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The actual reason was not financial, the customer was replacing the "other" system and therefore decided to keep my bit in place until that happened, unfortunately there were some problems implementing that new system (nothing to do with me or my company) so things lasted longer that they expected, quite a bit longer - but given it (eventually) ran for 17 years without issue there was hardly anything to panic about, Y2K came and went, ships didn't sink, planes didn't fall from the sky and that bit of software kept on dealing with hundreds of patients each and every day. During my time viruses and hacks were very few and far between but the Internet was not so prevalent and most/(all?) machines could only access the LAN. To gain access in bulk to any useful data would involve writing something to download it - and that would have been spotted almost immediately by the 24x7 monitoring which went on, human and software, I've run Windows since Windows 1.0 - my girlfriend, now wife, worked for Apricot at the time, 1980s and she was allowed to bring home a PC running Windows 1, the kit was so expensive she wasn't allowed to bring the mouse home so I had to use it with keyboard only, a skill which has served me well over the years, although I've forgotten a lot now, I used to be able to do virtually everything using keyboard shortcuts. - I didn't like it (W1) If you can convince someone to give you the root password for a minute or two, a snall program can be written which gives a back door into a UNIX based system.

I worked for a major supplier of systems to the NHS - a fair number of people in the UK will have been passed through systems I worked on - the suppliers were not the problem with NHS IT at the time (80s/90s/early 00s). It would have taken a brave - and stupid - minister to mandate Linux on the desktop in those days, especially as it didn't exist until the 90s and was not user friendly until many years later, Up until 2005 one of my programs which linked our system to a theatre system was still running on a DOS based machine, in it's last year or two it was a virtual one - if it ain't broke don't break it. Windows (client) was favoured because end users had it at home and so it was familiar in it's basic use, having an application which followed Windows conventions was a sensible move for suppliers, having one on Linux not so much.

I have a few of the box, ground signal and starter if they are of interest, let me know.

Horton-in-Ribblesdale - Fri 18 September 1981

Sad news although as I no longer do any modelling it doesn't directly affect me. Used to go to Hattons often, from the days of the Smithdown Road shops, ca 1980 onwards , when Norman was both active and - sadly- not so active in his latter years. Very sad for all concerned and I wish them well and would like to say "Thanks" for being such a stalwart of railway modelling.

most modern browsers Fixed it.

I signed it and worked with some things that were very covered by it (power station and submarine fuel amongst other "stuff") - when I left the nukes I was debriefed by a large, very well built, gentleman who told me that even though I was leaving, the act still covered me for several years and for the "nudge nudge" work would apply for - effectively life - as he left he said "goodbye and hopefully I won't have to come back" - I took the thinly veiled warning seriously so still don't talk in detail about what I did even though I suspect the technology has long moved on.

A detail for the really keen modeller Eccles Road 05/01/2024 (Friday) Number of 66701 and End of Steam 1968 - 11/8/1968 and Good Riddance written in the dust

4E43 with 66740 at the sharp end has come to grief between Needham and Stow, looks like a tree fell onto the overhead as it was passing - the line is currently shut. Brecks also severly affected due to trees down, in fact very few trains running around Anglia at the moment although the winds have abated.

Widnes had this modelled - I wrote the software to control it

About 1977/8 the gantry was replaced by separate signals.

Rhyl No.2 down fast home and down fast to down neck.

Merry Christmas to you too Dave. I don't think that's a Peak passing Selside 😉😀

From the YouTube channel about. "Speed limit 25, 10mph warning before the bumps with signage on the street as well as poles"

EMR currently using the MML and Melton lines due to a broken down train at Grantham - here's 1L05 heading for East Midlands Parkway and beyond.

changed a bit https://maps.app.goo.gl/T2NmZqUG4YyH9cDH9

EMR are relatively often* diverted via the MML and across. * as in it's not rare but not every week either. Happens occasionally when there's no obviously issue, maybe it's a quicker route and can be used to recover late running. As to the Peterborough routing it could be a mistake ... or maybe there was something in Peterborough which blocked the normal straight route in and it was crossed over to keep it moving.

I've found a further working on 17/08 - Tyne Dock to Tyne Yard as 0S48 - 6S48 was a Tyne Yard to Mossend, probably no traffic at Tyne so it was running light to Mossend to bring a train back - which would make it's move 0S48, 10:13, Tyne Yard - Mossend. In my defence it was at Doncaster on 16/08 and then moved to Tyne Dock for first thing on 17/08 and was back again for first thing 18/08

66715 was on a Doncaster - Tyne Dock move.

July 1969 Derby PSB took control of the area, Daves photo could be only a week or two later, the cutting crew probably hadn't caught up with the commissioning.

et Viola .. https://www.gwra.co.uk/auctions/british-railways-western-region-signal-box-diagram-2023mar-0250.html 1,2,3 and 4 it can show

Looks like a stencil, it's made up of blocks, each block would show a single character - probably 1,2,3, etc and possibly S for siding or G for goods - a copy of the signal box diagram for the era will show what it's capable of showing

For a distant to be cleared all the stop signals controlled from the box need to be cleared (and sometimes other things like a face disc showing it's ok to be cleared) - line clear is part of block working, not interlocking, and until the mid 1970s some boxes still worked passenger lines without requiring a line clear release on the section signal. Generally semaphore distants would not be cleared for a terminal station, Birkenhead Woodside had a working distant up to the buffer stop but was unusual in this. Colour light areas were different as the signals reading to the final stop signal were (normally) repeaters rather than distants so could show a green if the next signal was showing proceed, only the last stop signal was peculiar in that it used to show a green onto a red (the buffer stop) - this was "corrected" after Moorgate. I can remember hanging out of train windows (tut tut) while running into Lime Street with greens all the way down the cutting, running into platform 9 on greens could be "lively"

Only for the theatre indicated route = PN249, acting as up main home for Lancaster, has a theatre but shows a straight Y/YY/G for the up fast with a line speed of 75mph

Using the down fast in bi-di mode