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4369
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Sideshoots - associated subjects / Railway History and related topics / Re: On This Day, 4 October 1976 - British Rail began its new 125mph High Speed Train (HST) service
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on: October 05, 2013, 11:24:17
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I've done the best I can with the video from the 1976 BBC» Points West news report. Original quality was terrible and enlarging hasn't helped, but I've smoothed out the worst of the pixelating and visual artifacts. More powerful software than I have at my disposal would be needed to improve further. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ySyFzWgLt_4Not sure what 1st Class passengers had done to deserve orange velour. Looks the same colour as 1970's Kia-Ora before they stopped using tartrazine. Thanks for that bnm - so much easier to view your version than go through the pain of installing Real Player (if indeed you can on Windows  . I'd forgotten about the funny aluminium grab-knobs (as I suppose you'd call them) on the seats - very modern, very socialist! Intrigued to see that the service shaved 15 mins off the old schedule whilst dropping three stops - were HSTs▸ actually any faster than the old kit? |
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4372
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All across the Great Western territory / The Wider Picture - related rail and other transport issues / Re: End of the line for the mile, the chain and the yard
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on: October 03, 2013, 10:01:52
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I have a dim recollection that when our currency went decimal (15 Feb 71; 21 Feb for buses!) the plan was to complete metrication by 1974. We seem to have slightly overshot that target!
It'd be interesting to know what percentage (or should it be fraction?) of people wish to see the current mess of partial metrication projected ad infinitum, rather than pressing on to complete what is surely an inevitable process. I appreciate that there are some issues that would require thought (for example, some counties have retained cast iron 'heritage' signposts with distances in miles) but none of this should be insurmountable. As a first step, introducing 'M' instead of 'm' as the abbreviation for 'mile' on road signs would surely make sense.
I see metrication as another example of how the rail industry is shaking off it's old-fashioned image. Good to see!
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4374
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All across the Great Western territory / The Wider Picture - related rail and other transport issues / Re: End of the line for the mile, the chain and the yard
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on: October 02, 2013, 20:38:29
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...but in actual fact it is meters.
Picky of me to point it out, but I've noticed an increasing tendency towards using the US spelling of 'metre' - which I find odd given that metric units are less-widely used there. I know I should learn to live with this kind of thing, but it sticks in my craw; also it is to my mind useful to keep the distinction between the unit of measurement (the metre) and the measuring device (the meter). While I'm on the subject, does anyone else find it irritating that people pronounce 'kilometre' to rhyme with 'thermometer' rather than follow the pattern of 'milimetre' and 'centimetre'? Again, it sounds like a device for measuring 'kiloness' rather than a multiple of a metre. Just me then  At least the railways didn't repeat the daft mistake that was introduced on the roads with the (otherwise excellent) Warboys signage, whereby 'm' is used to mean 'miles' - how are they going to get round that one when they finally bite the bullet? |
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4377
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Sideshoots - associated subjects / The Lighter Side / Re: Interesting transport modes
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on: September 30, 2013, 22:56:08
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I think I may have ridden the paternoster in Fairfax House (Co-op department store), Broadmead, Bristol, as a child. It's a vague recollection and it may be that I just saw it in operation in the late 1970s.
Fairfax House is long gone. Replaced by The Galleries' car park in 1989.
I, too, would like to ride a paternoster. Doing the full loop, over the top and under the bottom.
I have done this many times on the Paternoster at Rolls-Royce's Sinfin 'A' site in Derby - in fact I had to, because I found myself too much of a coward to get on it going down, or to get off whilst going up. So to go down I'd get on one going up and go over the top. Going up was equally convoluted because I found it easier to get off a lift that was going down - so I'd get on an up-bound lift, pass the floor I wanted, and then get off after going round the top. The whole apparatus was suffused with the scent of light oil and hot rubber - mmmmm! The winter days flew by. As I recall, there was a fire at Fairfax House some time in the mid to late sixties; I feel sure the Paternosters had been removed when the store reopened after this. The late 70's sounds too late to me... |
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All across the Great Western territory / The Wider Picture in the United Kingdom / Re: HS2 - Government proposals, alternative routes and general discussion
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on: September 30, 2013, 22:33:28
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Politrics is a funny old game; it is (I think) fair to assume that at the next election the Lib Dems will be going back to their constituencies to prepare for oblivion, which leaves a lot of spare protest votes flying around. The Tories obviously fear that a fair number will go to UKIP, who of course are in outright opposition to HS2▸ . Will the Tories find it worthwhile to trade the scorn that'll be heaped on them if they abandon the HS2 project, to try and regain the votes they look like losing to UKIP in the Home Counties? And then there's the bit I've never understood - why do Labour hate railways? More track milage was closed under Labour than the Tories, and under Bliar and Brown (IIRC▸ ) 400m of track was re-opened in England - and yes that's metres, not miles. Somehow I don't hold out much hope that Steve Miliband will be much better.
Wonder what the Monster Raving Loony Party's Transport Policy looks like? (cue: FT, N!)
Edit: changed 'can' to 'abandon', for clarity.
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4380
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All across the Great Western territory / Across the West / Re: Early departure to avoid connecting passengers causing a delay?
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on: September 30, 2013, 16:14:54
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Very well said, B&Hcommuter.
As far as the staff are concerned, there's too much emphasis on not getting delay minutes attributed to you, and too much emphasis on blowing whistles too early and trains leaving early as a result. For example, with the connection in question, had the platform staff received a request from control then it would have been held, but they would be reluctant to hold it off their own back in case they get clobbered for delay minutes.
Dispatch wise, 40-seconds to start the door closure procedure on a Voyager or a HST▸ is probably about right in terms of the train departing (i.e. wheels moving) at the right time, but if a DOO▸ Turbo does that at a remote location then the train can be on the move 30 seconds early - sitting there with the doors shut and locked waiting departure time is just another kick in the teeth for any passengers who wanted that train.
So a bit of common sense needs to be applied - platform staff should not have to risk castigation when they spot a train likely to have connecting passengers on it and decide to hold it for a few seconds without authority (I'm talking seconds rather than minutes). And rather than a blanket 40-second policy, the time it takes to dispatch each and every type of train should be taken into account. Giving permission to lock/close the doors 40 seconds in advance for HST's/Voyagers, 30 seconds for other non-DOO units, 20 seconds for platform staff dispatched DOO services and 15 seconds for driver dispatched DOO services would, in most cases, result in the wheels moving at the prescribed time.
As it is, once again the railway industry upsets its passengers for little reason other than the largely fake financial world of train delay attribution and that leads to circumstances as described by Graham in the original post.
Perhaps there should be a penalty for departing early? If it was set at around 20 times the penalty for departing late, it would be about right IMHO▸ . |
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