Driving along at 0815 this morning, I was listening to Magic Radio (having tried a few others readily available on my car radio) when there was a commercial announcing the new rail timetable on December 15 ...

Four weeks too late, I thought, but I don't suppose there's any harm in reminding the occasional rail traveller who might not have realised.

Marlburian

Most Saturday mornings I work at Hosehill Lake, which is next to Main Pit, so have been following the debate for several years. The road between the swingbridge and the Fox & Hounds pub flooded badly several years ago and for a couple of Saturdays I had to leave the car and splash through the floodwater, hoping that no 4 x 4 driver would think it fun to drive past and douse me.

The developers came up with some flood-alleviation ideas that included enlarging the sluices in and out of "our" lake.

Marlburian

There are plans to build 15,000 new homes at Grazeley, south of the M4, to be served by a new station.

Details

So that's 35,000+ people, 30,000 more cars, many driving into Basingstoke and Reading, the new station notwithstanding.

And that's without housing developments nearby.There's an application for around 100 houses on green fields on the north-west corner of Theale, with another application, likely to succeed, relating to brown-field land opposite. South of Theale Station there's a controversial plan to build around a lake, close to a canal swingbridge where traffic is controlled by lights; one boat using the bridge takes eight minutes...

Depressing ...

Marlburian

On a personal note, so am I, and I do voluntary work on several of its sites in West Berkshire. Another site (not a BBOWT one) is Furze Hill, Hermitage, which includes a short stretch of the old Didcot, Newbury and Southampton line. Furze Hill is the site of a former brickworks close to where Pinewood Halt was and which was served by a siding, with a narrow-gauge railway inside the works.

At Furze Hill now are a housing development, large new village hall and playing fields, with some land being returned to nature. Every now and then we go along the former trackbed almost to the M4 cutting back growth. A couple of us, supported by contractors, have just extended the path along the bed the other side of the motorway bridge to Hampstead Norreys.

Nothing much of the old railway is to be seen, apart from a few fence posts, though there a couple of bridges to the south - and I think that the former Ministry of Supply cold store, once served by two sidings, still stands.

Marlburian

I'm nudging 75 and it was back in 2012 when a male member of the Romanian Olympic rowing team insisted that I had his seat on a bus near Staines. Since then, several attractive young ladies have offered me their, err, seats on the Tube and I've always declined. One said "Let me know if you change your mind"; as I left the carriage, I good-naturedly said to her that four days ago I'd walked for eight hours with no rest and only yesterday had I been cutting down 30-foot trees for environmental reasons.

But I'm conscious that I'm getting a bit clumsy on my feet and if I get off an evening rush-hour train at Tilehurst I usually wait for the hordes (some intent on their screens) to get up the stairs before me. Nowadays I don't feel too bad about taking one of the "priority" seats near the doors but usually offer it to someone appearing to have a greater need. (I confess to making a point by offering it in a louder voice than necessary.)

Marlburian

Marlburian

Call for a public inquiry into the delay
 
Often I despair at the standard of comments on local news websites, but at the end of the article are some suggestions that I like, including "[Inquiry] Meetings should be held on hard seats and without toilets. You know... Practice what you preach."

But another person is woefully uninformed: "Budget restraints mean it will only go as far as Maidenhead. Ground surveys between Maidenhead and Reading revealed difficult conditions requiring the further funding, which I am told will be refused".

Marlburian

Today's Sunday Times has an article quoting Lord Berkeley as claiming that the report has exaggerated HS2^▸ (The next High Speed line(s))'s benefits by assuming 18 trains an hour will run, "a feat not managed by any high-speed service in the world".

Apparently the report has revised down the financial benefits, once claimed to be £2.30 for every pound spent, to between £1.30 and £1.50.

I was a bit surprised that the review chairman, Douglas Oakervee, was once chairman of HS2. Perhaps a less-impartial chair would have been preferable, though I suppose it could be said that Berkeley provided a counterbalance.

I recall David Cameron, when launching HS2, being asked about the risk of the scheme going over-budget and his poo-pooing the notion - which prompted me to laugh derisively.

Marlburian

A couple of days ago, someone on www.reading-forum.co.uk posted about such a leaflet and later made another post: "Here's the Flyer", which I took to be his attempt to provide a hyperlink. Only it isn't one. I'm not registered with the Forum, so I can't nudge him. I spent a few minutes looking for one on the GWR website and by Googling, and only got something relating to 2014.

I suspect that I could note down the trains from a timetable for myself (just five GWR services plus any TFL^▸ (Transport for London) train). And I may have time to kill at Reading Station tomorrow and, if so, I shall ask for the leaflet.

Marlburian

I wasn't on a Hitachi but an Electrostar.

As I'd learned to my dismay the other day, as well as spending 12-15 minutes at Reading before continuing to Twyford and beyond, the Didcot-Paddington-Didcot stoppers also linger at Reading on the way back.

I suppose that this means they are more likely to leave on time which, to be perverse, is a mixed blessing. On quite a few occasions, friends have just caught the Reading-Tilehurst trains during the day because they're a couple of minutes late leaving, to allow freight trains to plod on ahead.

Talking of software, this morning at 0910 some of us were confused by the station info at Tilehurst announcing "No Service" from all four platforms.

Marlburian

After what seems a very long time since work started (at least 18 months, if not two years) the extension to Platform 3 at Tilehurst has been completed and is accessible to passengers. But on my train this afternoon there was still the customary warning to passengers in coach 8 to more forward if they wanted to get off.

I'm guessing that platform extensions at other local stations are not yet complete and to avoid confusion the warnings will continue until they are.

Marlburian

This afternoon I had a few minutes to spare at Reading Station and noticed that the windows facing westover platforms 7 and 8 remain unfrosted, as do those by the Starbucks seating area, where the immediate view is obscured by a canopy.

And I don't think that the windows facing east have been frosted. (I didn't think to notice.)

Marlburian

Elizabeth Line to Reading: Do you need a different ticket for TfL^» (Transport for London - about) or GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) trains to London?

I'd assumed not, but some media coverage has caused me to wonder.

Not so helpful: "Children under the age of 11 can travel for free on the TfL network between Reading and London Paddington with a fare-paying adult, making day trips to the capital even more affordable. Under TfL rules, all children under the age of five can travel for free with a fare-paying adult."

Not that I have any children, but the contradiction puzzles me.

Marlburian

A short article in the Daily Telegraph of December 6 mentioned that the replicas of original helmets proved too small for the actors' heads in Steven Spielberg's new film of the Great War, "1917". Larger copies had to be made.

(Other observations of "1917" - and of the recent "Dunkirk" film -  is that the actors' teeth were in far better shape than they would have been at the time of the events.)

Marlburian

I suspect that this explanation/justification has been posted before, and more than once, but Written Answer received by the London Assembly on 21 December 2011:

"Crossrail will be a high-frequency metro-style service for London and the south east. It is estimated that the average time a passenger will travel on Crossrail will be 20 minutes. It is not intended that toilets will be provided on board Crossrail trains.Thirty out of the thirty-seven Crossrail stations will have toilets (81 per cent).  This is an improvement on what was previously envisaged and has been accommodated through further design work. Furthermore, twenty three Crossrail stations will have at least one fully accessible toilet (62 per cent).  With only ten of the existing stations on the Crossrail route currently having at least one fully accessible toilet, this represents a significant improvement."

Which prompts some speculation as to why children were urinating on the platform at Hayes at 1030? Couldn't wait? Queues at the station loos (I can't recall where they are at Hayes)? Afraid the train would go off without them?

Let me stress I'm not criticising them; I would probably have had to do the same - I'm at the age where I have to plan these things.

Marlburian