Morello Cherry

Indeed, BF is an exception because it had the former narrow gauge - standard gauge transhipment sidings which had by the 1970s could be used as docks. Although those photos appear to show the coal piled on the ground. Would stations like BF have even had a station master by the 1970s?

In the sense of you have a goods yard like BF that doesn't appear to have any specialised equipment for coal unloading other than a dock. Would it have been in a 16T mineral wagon and people and shovels as late as the 1980s? I'm assuming it wouldn't have been an HBA because no drops. I guess by this time the era of a coal yard with three coal merchants was probably gone in towns of similar size to BF The thing is that for example I can remember in the early 80s we would have coal delivered by the coal man but by the end of the 80s I remember getting it from the local DIY store. I can't remember when it stopped but I guess it was a knock on from the Miners' Strike. There is an image of the coal yard at BF in 1977. If anyone can decipher how coal was unloaded and what was being used to bring it to BF that would be brilliant. Wiki commons has thrown up a photo of the station site from 1976 and the coal yard can be seen clearly.

Possibly OT and in which case I apologise. I have a question - how would coal have been handled in small towns etc towards the end of such traffic. I was reading about Blaenau Ffestiniog and it mentions that goods facilities including coal were withdrawn in 1984. How would coal have been handled there where there don't appear to be any obvious facilities for unloading? What would it have been transported in? (I assume that BF wasn't the only small place receiving household coal until late and maybe people can remember how it was done elsewhere - this is one of those small but common operations that I probably saw but took no notice of until it stopped).

That is fantastic. I love that you've gone for the FR station in its early 1980s form with the huts and no shelter. It really captures BF. I like the wandering sheep as well. Brings back plenty of memories of waiting in the rain for EoM or the Alco on a train of red carriages. Thank you for sharing. I was looking again at the 2d53 site again and it mentions that goods traffic to BF stopped in 1984. It makes me wonder what would the traffic in and out of BF have been before then: Explosives, slate (as evidenced by the photo on the page) and it mentions coal in. Does anyone have any thoughts on what else might have been in. I assume that good traffic was worked to and from Llandudno Jnc worked by one of the locos from there and traffic was split/added to workings along the rest of the coast. Clearly it wasn't a lot of traffic as it ended in 84. http://www.2d53.co.uk/blaenauffestiniog/Goods Yard.htm

Apologies if this is old news. A few images of British Oak appeared on flickr this week. https://www.flickr.com/photos/tags/britishoakocdp

Do tell more. Sounds good.

Other equipment could be threshing, sowing or harvesting (depending on what your crops were). You might be interested in this: https://www.fwi.co.uk/machinery/tractors/machinery-milestones-the-worlds-first-tractors A little way down we have a very public demonstration of the Ivel tractor in 1905. So you could have your very early tractor being transported to 'demonstrate' its prowess to local land owners. It is worth noting that the 1911 Royal Agricultural Show was held at Crown Point. And that there is mention of an early tractor being demonstrated at the 1903 Royal Show and it failing. Another reference says that around 1900 there were 160 tractor manufacturers. https://www.farm-equipment.com/articles/15962-manufacturer-consolidation-reshaping-the-farm-equipment-marketplace Agrimotor were Saffron Waldon and we have this little bit of information here (I can't paste the link because it is straight to a pdf): So you have an example of machinery going from GER to GWR territory for a show. It is also worth noting that many tractor makers were American, and they were exporting their tractors to the UK. So you could also have a tractor that might have been imported via Bristol for example and then shipped to Suffolk. Also, do you remember a few years back there was the 'Edwardian Farm' series on TV. They tried and tested a whole series of new machinery that was available then, so this might give you some alternative loads being shipped for demonstration.

Agricultural shows were and still are big business. A lot depends on the type of farms, size, what they are doing etc as to what they might need and where they might source it from. Seasonality also matters as there will be busier periods where labour and machinery would be hired in. Large estate type farms are going to be more mechanised than smaller farms (Although they too would be becoming increasingly mechanised).

Just off to the right behind the water tower was Charlbury gasworks. I am not sure but I'd assume a fair amount of coal was for that. Or is that the long siding at the back where there appears to be a cart backed up against a wagon? The Charlbury shot is interesting because there is a wheelbarrow and what looks like ramps, I pity the poor sod tasked with that job. Amazing that somewhere as tiny of turn of the century Charlbury could generate so much traffic and need such a complicated track layout. (Nice to model though).

Apologies if this has been mentioned but what about this image of Moreton in Marsh? https://www.warwickshirerailways.com/gwr/gwrmm982b.htm There seem to be three very dark patches. The interesting thing to me is that the dark area that I think is coal is on a dock but then I am not so sure from this image of the dock that it is coal https://www.warwickshirerailways.com/gwr/gwrmm987b.htm Charlbury down the road looks a bit more rough and ready.

It is a line that has something for everyone and 'quirky' traffic in almost all eras. Even a small station like Conwy has tons of modelling potential, while Bangor, Llandudno Jnc, Llandudno, Holyhead and Rhyl are big stations and then you've got places like Mostyn Quay, or the branch lines off of it, all of which have tons of potential.

Excellent photos. I always thought Blaenau Ffestiniog in either pre-1946 or post-1982 form would be interesting to model but probably impossible. I am not sure how you could capture Blaenau in all its atmospheric grey and drizzly glory.

Thanks. I'd had a long look at it and always find something new. It appears there was also an LPG train to Anglesey Aluminum as well as the petroleum coke. I've also found a photo of the Cooke's traffic (when it was picked up from Maentwrog Rd) which answers my question. What with flasks, chemical and explosives traffic it must be one of the last places with a lot of brake van use. http://www.penmorfa.com/Conwy/47234 Blaenau explosives.jpg

I am currently researching some potential lines/areas to model. I've always liked the North Wales coast line and am thinking about modelling something based on the area if not 100% totally prototypical. Time can be fluid and it was obviously a period where a lot of things changed and not everything ran at the same time. I've been looking at various websites with photos from the line in the 1980s as well as drawing on my own memories and the line undergoes a lot of changes in terms of rolling stock operations etc between 1980 and 1990. Class 40s, 20s, 25s, 31s, 45s, 47s and 1st gen DMUs in the early 1980s, to 33s, 37s, 47s, HSTs and second generation DMUs later on. I've been trying to work out what the freight flows were. I think they are: Coal from Point of Ayr Ballast from Penmaenmawr Freightliners from/to Holyhead Flasks from/to Valley and Trawsfynydd Ethylene Dibromide and Liquid Chlorine from Amlwch Sulphur to Amlwch Petroleum Coke to Holyhead Speedlink: Cement and Bricks from Bangor Slate from Blaenau Ffestiniog (until 1984) (?) There are some that I am not clear on and I was wondering if anyone knows. It is mentioned that Cookes explosives were transported from Blaenau Ffestiniog after locos were banned from the Cambrian Coast. I've seen that freight traffic was withdrawn from BF in 1984. What would the Cookes traffic have been transported in? I am struggling to find any photos of freight on the Conway Valley line except flasks. What traffic went in and out from Anglesey Aluminium? A couple of other questions. I am struggling to identify what wagons are used in the Sulphur, Chemical and Stone traffic. With the Sulphur traffic it is not just the hoppers I am struggling to ID but also the van used to transport the covers when the train ran empty. http://www.penmorfa.com/Archive/47335 Llangefni.jpg - Chemical Traffic. Vans at both ends as well :) http://www.penmorfa.com/Archive/47325 Prestatyn - sulphur train.jpg - Sulphur train and van http://www.penmorfa.com/Archive/37676 Mostyn - roadstone.jpg http://www.penmorfa.com/Archive/37681 + 685 Towyn - roadstone.jpg - Roadstone - I don't recognise these wagons in either For passenger traffic: This I am not sure about as a basic framework to work from. 25s - locals + Manchester traffic 47s - Euston - Holyhead 40s - Euston - Holyhead, Manchester traffic until withdrawal 45s - Manchester and Trans Pennine 33s - Cardiff - Holyhead DMUs the majority of local traffic including stoppers to Manchester Vic etc. Sprinters and Pacers replacing by mid 1980s. 37s - not until 1990s 31s - ??? Mail and Newspaper traffic - when was this lost from the line? There was a Holyhead - Bangor - Chester mail of a single BG (sometimes upto four vans) in this period but that seems to be it. When were parcels and newspaper traffic lost on the line? Is there anything I've missed?

The comment about being able to hear it when the wind is in the right direction prompts a question. Does audibility matter in terms of siting a whistle board? I'd assume it can't be so far away that you need the wind in the right direction for it to be heard but also not so close that people would not have time to get out of the way if a train is approaching. I do recall reading in the context of one line (Ffestiniog maybe?) that there were 'deaf spots' so to speak where the lie of the land is such that it is very hard to hear a whistle that is quite close to you.

Good stuff. I think the guy you saw in 2000 was the Hungarian President Ferenc Mádl not the Prime Minister. I think in 2000 the Prime Minister was Viktor Orban. Was the stuff you didn't recognise in bottles Kvas? It is very popular in Moldova, Ukraine etc. Keleti is a proper old school terminal and always interesting to watch all the shunting operations. I do remember seeing the Zagreb-Moscow train and thinking that it was a bit of trek.

The discussion of the routing of the train is here, it was sent all the way around Woking, Feltham etc. My guess is capacity at Reading, it was pretty busy and you already had the cross country trains with run rounds etc going on and Guildford was an easier place to do it.

The fourth photo down is a GCR Fish van at Weymouth in a GWR hauled train. https://www.steve-banks.org/prototype-and-traffic/416-fish-traffic I see no reason why it could not go the other way. As others have said there are seasonal and local catches. There is a little bit here on fish trains from Milford Haven that include a reference to a train that ran to Manchester via Carmarthen and the Central Wales line and to Sheffield. And to go back to the image and source - Weymouth is a harbour and I find it hard to believe that there would not be locally sourced fish, and yet we have fish from Grimsby in the image and the text mentions fish from Milford Haven going to Weymouth as well.

MERL - Museum of English Rural Life will probably know. https://merl.reading.ac.uk/ https://merl.reading.ac.uk/merl-collections/search-and-browse/databases/ What workers wear seems to depend on what they were doing and the type of farm The photos in their collection point to workers involved in milking wearing the brown coat linked to above but also white. For workers in the creamery itself it seems to have worn white. Couple of links to images: workers in a dairy - http://www.reading.ac.uk/adlib/Details/archive/110290257 http://www.reading.ac.uk/adlib/Details/archive/110329131 workers in on curd mill 1936 - http://www.reading.ac.uk/adlib/Details/archive/110021143

For what it is worth - there is a discussion here about a Grimsby - Whitland Fish train. I have no idea if it ran in your period or if it contained GWR fish vans. However, it is a fish train from Grimsby to GWR territory.

Have you asked the Cotswold Line Promotion Group? Although they are very much about the line now, they are pretty much the holders of the memory of the line and if anyone is likely to know then it is probably going to be a member of CLPG. Might be worth shooting the editor of the newsletter an email.

For a small rural oil terminal what about North Camp? Nice to model with the level crossing, SER buildings, limited but interesting rolling stock for transition era and interesting operation. Short video of one of the last oil trains to leave.

Straying a little from the OP - not BR but the Ffestiniog can give you a steam hauled revenue earning* freight in 2008. *The load was revenue earning for the National Trust.

That is true but it is also true that while we see increases in average passenger speeds over time there is not a commensurate increase in average goods traffic speeds. The coal train at Quintinshill was an unfitted, short wheelbase wagon mineral train, 20 years later at Shrivenham, the coal train is an unfitted, short wheelbase mineral train. Compare and contrast with how passenger trains developed in that same 20 year period. Passenger trains are going faster, and freights are still plodding along at 25mph and having to be shunted out of the way every few miles because passenger speeds are increasing. As the gap between passenger and freight speeds grows surely that increases the risk? How does the UK compare to France or North America when it comes to the end of unfitted and short wheelbase goods trains?

It is worth noting how many accidents where the general nature of unfitted freights and their slowness was a contributing factor. (If they weren't so slow and/or unfitted then they wouldn't have been where they were when the accident happened). The accident reports are a good source for speeds how they were run as witnesses will invariably describe their run upto the point of the accident. At Quintinshill, you have the loops being occupied by goods trains. The goods train heading north having taken 25 mins to do the 10 miles from Carlisle to Quintinshill (it was an hour late leaving Carlisle), and then the empty coal train in the other loop. (Whose crew had been on duty since 10.15pm the previous evening - (where would they have worked from? The coal train is described variously as an 'empty coal special' so is it a returning Jellicoe Special?)) At Charfield you have a goods train that takes water (without telling the signalman) and both the LMS and GWR goods trains having to be shunted out of the way. The GWR goods was shunted twice, once at Berkeley Rd Jnc and then again at Charfield, it leaves Berkeley Rd Jnc at 4.53 and doesn't get to Charfield until 5.13, so 20 mins to do something around 5 miles - a 15 mph average. Shrivenham is one of many involving breakaways - the Guard in that case seems to have assumed that they had stopped at a signal (although I think there is a suspicion that he was asleep). But there it is interesting because the speed at Marston crossing is variously described at 18-20 mph (driver and guard) and 10-15 mph by the signalman. And the average speed between Shrivenham and Marston is given as 21.5 to 25 mph and a top speed is estimated as being 25mph. There is a long discussion around how fast the mineral train was going when it split to work out how far the separated portion would have run to then work out where the split took place and whether the train was complete or not when it passed different boxes.