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 02/06/24 - Summer Timetable starts
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27/09/25 - 200 years of passenger trains

On this day
28th Mar (1988)
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Train RunningCancelled
17:48 Reading to Gatwick Airport
17:54 Cardiff Central to London Paddington
17:57 London Paddington to Worcester Foregate Street
18:03 London Paddington to Penzance
18:08 London Paddington to Frome
Additional 18:25 Shalford to Reading
18:36 London Paddington to Plymouth
18:37 Westbury to Swindon
18:51 Filton Abbey Wood to Bristol Temple Meads
18:55 Bedwyn to Newbury
19:23 Reading to Gatwick Airport
19:24 Newbury to Bedwyn
19:33 London Paddington to Worcester Shrub Hill
19:55 Bedwyn to Newbury
20:13 Swindon to Westbury
20:16 Frome to Westbury
20:49 Newbury to Bedwyn
20:56 Worcester Foregate Street to London Paddington
21:16 Bedwyn to Newbury
21:53 Newbury to Bedwyn
22:25 Bedwyn to Newbury
22:47 Newbury to Bedwyn
Short Run
15:03 London Paddington to Penzance
16:19 Carmarthen to London Paddington
16:23 Portsmouth Harbour to Cardiff Central
16:35 London Paddington to Plymouth
16:50 Plymouth to London Paddington
17:03 London Paddington to Penzance
17:30 London Paddington to Taunton
17:36 London Paddington to Plymouth
17:50 Gloucester to Salisbury
17:59 Gatwick Airport to Reading
18:18 Newbury to London Paddington
18:19 Reading to Gatwick Airport
18:29 Gatwick Airport to Reading
18:54 Reading to Gatwick Airport
18:59 Gatwick Airport to Reading
19:04 Paignton to London Paddington
19:06 London Paddington to Bedwyn
19:29 Gatwick Airport to Reading
20:03 London Paddington to Plymouth
20:42 Bedwyn to London Paddington
Delayed
13:59 Cardiff Central to Penzance
14:15 Penzance to London Paddington
16:03 London Paddington to Penzance
16:15 Penzance to London Paddington
Additional 17:17 Exeter St Davids to Penzance
Additional 17:26 Castle Cary to Penzance
17:29 Gatwick Airport to Reading
An additional train service has been planned to operate as shown 18:25 Shalford to Reading
19:04 London Paddington to Plymouth
19:59 Gatwick Airport to Reading
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46  Journey by Journey / South Western services / Re: Island Line services, Isle of Wight. General discussion on: August 02, 2023, 16:43:56
The Esplanade Hotel webcam periodically focuses on the bus stands, so it’s possible to see how the new road layout works, you can also scroll back up to 12 hours earlier:

https://www.youtube.com/live/R1P9v9bEtuk?feature=share
47  Sideshoots - associated subjects / The Lighter Side / Re: Where's this train on: August 02, 2023, 12:10:48
1. Is it Barnham P3? The down loop or Bognor Regis platform.

Paul
48  Sideshoots - associated subjects / The Lighter Side / Re: Freedom of Severn and Solent - away from the station - 2 on: July 31, 2023, 10:46:46
11. On the Salisbury bound platform at Mottisfont and Dunbridge Station?   

But is it recent, or does it date from before the station was renamed?

Paul
49  Sideshoots - associated subjects / Railway History and related topics / Re: What's the link? on: July 27, 2023, 22:42:49
Pneumatic railways! (Though I'm not sure if Foyles' one was a true railway or just a cyclinder-in-tube one.)

Yep, Pneumatic transport.  I remember the Foyles system that took your cash and invoice to the central payment department and bright the receiptd invoice back.
Well, if you’d mentioned my local Co-op in 1960s Newcastle I’d have got it straightaway…  Grin
50  All across the Great Western territory / Buses and other ways to travel / Re: Bus fare evasion arrest, Croydon on: July 27, 2023, 18:02:52
Also on the DLR (Docklands Light Railway) to Lewisham on Monday I had my ticket checked - the guy was lovely about it but firmly believed that a national rail ticket with cross-London transfer included wasn't valid on DLR. This is partly down to the Elizabeth line, which has enabled a lot of new interchange options so staff are unfamiliar. We didn't want to start talking knives on the DLR but were able to point out that the ticket( had the † that indicated it was valid.

My understanding of that cross was that you could use the London Underground (is the DLR underground?) or London Buses between two national rail stations. Is The Elizabeth Line part of London Underground or has it been added to the allowed routes?
Although Lewisham (DLR) is in the National Rail list of cross London transfer stations, it’s not in the LU version of the list in their ticketing handbook - presumably because the latter is intended for underground staff.  It’s possible that’s confused the revenue inspector, depending who he works for?

On the other hand, the National Rail guidance doesn’t mention buses being generally available, although it does mention the use of night buses when the underground is closed.

Paul
51  All across the Great Western territory / Buses and other ways to travel / Re: Bus fare evasion arrest, Croydon on: July 26, 2023, 00:46:27
I believe on TfL» (Transport for London - about) buses the revenue inspector can download a list of contactless cards that have been touched in, and when he scans a card he will be warned if it is not touched in.  They can only do this on buses, and no other mode, because only the bus carries its touch in data around with it.   

If you are on anything except a bus, then all they can do with contactless is to attempt to touch you in, this will only fail if the card is hotlisted due to previous issues. Otherwise the touch is resolved later as already mentioned.

Paul
52  All across the Great Western territory / The Wider Picture in the United Kingdom / Re: Emergency stop - 08:20 Newcastle to London (Lumo) 17.4.2022 on: July 11, 2023, 11:09:59
NR» (Network Rail - home page) have temporarily modified the signal sequence since though, (report paragraph 198), now if the route is set through one of the various junctions the driver will only see a yellow, so shouldn’t accelerate to full speed.

As it was before when the approach control to a red was used the signal then went straight to green.  (As mentioned by Bradshaw in his post #21 yesterday.)  So it looks like a relatively straightforward change was possible.

Paul
53  Journey by Journey / London to the West / Re: Dawlish - permanent resilience work - ongoing discussions on: July 09, 2023, 11:10:01
Looking at the beachcam this morning, the down side lift tower was topped off overnight last night, and it looks as if the protective wall sections by the steps are now complete. 

That suggests they will soon be in a position to fully open the promenade walkway, for a few weeks now it’s had a temporarily narrowed section on the seaward side of the lift tower, and I think one of the videos showed that on “opening day” there was still an under track concrete pipe present, hence a gap in the platform wall.

But definitely on the last stretch of the overall project now.

Paul

54  All across the Great Western territory / The Wider Picture in the United Kingdom / Re: Southern - west coastway proposed changes on: July 01, 2023, 12:48:43
On the last point I believe there’s only platform 3 that allows a train to do the crossing from east to west, and it’s a mid platform set of points so very short, only 4 car.  The full platform 3 takes 12 cars as usual with the main part of Brighton station.

But even then I believe reliably timetabling a crossing move across the entire throat at Brighton is usually considered next to impossible, it must be quite a while since it was routinely done.

I think the 2017 SWR» (South Western Railway - about) proposals included a Portsmouth to Bournemouth through service, that was to be a semi fast on the Netley line but a stopper west of Southampton, but I don’t ever recall any serious proposals to have through trains to Lymington.  I think the probable reason is that there’s only a finite capacity on the Redbridge to Brockenhurst section, with the mix of fast and stopping trains, and the timings on the branch are suited to a shuttle. If a through train an up service would have to cross to the up side west of Brockenhurst, and coincide with a suitable path towards Southampton. 

Extending any SN service west of Southampton would always require an extra unit, or possibly units depending how far it went, but the times would have to fit in with SWR and XC (Cross Country Trains (franchise)).  SN used to run Victoria to Bournemouth until about 2003, (from memory), and the service was apparently binned because it carried very few through passengers and got in the way of more useful services.

I also suspect if you theoretically could extend a Brighton service through to Lymington Pier it would not be able to have an adequate layover at that end of the route, so the only option for reliability would probably be to do that at Brockenhurst.

Paul
55  All across the Great Western territory / The Wider Picture in the United Kingdom / Southern - west coastway proposed changes on: June 30, 2023, 20:01:39
Southern have launched a consultation about rationalising the service patterns between Brighton and Portsmouth/Southampton.

I know a number of people have always been interested in the Southampton to Brighton route, and a number of calls for improvements have been made, often proposing more through services across Southampton.

What they’re proposing now though, is that both the Southampton services will run to Brighton, and be half an hour apart.  The flip side is that both Southern services from Portsmouth will therefore have run to Victoria.  Both “country” destinations end up with services 30/30 mins apart, rather than 45/15.

Southern explanatory pdf here:
https://www.southernrailway.com/-/media/goahead/gtr-all-shared-pdfs-and-documents/timetable-consultation-2023/west-coastway-timetables-changes-engagement.pdf

I think, (although they skim over the point), spreading the services on the Netley line about the hour might have a slight impact on GWR (Great Western Railway) and SWR» (South Western Railway - about) timings.

Hope this is of interest.

Paul
56  Sideshoots - associated subjects / The Lighter Side / Re: Trainspotters furious after Flying Scotsman Nuneaton visit - 'it's a shocker! on: June 14, 2023, 16:14:35
I am also reminded of this.
https://youtu.be/kBBK2hjcPuA

In years to come that will probably be considered a very good historic record of a 9 car 159 formation…  Grin
57  Sideshoots - associated subjects / The Lighter Side / Re: X marks the spot - and other places on: June 12, 2023, 10:34:50
3 is the Weymouth little land train

Yes ... on the tramway to the Quayside
On a normal road nowadays…
58  Journey by Journey / London to Didcot, Oxford and Banbury / Re: Black Bridge, Nuneham: southern abutment failure on: June 09, 2023, 17:44:59
*From Saturday 29 July until the early hours of Monday 7 August Network Rail will be working to upgrade the track just north of Oxford Station - installing new high speed crossovers. To the south of the station,  Osney Lane footbridge will be modified, moving one of the piers to make way for track layout changes. Work will also be carried out to adjust the coping stones on platforms inside the station.

Which of the piers are to be moved and where to?  None of them seem to be intruding far into operational railway land at the moment.
The new down through line (platform 5) alignment starts a short distance south of the footbridge, so the present three tracks under it become four. My money is on the western pier being moved a bit further west.  I’ve subsequently found that’s definitely the case, it’s specifically mentioned in the TWA order inspectors report. 

Not much detail that I can find yet, but the track change extent is shown at the bottom of this drawing:

https://sacuksprodnrdigital0001.blob.core.windows.net/twao-oxford-corridor-phase-2/Environmental%20Statement/Volume%203%20-%20Book%20of%20figures/Ch%2002%20-%20Figure%202.1%20-%20Scheme%20Layout%20and%20Location.pdf

But is this the best place to discuss it, or should the question be moved to the main Oxford station thread?

Paul

59  Journey by Journey / London to Reading / Re: Maidenhead timetable changes on: June 07, 2023, 21:10:40
Local MPs (Member of Parliament) on the route pushed like mad for quite a few years for Crossrail to be extended to Reading. 

A great example of being careful what you wish for.
60  Journey by Journey / Bristol (WECA) Commuters / Re: New station at Ashley Down, Bristol on: June 06, 2023, 21:43:15
I won't bore you by republishing all the photos on the Network Rail Western twitter feed, but this one piqued my interest: Is this the packing material the platform sections came in, or the platform itself  Huh

I heard that some new stations were being build using expanded polystyrene, but it's still a bit of a surprise to see it!

There’s a number of case studies on their website, this link should go to the one about the Maidenhead platform lengthening.  Please see the 29 photo gallery, shows all the components.

I think once built they’re almost undetectable, as the walking surface is solid concrete and the visible front face under the coping is also a concrete “skin”.
https://www.megatechprojects.co.uk/projects/maidenhead/

Paul
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