TRACTION 216

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TRACTION issue 216 is published on Friday 1st November and has the usual fascinating mixture of articles for enthusiasts interested in diesel and electric traction.

 

Cliff Cook writes about his time at Stratford diesel depot in ‘STRATFORD SECONDMAN 1979-1984’. This is the first of a three part feature which reveals much about footplate work at that time.

 

In ‘EXPRESS EMUs OF THE SOUTHERN RAILWAY’, Colin Boocock continues his series of articles about the multiple units of the railways south of the Thames.

 

Peter Rose has chosen some of his favourite photographs showing ‘PEAK DISTRICT TRAFFIC IN THE EIGHTIES’ around Chinley, which was one of the editor’s favourite locations in early diesel days before the track layout was rationalised.

 

Recently, Trevor Bruford spent a day with the team who work on the ‘Deltics’, based at Barrow Hill and, in ‘THE DELTIC PRESERVATION SOCIETY - A DAY AT BARROW HILL’, tells us what he found there.

 

In another of his photographic features Bob Cragg looks back to the days of Railfreight sectorisation in ‘COAL SECTOR BLACK DIAMONDS’.

‘ALYCIDON’S SECOND MAINLINE RETURN’ is the other ‘Deltic’ feature in this issue and Jon Littlewood recounts the amazing exploits of 55009 back on the main line hauling heavy trains.

 

Freight train enthusiasts get another chance to wallow in nostalgia with David Gommersall’s photographs of ‘THE LONGBRIDGE TO SWINDON CAR COMPONENT TRAINS’ taking us back to the days when these trains still ran several times a day.

 

The days of schoolboys train spotting seem to be almost over, but Deane Baker in ‘SPOTTING ADVENTURES- 24 HOUR SPONSORED TRAINSPOT’ remembers when his school’s railway society organised an event at Cheltenham.

 

Gavin Morrison brings us another selection of his superb photographs, which are of a rather neglected part of Britain’s railways. In ‘BLACK & WHITE DAYS IN SOUTH WEST WALES’ we see the variety of motive power and trains that used to run there.

 

Former BR manager Keith Widdowson returns with another story of chasing locomotives for ‘haulage’ in ‘TRACKING DOWN THE SOUTHERN REGION TYPE 3s’.

 

Finally, we have the first of TRACTION’s European articles. Tom Braund visited Germany recently, and discovered that there is still a surprising amount of older motive power to be seen. In ‘RHEINLAND MIXTURE’ he recommends taking a holiday in this attractive part of Germany.