Great Western Coffee Shop

Archie is enjoying a rest after a game of chase-the-greyhound - no prizes for guessing who won! But if he'd sat here in 1960 he'd have been in danger of being flattened by a train. Where was he?

(https://zemblanity.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/archie.png)

1960 means my first guess about the Camerton Branch is a no no but I'm now wondering if it's somewhere twixt Castle Cary and Bruton on one of the abandoned stretches there?

Hmm.  ::)

I'm trying to narrow it down a bit: was Archie perhaps somewhere in Devon?  :-\

First clue: It's in the South-West, but it's not rural.

A wild guess - the Somerset Coalfield ... not too far from Midsomer Norton?

Still too rural!

Kelston nr Bath?.

No one has suggested Taunton yet?  :o

Right railway company...

This suggests the Mangotsfield and Bath branch but I can't place the exact location. Or is it more generally on the old Midland railway?

Ooh, your getting close... it's pure Midland, not far from Mangotsfield, but not the Bath branch.

Rodway Hill perhaps?

Archie is pretty well in the cess (and we won't go there - he has some filthy habits...) near where two tracks crossed four.

Still waiting for BNM to come in with the coup de grace (which, to be clear, is not French for lawnmower).

I think I have it...and I'm kicking myself because if I'm correct, I've walked along there plenty of times.

I'll let others try though. I'll find out if I'm right later.

BNM will have a guess at somewhere between Kingswood Junction and Ashley Hill Junction, perhaps Narroways Hill, where the Midland joined the Clifton Extension Railway (Severn Beach Line).

But BNM isn't 100% sure.

Narroways Hill it is, looking south pretty much at the centre of this aerial view (https://goo.gl/maps/KJS7DJcaus62).

It is now a nature reserve (https://narroways.wordpress.com/map/) as well as being a good spot to walk dogs and watch trains.

That map link appears to be centred on Rodway Hill rather than Narroways Hill.

Attached is a 1911 Railway Clearing House map of the railway lines around Bristol. The Midland branch to the Clifton Extension Railway is top right. 

For once, there was a site I actually recognized! Distinctive shape, if you've been there.

Now that's intriguing - when I follow it I see the word 'Narroways' right in the middle, round about where the photo was taken in fact. The Google search box however contains 'Rodway Hill, Emersons Green, Bris...' - which was the last thing I looked at.

Our regular readers on the Coffee Shop forum will know by now that I tend not to suggest Taunton - even when it is probably the right answer, in other examples.  :-[ ::)