or was that nanny statism as well? And CDL is just the latest step to make our railways safer. I struggle to work out why you object to making the railway safer for passengers? CDL so doors don't fly open when people are on board is a good thing and the fact that i can stand on the platform as the train comes in and not worry about some idiot opening the door into my face is also a good thing. ORR demanding CDL for WRC is simply requiring them to meet the same safety standards that everyone else on the mainline has been operating to for more than the last 30 years. And oh yeah, plenty of people did come to grief 'thinking for themselves' such as that railway photographer who fell off the Victoria Bridge. So let's put this lie to bed once and for all.

Not the UK but the Twin Cities chosen few, Husker Du, the album cover for Zen Arcade (not the album cover below but another from the shoot) Was shot in Minneapolis at the rather brilliantly named 'Pig's Eye Railyard' which is now part of CP. Apologies if these have been posted before but I also give you R.E.M. Driver 8 . And the Doves at about 2 mins 30 in.

I agree with you. I think the heritage rail sector has been very lucky so far - Wootton Bassett, trespassers on the line at various events (think the dude at the level crossing), the SDR, the GCR, incidents at the NYMR. These are near misses by fractions of seconds, or centimetres. The heritage sector is in John Bradford territory - 'there but for the grace of god go I'. Think how the authorities, politicians and media would have reacted if the mother had not caught the toddler? Or as you say Wootton Bassett, or if someone is killed falling out of a poorly secured door. I would say that all of these incidents were avoidable but also that the warning signs had been present for a while. I haven't volunteered for years, but the first thing I was taught was if in doubt fail safe. I made a visit I reckon about a decade ago to one of the heritage lines which was to later have a safety incident. We arrive at the end of the line, everyone gets off, the engine is unhooked. At which point I hear a scream from a woman standing next to me, 'my dog is under the train'. No idea how it got under the train. One of the blokes with them says 'I'll go and get it'. My immediate reaction is 'sh*t - stop the loco running round'. There are some older volunteers doing some painting, I go and tell them 'there is a dog under the train and a bloke is getting onto the track'. The response 'Again?'. I'm like dude, the engine is doing its run round procedure, there is a bloke and a dog under the train. The guy ambles to the group where the bloke has got the dog, the guy then proceeds to lecture the bloke that he is lifting the dog up wrong and will break the dog's back. Not 'stay there, don't move until we've made sure that the loco isn't moving' Not 'what the hell are you doing under the train carrying a large dog, let me make sure sure the engine is stopped', but 'don't carry the dog like that you'll break his back'. Bloke carries the dog under the carriage out onto the loop side, then walks around the carriages carrying the dog. At no point in time do I see that anyone has made any effort to stop the loco running round and it shortly clanks past (I'm guessing about 90 seconds after the bloke gets up onto the platform). It is clear to me that no one has warned the footplate crew. No platform staff or 'station master' appears to find out what has happened, the group wander off, seemingly completely oblivious, and the older volunteers go back to their painting. It struck me the lack of professionalism and basic safety awareness. I was not surprised when there was a later incident that made the national press and which brought the authorities into play. I don't think the attitude was a one off at one line, on another railway, when buying my tickets I was greeted with an unasked for rant about 'elf 'n safety' (and they did use the term 'elf'). Again, which was to me revealing about that person's attitude towards rules and regulations about safety. If you dismiss them as an imposition then you are not going to apply them seriously. Now, it strikes me that we are reaching a new stage - the ORR is clearly taking a much closer look at safety in the heritage sector due to the near misses. I hope that this means that we are entering into a new era of professionalism, and with that greater safety and hopefully no more near misses. However, it is clear to me that, WRC are like those volunteers on the platform or the person in the booking office, they don't get it and they don't believe it in. What worries me is that one of the refuseniks who views it all as a terrible imposition by government that they can't do what they used to do in 1955, 1975 or 1995, is going to play fast and loose with the rules and we're not going to have a near miss, we are going to have fatalities and serious injuries and then there will be true hell to pay. If the ORR takes a tough line with WRC and we get a sea change and people realise that no you are not playing trains with your mates, and no this isn't how it used to be in the 1970s, then that is only a good thing for the industry as a whole.

What you seem to be missing is that it is about risk. The risk of injury of falling on a slow moving city bus is lower than on a coach on a motorway or a plane (despite however much Ryanair et al might want to introduce standing on planes). Likewise, the risk from falling on the lower deck is lower than the upper deck - hence no standing on the upper deck. And so it is that the risks associated with falling from a train at 45mph are greater than at 25mph. Secondly, safety rules are not fixed and permanent but rather evolve across time, often in response to the last incident that showed the limitations of the current rules. Hence, if there are more incidents such as the GCR then we may well find CDL being introduced. (The Ffestiniog of course never stopped locking everyone in). If there is a bad bus accident then there may be a change in attitude to seatbelts on buses, just as bad accidents involving coaches drove the introduction of seat belts on coaches. Just because there were toilets that emptied onto the track in the past doesn't mean that there will be in the future, just because there isn't a requirement for CDL on preserved lines today doesn't mean that there won't be in 20 years time. Finally, there is an element of cakism in the WCR. On the one hand the argument is but we always used to have slam doors and everyone knows what to do, and on the other the PR spin is that there are all these Harry Potter fans who have travelled the world to ride on the train - and who by extension won't have travelled on a MK1 before. So if all the passengers are tourists who by the very nature of tourism will likely to be more unfamiliar than familiar then it makes sense to mitigate the risk by ensuring you have CDL or if you don't have CDL to then ensure that you are fully meeting the requirements of your exception from CDL. Once again, WCR brought this on themselves. They had the exception - they f'ed up by cutting corners on health and safety again (and with a rap sheet as long as Norman Stanley Fletcher) and now they are crying about how they are being hard done by. Sorry but not sorry but they can jog on.

The Euston Tap is nice if you like hipsters and craft beers. Further down Euston Road is the Euston Flyer, which bizarrely is closer to Kings Cross and St Pancras than to Euston. Has a lot of railway related stuff hanging on the walls. It has the air of a 1990s Irish theme pub, so I don't know how much of it is genuine.

I am reminded of a friend of mine who worked for the EU in reforming the administration of the borders in the former Communist states of Eastern Europe. She described border policy like this: "Under Communism the aim of the border was to keep everyone in, in post-Communism the aim at the border is to keep everyone out'. I tend to see the aim on public trains as being to keep everyone inside the train, and on the royal train to keep everyone out of the train. TBF I don't recall seeing many shots of her Maj window hanging or Charlie bellowing out of the window because there is some good clag.

When I checked quickly it said Carnforth is in the Morecambe constituency but you maybe right. My main point is that the only local business that is complaining is WRC. That there are a group of Carnforth and surrounding area MPs and a few randoms says a lot. Maybe Brady is Riley's local MP? I do recall that MPs will tell you that they can only respond to constituents' concerns.

Strange then that the MP for the Fort William and Mallaig areas did not sign it then. I am struggling to work out which businesses are being damaged in Keighley, Altrincham, and Norfolk by the ORR demand that WRC fit CDL to their coaching stock. I think the only MP responding to a local business going apoplectic is the MP for Morecambe.

I am not sure I would read too much into the various MPs signing the letter. There is an election in 6 months and most politicians would sign anything if they think it will win them a few more votes. The deaths of about 1 every 2 weeks when there were large numbers of slam door stock running seem about right. I can remember the frequent start - lurch to a halt, shut the errant door, restart routine. The numbers show just how much of a risk slam doors are. A university friend of my cousin was killed falling out of a door, certainly I actively avoided ever sitting or standing next to a slam door. The last thing I wanted was to lurch over some pointwork or rough track and find that the door was not securely shut. It would be interesting to know how many people were injured in this period falling from trains where there was no platform or opening the door on the wrong side. Interestingly and I think relevent in a recent edition of Pines Express, there were the memoirs of a former member of staff at Shepton Mallet station, he recounted how a train had overshot the station and ended up on the viaduct. It was dark and before they had a chance to warn people a passenger thinking they were in the station opened the door, stepped out onto the viaduct parapet from where they fell to their death. Incidents so common that they are barely reported as out of the ordinary. I don't see WRC's attitude to be different from a certain someone who made a special lockdown visit to Glenfinnan viaduct 'to test the toilets'. There is a degree of entitlement within railway heritage among those who have the money to play on the mainline that rules are some how for the proles not the likes of them. Southall and Carnforth whenever I went past looked more like a decaying scrapyard than a professional engineering/railway company. The RAIB reports normally include a section marked 'learning points' it is clear that WRC have not learnt from Wootton Bassett etc. This is all entirely self inflicted by WRC, all they have to do is fit the CDL. If they had met the terms of their exception then they would have been fine, if they didn't have a track record of playing fast and loose with health and safety then they wouldn't have brought this on themselves.

I think tone matters a lot and thinking about how what you say might be recieved by all audiences, including your hardcore purist volunteers. I have met an awful lot of very tone deaf managers in my time. Recent examples include a manager who during the cost of living crisis and general job insecurity would send us a monthly email (ostentiously about what is going on at work) which seemed to be about their trips to the local farmers' market. To the staff it confirmed that they were a completely divorced from reality, wealthy idiot who lacked the brains to think about how they were coming across to those lower down the pay chain. The second one was a manager who sent an email announcing that he welcomed constructive feedback - in other words, if you give me feedback that challenges me then I am going to dismiss it unconstructive. What I would say is this - I have no reason to doubt that filming etc is extremely lucrative, but that is only possible because Dave, Joe, Bob, Sue and their dog Cyril turn up every tuesday from November through to February to do various tedious, thankless, dull tasks on the station to keep it looking beautiful so that film location spotters can go 'that would look perfect in my film'. (At the same time, there wouldn't be a station to keep up if the money didn't come). The point here is that both need the other. If it wasn't filming it would be Thomas/Peppa/Bluey/Paw Patrol/Diesel Galas that would be seen as the betrayal of the ethos of the railway. Managers need to put themselves in the shoes of those at the bottom, and unfortunately, as we can see all around us every day most seem to be devoid of the most basic elements of human intelligence necessary. I have to say, that I think being part of a fly on the wall/reality programme is about the worst thing you can do for your business. If for no other reason than some people take it as an opportunity to become 'characters' even though no one likes someone who spends their time going around gurning for the camera like Greg Wallace on speed. (Bangers and Cash is the worst one for that it has to be said).

You mean to say that they wouldn't let you fit a garden shed to the front of a double fairlie? (It would be a very tiny shed - and I guess being a double fairlie you'd need two). I will check out the book. Just out of interest how would you measure smokebox vacuum before and after the spark arrestor from the indicator shelter?

I am just wondering what all the pipework and stuff attached the cylinders was in this test: http://www.traintesting.com/images/Bullied_Merchant_Navy_Class_35022_'Holland-America-Line'_on_Dyno_Test.jpg I'd love to know what the things that look like a load of rockets on the side of the smoke box are for.

Thanks, I'm still trying to get a map of the layout in my mind. Would it be one per cylinder? Where would the drum and paper be - at the front or on the side? Were there any other tests that could only be done from the indicating shelter? I have just found this image which looks like the equipment was being set up: Given how far down the side the shelter extends on the King I am assuming that the equipment is on the side. I'm also trying to work out why the WR was still using indicating shelters in 1955 even though Rugby was up and running. But a much shorter set up down the side. Still have no idea how it was fixed to the loco though.