I have to say, these timings do nothing to help me get out of the car and onto the train.  Add onto this journey the time taken to walk to and from the station and I have a very much shorter day with my family than driving there and back.   Sorry!

Ok, Gordon the Blue Locomotive! 

As a senior traveller I can go virtually anywhere I want to for free on a bus,  the train only offers me a small discount, having had to purchase a senior railcard.

Thanks for these definitions.  Maybe the word engine is appropriate in a more historic context.   For example, I don't remember steam trains being driven by 'locomotive drivers', rather, 'engine drivers', but then that's me still living in the past.  You all knew what I meant by 'engine', anyway!

Am I wrong, or am I reading about more of these incidents lately? Terrible waste of a young life, and such a shock for this young man's family; my heart goes out to them.

Thanks for that, BNM. 

Thanks very much for that Chris.  My usual habit is to visit my daughter on a Monday, this week I'll be using the car but hopefully will start getting into the train habit thereafter.  I will be looking for a train about 9.15am onwards, return time depending on whether I've put the dog into kennels for the day; if so, I have to be back in Melksham by 5pm or she turns into a pumpkin.

Then that would be a furp rather than a parp?!

Oh dear, ashamed to say, reading this thread, I haven't been on a train at all in the last two months.     Hopefully that will soon change, when my daughter moves to Backwell, within walking distance of the station.  I just have to work out how to get there from Melksham.  Any clues, anyone?

Ok, thanks folks.  By the way, what is the difference between an engine and a locomotive?  They both provide propulsion don't they?  Sorry, a bit of a girlie question, that.

Much to my surprise, Mr. P. didn't get down on his knees to pay homage to Mrs T whilst in Grantham.  Probably didn't want to spoil his snazzy slacks.

Whilst watching Michael Portillo's 'Great British Railway Journeys' the other day (complete with shades to negate the effect of his gaudy jackets!) I noticed that while he was standing on a platform doing a bit of his narrating, a humungously long train pulled in behind him.  Didn't count the carriages but was fascinated to see an engine half way along the train, as well as the one at the front!  Must have a look again, on iplayer.  Can't remember the line he was travelling at the time, though he was on his way to Lindisfarne.

Forgive the ignorance of someone who knows diddly squat about the inner workings of a train, but is it not possible to have them running as duel fuel engines? 

Oh sorry, nothing to do with Melksham Help Point, I just have to keep smiling at BNMs avatars depiction of IKB^▸ (Isambard Kingdom Brunel) in party mode! Tee hee hee.....

Electric train and Superguard, I share your distaste of the Mail and Express wholeheartedly, and the only reason they don't blether on about bankers' (and others') bonuses is that they're frightened of biting off the hands that feed them.  For the same reason they keep very quiet about tax avoidance by these same mega-earning bankers and industrialists.  It's much easier to make scapegoats of benefit fraudsters and immigrants, whose claim on the exchequer is miniscule compared to these same cheating oh-haven't-we-got-jolly-good-accountants super rich.  It's much better sport for the tabloid editors to slag off our railway system.