A summer day at Nuneaton

When I think of the days that I’ve spent cowering from the rain or nipping into station refreshment rooms to get out of the cold, here I was in the West Midlands without any means of protection from any rain or even so much as a jumper. Now it was more a matter of not getting burnt and using the platform canopies to good advantage.

A day with the trains was the perfect antidote to the disappointment of the England Argentina world cup semi-final the previous evening. They do get worked up about stuff in some parts of the world. Here at the junction station, the phlegmatic English were just going about their business quietly and without fuss as though nothing had happened. Perhaps it’s for the best. It was getting quite confusing trying to work out which England flags were the angry Reform and Restore flags and which were the innocent and positive football supporting variety.

It was announced that my train from Hinckley was delayed. The extent of the disruption to my day was soon made clear. It would arrive one minute after it was due. This is getting close to Swiss or Japanese standards of punctuality, surely, if we are getting obsessive about missing 60 seconds out of our otherwise purposeful lives.

It was busy as usual at Nuneaton, but it’s not the passenger trains that I’m there for. I noted 21 freight locomotives from classes 56, 66 [mostly], 67, 70, 88 and 90 in four and a half hours, so a pretty good rate. I try to hold out for my lunchtime sandwich until 12.00, but Realtime Trains kept me on my toes until after 1.00 as I tried to find the right angles to get some decent photos. The configuration of Nuneaton station does not necessarily make that as easy as it sounds, nor does the roughly north-south station layout and bright sunlight in the southern sky.

I really appreciate my train days. All other concerns are put on hold. It’s just me and the trains, unless anyone asks me anything [which they did, about telephoto lenses] or I need to check a number I wasn’t sure of [which I did, for a double-header Class 90. I know it’s solitary and mindless escapism and I love it. I also know, that I’ve currently nothing particularly that I need to escape from, though, as for everyone, that has not always been, and will not always be, the case. Maybe that’s the point. At the back of my mind, I know that nothing lasts for ever. I’m going to go on savouring my lifelong hobby for as long as I can.

Football matches, prime ministers and presidents [including of FIFA] will come and go, but Everton Football Club, the Houses of Parliament and Nuneaton station will still be there. So too, will be the forces that created them in the interests of the [usually] beautiful game, tolerant and liberal democracy, an international law-based order that can’t unravel the colonialism of previous centuries at a stroke but can only respond sensibly to the current state of affairs, and decent and efficient public services for all. My belief in people and the future at least partially restored, I caught the 15.24 back to Hinckley, which was four minutes late leaving Nuneaton but I didn’t mind a bit.  

   

The Welsh Marches Main Line

When I first travelled this line in 1963 it was a major route between the north of England and the south west. Much of this traffic was later rerouted via Birmingham, which became the hub for cross-country trains, a position it still holds today. On 27/7/63, the first day of our family summer holiday to the Blackdown Hills south of Taunton, our train from Liverpool Lime Street via Crewe was hauled south from Shrewsbury by Castle Class No. 4087 Cardigan Castle as far as Bristol and on from there by Hymek No. D7017. The return journey was also behind a Hymek, first of the class No. D7000, before Warship Class No. D845 Sprightly took over from Temple Meads. The prevalence of the diesels at the head of these expresses was certainly a sign of things to come. Former GWR main lines in the south west were amongst the first to embrace this change by going for diesel hydraulic transmission in a big way from the start.

Locomotive types may have changed but the scenery of Shropshire and Herefordshire is still much the same. It is a very attractive part of the country, yet somewhat overlooked as a tourist destination. The valleys that thread their way west and up into the Welsh hills take you off the beaten track, and it seems almost into a less hurried time zone, whereas the busy major north – south routeway and the local town service centres between Shrewsbury, Hereford and Newport are still dominated by the railway and the A49 trunk road. They run side by side for much of the time.

We spent time a little time at Craven Arms station, junction for the Heart of Wales line to Llanelli, and at Church Stretton. Both have lost all their original station buildings to the ubiquitous modern shelters. Nevertheless, this route is still busy with passenger traffic, run today by Transport for Wales, in spite of the fact that much of the track is in England. Not only that but it is actually one of the few stretches of main line railway where locomotive hauled passenger trains still operate regularly on the national system. A handful of Class 67s push and pull 5-coach trains linking Cardiff with Holyhead and Manchester. Three such services came past Stokesay Castle during the time it took us to walk round the medieval site and all 3 locomotives were in different liveries.

The sun shone on the Shropshire hills and the Welsh Marches main line gave every impression of being in good health, too, with plenty of recent additions to the rolling stock, mostly in the form of clean, bright Class 195 units, most of which were being well used. I’m sure that I must have made a mental note of this scenic route in the summer of 1963, so much so that I have been drawn back since on many occasions. We may have swapped Cardigan Castle for Stokesay, but I still have the memories, and we still have these unchanging and beautiful rural landscapes to enjoy. The Shropshire hills are a delight, especially when viewed from the top of the Long Mynd on a lovely summer’s day.

The Bishop’s Castle Railway

There’s not much left to see of the Bishop’s Castle Railway, a branch line that ran from the main line at Craven Arms to Lydham Heath, where trains reversed before making the last leg of the journey to Bishop’s Castle. A barred gate prevents access to the old station site at Lydham. The railway ran three passenger trains a day each way on a one engine in steam basis. It was an independent company, but it could not persuade the GWR to take it on when it was struggling financially and so it closed down completely in 1935. Its existence is commemorated in various plaques erected by the Bishop’s Castle Railway Society. There is also a small railway museum dedicated to the railway, though its opens very infrequently and was unsurprisingly closed when we called by, in spite of it being a carnival day in the town, when there was likely to be more people about than usual to reach out to.

  

Nottingham Revisited

Three times in as many weeks, we headed off towards Nottingham station from Lowdham, en route to Derby, Carlton Male Voice Choir at Dadfest on Father’s Day at Binks Yard and day four of the Trent Bridge test match against New Zealand. Nottingham station has been revitalised in recent times. It’s a grand old building to begin with, of course, in smart red sandstone on the outside and solid Victorian red brick downstairs at track level. The concourse is now in two sections, having taken in the substantial former porte cochere [and then taxi ranks] into a modern, airy space - naturally well-lit from above and with a range of retail and fast-food outlets.

The surrounds have changed, too, with the pedestrianisation of the adjacent Station Street and the planting of trees around the station entrance. Binks Yard is another modern development, this time on a derelict brownfield site, with a new restaurant and entertainment venue standing directly opposite Nottingham’s distinctive first railway station at London Road Low Level, which was opened in 1857. Connecting up the central city area in Nottingham with the station and the riverside area has been an admirable part of the plan for the future, helped enormously by the removal of the Broadmarsh obstruction.

I’m heartened by many of the ways that our traditional provincial cities are reclaiming their central spaces in ways that encourage people to return there, both to live and to enjoy what are becoming increasingly attractive environments. The marrying of what was good about the old that has fortunately been saved with inventive recent additions makes rediscovering these areas an altogether pleasant experience. Being old enough to remember the cost to the inner urban areas of rapid deindustrialisation in terms of displacement, deprivation, dereliction and despair, its encouraging to be around to witness this rejuvenation taking place.   

Still making it in Derby

 

On the day that Rolls Royce announced new contracts to produce the UK’s first small reactors for nuclear power stations, we went to Derby again, 55 minutes by train direct from Lowdham. Since we were last there, the old silk mill next to the River Derwent has been transformed into the excellent Museum of Making. Most of one upper floor is given over to the Midland Railway. It’s full of railway related artefacts, many of which still need sorting and explaining. Most of the ground floor is given over to a rather nice café.

The main reason for our visit was the exhibition “Wright of Derby: From the Shadows”, recently returned to Joseph Wright’s home city from the National Gallery. He was an extraordinary artist and I would strongly recommend anyone who can get there before the display ends in November to make the trip to Derby Museum and Art Gallery.

The Grade II listed triangle of buildings fronting onto Railway Terrace, which is the approach road to the station from the north, is now a conservation area that reminds us just how important the railway has always been for Derby. It includes an array of brick-built, slate roofed terraced streets provided for rail workers in the nineteenth century and the old Railway Institute. As the headquarters of the Midland Railway and as a location for manufacturing and maintaining locomotives and rolling stock, the city has a rich railway heritage and a long-established reputation for making things of quality and for the necessary skilled craftsmanship.

The façade of the modern station barely does justice to its strategic past, though it has been tidied up a bit with a paved pedestrian area and a bus interchange. Derby remains a busy and important junction for passenger traffic, where East Midlands Trains services between Sheffield and London St Pancras intersect with Cross Country trains from the north east to the south west of England, as well as the hourly east-west EMR link between Lincoln and Crewe.

         

Leicester for a Ninety-Nine

Time was, searching out a ninety-nine involved a trip to the nearest shop for an ice cream. Now it’s a bit of a journey to Leicester, instead. Stadler’s Class 99s are based there for tests as they arrive from Spain in batches. No. 99004 was parked outside the open doors of the depot and No. 99005 was just behind it, having a peek outside but not ready to fully show itself on this occasion. There was quite a mix on view from the platform end and briefly from the train on arrival in the city. The former HST and now Derby’s Network Rail flying banana test train was there, as was Stanier Black Five No. 44871, hiding round the corner and in steam, presumably between main line specials duties. She was the second Fifteen Guineas Special survivor from August 1968 that I’d seen in the last few days. Class 73 electro-diesel No. 73962 Dick Mabbutt was also receiving attention in the yard, along with a Europhoenix Class 37. I had a very relaxing few hours on Leicester station, entertained by Class 66s on all the freight workings before my first ride on an East Midland Railway’s new Hitachi Aurora. No ice cream this time, but a Costa coffee did fine.

The Cotswold Festival of Steam

The Gloucestershire Warwickshire Steam Railway’s May bank holiday extravaganza was well attended on Sunday. Though they would have hoped for good weather to encourage attendance, record-breaking May temperatures over the whole weekend came with its own problems. With some notable guest locos as attractions for enthusiasts, an ambitiously busy timetable and the natural constraints of a single-track railway with passing loops to fit it all in, they were working to capacity and keeping their fingers crossed for a smooth ride.

The timetable was already 40 minutes down when we arrived at Cheltenham Racecourse station to start our day on the trains and timings slipped further as the day proceeded. As most people have committed to a leisurely day out with no particular place to go other than up and down the line and stopping off at the intermediate stations, delays are generally no big problem on occasions such as this. After all, this is resurrected Victorian technology being put to the test, big time. It provides a serious work out for the permanent way and the men and machines.

The reasons offered for the increasing delays to services depended on who you asked. I think I counted about five that had all come from different sources at various times of the day. The result was that folk really didn’t know what was happening or what was going to happen next to allow them to get moving again. Lengthy signal or station stops are normally no bother on gala days. Admiring the beautiful scenery along the Cotswold scarp from the train as it trundles along, accompanied by whisps of smoke and the odd whistle from the engine is the nostalgic idyll we have all come along to enjoy.

Baking slowly on a stationery train without air conditioning on a frazzling day under cloudless skies with no wind is another matter, altogether. The old Mark 1 stock has heating but no cooling. With movement and open windows, the draught so created is a welcome part of the experience. Like riding a bike, you create your own breeze. Without movement this soon becomes very uncomfortable indeed, especially on a very full train where you are already standing in the corridor and trying to get close to a window on the side of the train that’s in relative shade.

The heritage railways all depend on armies of willing volunteers. They are put under enormous pressure when plans start to unravel. I thought they were exemplary on Sunday as they fielded, best they could, all the requests and complaints that were obviously coming their way in fast order. They were blameless and so was the infrastructure. As mentioned, it too starts to creak when facing unusual circumstances. It’s an old and imperfect technology.

I only have one gripe – communication, or more pertinently, a lack of it. I heard it time and time again on Sunday from fellow [would-be] travellers. “Why don’t they tell us what’s happening?” It wasn’t that things were going wrong that upset them but that the train and station announcements were not keeping up with what was required. They needed information that wasn’t forthcoming. A couple of times I heard visitors complaining that although there had been a Tannoy announcement, it hadn’t carried to where they were standing on the platform. That one is surely rectifiable without too much outlay.

Decisions obviously have to be made according to established safe railway procedures but letting people know as soon as possible how that is going to affect them is very important and more so during a heatwave.

I read recently that return visits are critical for the heritage lines as they provide a substantial chunk of their income. Return visits depend on a memorable first experience. That puts public relations right at the top of the list of priorities.