The Italian Job

Is the size of the suitcases that turn up at St Pancras at the crack of dawn a suggestion that some of their owners have done a Great Rail Journey before? There is certainly a lot of lugging and lifting to be done, but, of course, it’s well worth the effort.

I first enjoyed Paris as a teenager in 1966. It smelt so different from anything I’d experienced before - garlic, Gauloises and drains. Then there were all those little green buses and the urinals where you were protected from public gaze by a cast iron curtain, whilst your feet and head were still on full view from outside. The area around Gare du Nord station today is depressing and it still stinks of wee and is prone to pick-pocketing. Shanty towns of camping tents provide shelter for immigrants under a former overhead railway route, their only obvious “luxury” being someone else’s discarded mattress. There seemed to be even more people here than at the same time last year, both times viewed from the coach as it crawled between traffic lights whilst transferring us to Gare de Lyon. One wonders what life must have been like previously to want to swap it for this sort of existence. The expectation of a better future must have been so much greater than this grim reality.

We didn’t exactly tear around the streets of Turin at breakneck speed, either, though the Metro certainly whisked us into the city very efficiently from our hotel, which was based in the former Fiat car factory. It still has the test track on the roof, though sadly both it and the roof garden were out of bounds on the day we were there. Turin was interesting, especially the area around the Roman gateway. It’s easy to forget how good the Romans were with bricks.

Then on to Liguria and our base in Chiavari at the excellent Monterosa hotel. As with all of the towns along the Italian Riviera, the buildings have a sense of permanence, as if they’ve been there for ever. They are all arranged in their grid iron pattern and decorated in various pastel shades, separated from each other by hefty stone paving blocks in the narrow passage ways, that must also create maximum shade from the summer sun.

The long-established market towns and service centres discovered tourism to add to traditional farming, fishing and boat building. The resulting string of settlements is linked together with a regular and reliable rail network run by Trenitalia, which we sampled a number of times as we explored the congested coastal strip that takes you through the series of short tunnels that cut through the frequent promontories that separate the limited flatter sections where streams and larger, managed flood channels enter the sea. The beaches were grey and stoney, but there was so much else of interest that unless a bucket and spade were the first things you packed, you would be well catered for, starting with local food delicacies, with pasta in all its forms, along with seafood, pesto and the olive oil based local breads like focaccia.

We began to wonder what they’ve done with all their birds. As keen twitchers back home, we were hoping for a bit more variety than we were used to but some late departing swallows were all we saw of the autumn migration, though we did pick up firecrest and short-toed tree creeper on the Merlin bird app. Perhaps they shoot birds more energetically over here. The lack of birds was made up for, instead, by plenty of innocuous but persistent and bothersome flies. The few mosquitos around were so glad to see us they could hardly wait to get up close and personal, while the noisy cicadas on the trees along the walkway to the station kept a more respectful distance.  

I’m always up for a boat trip, but the trip to Portofino to pay homage to the playground of the rich, with oodles of accompanying name dropping, was a less pleasant experience than wandering along the waterfront and harbourside at the much more relaxed resort of Comogli. Chiavari’s own seaside was a bit of a disappointment in part, as a concrete wall cut off the sea view close to the centre. You had to walk the promenade a good way along to the west, to find rock armour breakwaters that were having only limited success in trapping more grey beach material. However, the Saturday night revellers amongst the bars and restaurants here were having a great time at the waterfront.

The Cinque Terra villages clinging to the hillsides were very pretty when viewed from the water. The steep wooded slopes behind the settlements had been cleared, terraced and farmed for centuries, fearing visits from pirates for much of that time but today more worried about drought, flash floods and soil erosion. This area is very picturesque and rightly provides the illustrations for the travel literature that was instrumental in attracting our attention to the area in the first place. It’s a unique and distinctive landscape that I’m glad to have seen first-hand.

By contrast, nearby Genoa is a substantial working port, where tourists can enjoy the noise and fumes from the overhead motorway as they take lunch on the extensive waterfront strip, opposite the cruise ships all lined up at the jetties on the other side of the wide harbour.

The journey home on the French TGV in bright sunshine was a highlight for me. Watching the landscape change from the attractive pan-tiled farms and vineyards of Provence, through the parched and tangled garrigue around Avignon and the more comforting rolling countryside on the way back to Paris was a pleasure in itself. The riding quality of these modern express passenger trains at such high speeds is also admirably smooth.

From the poet who saved St Pancras to the Mediterranean, we were back again to a poem remembered on a wall at King’s Cross, and all within a week. We certainly packed a lot of memorable experiences into a relatively short time. Train travel is the way to go, for me, as it was for both Betjeman and Larkin. So, “as we raced across bright knots of rail”, I look forward to the next time that I can do exactly that. We had a great time, so thanks to the organisers, our enthusiastic guide and to all our travelling companions. 

The Great Central Railway and the Chesterfield Canal

We went to Staveley, where in times past, the GCR main line running north to south between Sheffield Victoria and London Marylebone crossed the east to west Chesterfield Canal. When the railway bridge over the canal was constructed at the end of the nineteenth century, the canal had already been in existence for around 120 years.

The canal runs for 46 miles between West Stockwith on the River Trent and Chesterfield, itself. The Chesterfield Canal Trust is in the midst of major works in this area as it restores the full length of the canal, including the replacement of the former canal bed with whole new sections in some places. The canal had largely been drained and returned to dry land and considerable funds have been raised in recent times to allow for its restoration. There is evidently a lot of concrete being poured in this area alone. The CCT’s website has plenty of information explaining about the canal’s past, present and future.

The track bed of the old GCR main line is now part of the Trans Pennine Trail, a multi-use path that crosses the canal and its towpath on the relatively modern steel footbridge that eventually replaced the conventional brick-built railway bridge, following the closure of the railway in the 1960s. The towpath alongside the course of the canal is now another long-distance footpath, called the Cuckoo Way. Current construction work means that this whole location is fenced off at the moment, though it appears to be well on the way to completion in the vicinity of Staveley.

Just south of this point, the GCR crossed another double track railway line that was part of the Midland Railway system and that line, in turn, also then crossed the canal. The track bed of the former Midland line has now disappeared from the scene. The GCR lines then splayed out to enter Staveley Central station. Old photographs show that this was a sizeable railway presence with sidings on both sides of the line. The landscape in this area has continued to alter according to changing transport requirements throughout the last 250 years, so much so that matching up old maps and photos with the present day became quite a challenge, though I think that I got there in the end!

                     Photo with thanks to the Chesterfield Canal Trust

Coal Mining around Welbeck

The exhibition at the Harley Gallery near Worksop lasts until 3^rd January 2027. Entitled Coal Mining Stories, it includes art work by former miners like Brian Morley, whose booklet is also on display alongside some examples of his drawings. The one showing the underground railway that took miners from the foot of the shaft to the coal face reminded me of my only visit to a working pit, at Bentinck colliery in the 1980s. It seemed to go on for miles and remains the strangest railway journey I’ve ever taken. Two others that come close were the Post Office Railway, which is part of their London museum and which was a tad more claustrophobic, and the ghost train at Wilkie’s outdoor fairground in New Brighton during the 1950s, which probably wasn’t nearly as scary as our coal mine experience during a “fact finding” mission for geography teachers that primarily taught us how lucky we were to be in the classroom for a living, even though we may not have thought so at the time.

    

Wide Angle View in Liverpool

Tate Liverpool is currently closed for renovation and has temporarily moved across the dock to RIBA [the Royal Institute of British Architects] North at Mann Island. The photo exhibition, Wide Angle View, is well worth a visit, nevertheless. It’s based on the nine pamphlets that made up the Manplan series, dating from 1969/70, which investigated the relationship between modern architecture for residential areas and the impact it was having on social spaces for the people who lived there. 

Those of us who have lived through the upheavals in our inner cities that followed the post-war years in the 1960s, remember only too well the impact those changes had on our urban landscapes. I suppose that my overall conclusion would be that much that was of value was removed, that much that replaced it was second-rate from a number of perspectives and that the inhabitants were not always prioritised in the way that they should have been. Awards for modern architects flowed, but in many cases, their flawed schemes simply left problems for those who followed them to address.

The work of a series of urban street photographers from the time shows how bleak and depressing these grey, concrete urban landscapes sometimes became, while many communities were decimated, relocated and continued to struggle. The work that stood out for me was by Ian Berry. Much travelled, he made his reputation in South Africa recording politics and social strife, later moving to London where he photographed city life, including a number of railway-related scenes, like the overcrowded commuter train pictured here. Sadly, Ian Berry died just last Sunday, aged 92. I’m pleased to have caught up with this fraction of his work at such a poignant moment. 

 

A Man Down at Llangollen

We were one short yesterday on the Llangollen and Corwen Railway. They were, quite rightly, busy celebrating their 50^th anniversary as a heritage railway, but, initially, at least, we had another priority. Some of Andy’s ashes were to be disposed of appropriately on the railway. It was his favourite line and he had visited it many times during his lifetime, which subsequently coincided with the fifty years of the re-born L&CR. It seemed like a good fit, therefore, to be celebrating our good friend Andy’s life on the same day.

John arranged a footplate moment for us all, even clearing it beforehand with the managing director, but also with faultless and considerate co-operation from the footplate crew of ex-GWR 2-8-0 No 3802, for which we were very grateful, as we effectively interrupted them in their duties. Andy’s ashes were duly delivered to the firebox on the fireman’s shovel. In retrospect, I can’t think that he would have preferred it any other way. That concluded, we were not just a man down for the rest of the day, but for the rest of our lives, too.

Andy certainly added something to our twice-yearly, lads’ days out on the trains, generously dispensing his extra-large packets of peanuts and plentiful supplies of Tunnock’s caramel wafers. Deliberate and emphatic pronouncements, usually issued in a way that was not exactly expecting a response from anyone else, were interspersed with examples of quirky good humour, sparingly used, but always lurking there and waiting for the right opportunity to further lighten the day.

Andy brought us here to Llangollen after the railway had been closed by BR in the mid-60s and before it reopened fifty years ago this weekend. He drove us all round this part of North Wales in his parents’ Hillman Minx. We found our way up to Brymbo, when the tracks to the steel works were still down and being used, as well as to the old lead mine site at Minera and a pub near World’s End, that I can’t find a trace of today during a brief search.

Andy was right about the L&CR, too, because it is special. The Dee-side setting is as picturesque a route as any offered by the other heritage lines. Temporarily hampered by financial woes that threatened its continued existence, the railway has bounced back magnificently in more recent times. They get their PR spot on. They are most welcoming and accommodating at every turn, and their online presence provides a lesson to other comparable set-ups in how to relate positively to their potential customers.

We took the slow train from Carrog to Corwen and completed the round trip to Llangollen and back behind No. 3802 before a leisurely lunch at the Grouse Inn. Fitting in another there and back trip to Llangollen in the afternoon for tea and cake, having persuaded the café on the terminus platform to stay open just a little longer while we cleared them out of “school cake”, we were rewarded with some very spirited running from the ex-GWR panier tank No. 7754 up the hill and back to Carrog in the non-corridor suburban stock. We finally went our separate ways after another rewarding day in each other’s company. We shall remember Andy by just carrying on carrying on. Life is short and nothing lasts for ever. It’s important to have things to look forward to and things to look back on, as well as enjoying the moment on the day. We’ve packed a lot into the sixty-six years since our friendship group began to take form and we’ve far from finished yet. Andy would expect nothing less from us. 

   

Norman Cornish

Entitled A Life in Sketchbooks, this exhibition at the Bowes Museum runs until 3^rd January 2027. It follows on from another exhibition of his work, Kith and Kinship, which also included works by LS Lowry, at the same location two years ago. Based on the 269 sketch books he used while out on the streets during his lifetime, it is a fascinating insight into the industrial north east of England before de-industrialisation so radically altered the urban landscape for ever.

Born in Spennymoor in 1919, Norman Cornish worked as a coal miner from the age of fourteen, whilst simultaneously developing his distinctive artistic style, with which he recorded the community he grew up in. His work is very evocative; stressing characterful personalities and their inter-relationships, communicating a jostling, physical mutual support and that feeling of camaraderie and intimacy that so typifies the former mining areas. He also paints the urban landscape itself, which already seems to be a world away, even to those of us who can remember it well, as we looked on from the outside.

I’m somewhat ambivalent about Bowes Museum, itself, which we have visited a number of times. On the one hand, I really like their smaller gallery temporary exhibitions like this one on Norman Cornish. They are clearly laid out, clearly explained, thoughtfully lit and manageable in terms of available time. The café, too, is way, way above average. I find the whole presence of the place so cavernous and overbearing, though, and the large hall which is full of classical paintings from head to foot - and it’s a very tall room, seems to me to be just not the way to show off works of art, assuming, of course, that they are worth showing off in the first place. Nevertheless, I’ll keep a look out for future exhibitions. Its not far off the A66, which seems to have become a very familiar route to the hills for us over the years.

   

The Eden Valley Railway

 

You can see the lines of carriages from the A66, as we have done a number of times as we have whizzed past on our way to the Lake District, on days the EVR has not been open. Last week they were running trains on the Monday, in the form of their ancient-looking but in fact 1957-built, BR Southern Region Class 205 Thumper unit DEMU No. 205009, so we took the opportunity for a look round. The staff were welcoming and the usual facilities were available, but it was still rather quiet for a pleasant day in the school summer holiday.

The original railway was also part of the trans-Pennine Stainmore route from Tebay and Penrith to Darlington. This particular resurrection has not got very far out of Warcop station on its way to eventually re-establishing the line as far as Appleby, but the signalbox still stands on the platform and is open to visitors and there is plenty of stock to inspect in the sidings including a Class 47 and a number of diesel shunters. The return trip to the current terminus at Southfield is 2.2 miles away.

Some of these ventures obviously struggle more than others. I guess that’s down to acquiring the numbers of volunteers with the right skills, made more difficult if your location is relatively remote and you are not in a tourist area. The EVR seems to be more on the way to places rather than an obvious attraction in its own right. There are clearly some very dedicated individuals involved in all these projects, but I do wonder how dispiriting it might be to see rather piecemeal progress being made as time inevitably ticks by.

The heritage railways can be very different from each other in terms of the visible progress they have made over the decades. This reflects their location and proximity to potential customers as much as anything else, though a multitude of factors are actually involved. It can also be affected by the existence of, or the potential for, a direct link to the national rail system. Some have made enormous strides in living memory and others not so much. They all rely heavily on volunteer labour, too, of course, which may or may not always be either available or forthcoming.

Where there is a tangible goal in sight, like the re-uniting of two formerly linked stretches of line or the reopening of a junction station on the main line, I can see why there might be that added determination to make things happen. It may also help with fund raising, as the concern can sell an idea that people can more easily identify with and one which can become a reality within a relatively short time.

All the heritage railways seem to have significant numbers of stalwart figures amongst their ranks, who give limitless amounts of their time, perhaps without even a thought about the end game. I have enormous admiration for these unsung heroes of the preservation movement. Without them, we would not have the recognisable and successful railway heritage movement that so many of us value and cherish.