eastwestdivide

With a 56, wouldn’t they have to be air-braked in that formation? For BBAs, could it be a trick of the sharp angle of the photo, making the side stanchions of BBAs look more substantial?

Iwade the nearest village but the station is Swale after the waterway behind the camera, with the lifting bridge.

Over the canal in Rhodesia: (near Worksop, not Zimbabwe)

Symmetry, well nearly, at Sheffield

Could it have been a last-minute replacement/relief for a no-show/very late hauled service? I saw that a few times when I was down that way in the early 80s. But yes, the 4-car 117/Met-Cam is pretty unusual.

Tilbury - see also a couple of photos here: https://www.rmweb.co.uk/forums/topic/183328-the-slow-train-to-rainham-marshes-via-tilbury/

Grand Central's guarantee - worth the paper it's written on? Don't know how many of these reservation tickets they had printed, but I've seen it twice, many months if not years apart.

Worth a look, definitely. In fact the whole Castlefield area's pretty interesting. The nearby science and industry museum is a bit limited at the moment though, having a refit.

Anyone think J2123 is oil rather than cement? It looks more like oil products tank wagons, and that might also account for the HAA as a barrier/reach wagon at the front

Similar arrangement on some Belgian units too, the AM96 units: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belgian_Railways_Class_96 Quite comfy, the Belgian ones.

Footbridge, as in this google maps view https://maps.app.goo.gl/9gvqZsCyjpszmhPLA?g_st=im Can't say about the litter!

Annual occurrence I think - I’ve seen them there a couple of times in recent years (N of Rotterdam where the HS line branches off).

JVol1196 What’s the first vehicle? Some sort of horse/cattle wagon?

If it’s any help, the photo on https://eisenbahnstiftung.de/ has a caption, but you can’t link to it directly. However, if you go to https://eisenbahnstiftung.de/bildergalerie and search the loco number, 18 316, it’s 2nd from the end. To save you the trouble, here’s the caption Paraphrasing, Carl Bellingrodt [the photographer] located it as Memmingen, but it appears to be 18 316 from the loco test facility at Minden with a measurement (test?) train during a water stop at Bebra. First coach from DSB (Denmark), then a British BR* one. June 1956. *I’m assuming BR = British Railways, by analogy with the DSB mention, rather then BR=Bundesreihe (~class)! If it was a Mk1 it would be very early for a conversion to measurement use, although such a conversion could also entail adding a ducket, if that’s what it is.

Assorted styles of railings, with 70020 on the Dewsbury-Hope cement empties at Rotherham today: