Recent content by Recessio

This seems like a good simple solution to me. No initial outlay as GBR will simply take over franchises as contracts expire, so no need to "buy out" remaining contracts. ROSCOs keep the rolling stock so private investment funds the huge initial costs of new trains, not tax rises. Open access...

The airports really like having their "own" service. Being generous, you can see how it makes it clearer for tourists exactly which train they need to get. Being cynical, it allows the ToCs to charge higher fares on that route. If more stops get added to GX, it removes any speed benefit and...

Wouldn't be much of an express if it kept stopping!

My understanding was that it was in the early 80s, there were two bridges at the end of their lives. The Greater London Council had always provided a subsidy to run the branch, and one of the very last acts of the GLC before abolition in 1986 was to fund replacement of the bridges, because...

I've always thought signallers could use the feature that allows them to directly PA into train tannoys more often

Ebbsfleet seems the most likely candidate for an extension, especially if the whole "Garden City" ever takes off, although there would be difficulties - running over the existing tracks would require AC overheard lines over existing DC third rail (difficult to do) and the lines are already...

It's extremely difficult to actually close a station nowadays. Most "closed" stations are legally still open, they may just have no services or only a "parliamentary" service as required by law. Given Chesham doesn't have other nearby stations, I'd be astonished if there was the legal (and...

I've heard reports a passenger pulled an egress, evacuated to track and started clearing branches themselves! Pretty terrifying that they were handling tree branches during wet weather on third-rail territory...

Thanks for adding this. Definitely seems an unfair reason to be sacked for me, I glad to hear that his colleagues are standing with him. Even if it was an LU test, an instant dismissal seems unfair to me.

Not quite the same, but it didn't happen with Stratford and Liverpool Street.

Not a line closure, but still interesting that an old railway act is still on the books - a consultation over housing near Hampton Court has been opened by the Secretary of State under Clause 49 of South Western Railway Act 1913 (source...

It is worth bearing in mind that if the "St Pancras" area just means the Metropolitan Borough of St Pancras, then this was a large borough (about 2/3 of modern day Camden) with some proximity to other stations. That said, and especially as he previously worked near Birmingham New Street, I still...

That's always the way with old electronics. In a non railway job I was involved with, we replaced three entire floors worth of 1960s-1980s era Westinghouse and Ealing electronics racks, with two servers about the size of a filing cabinet each. I wonder if the space the railway saves could be...

Thanks. Good work by LU and the services, for it to have not become a far worse incident.

Class 424 Networker Classic. Essentially an old BR slam-door chassis with a Turbostar/Clubman body thrown on top. Got as far as one carriage being converted and shown off at Victoria Station, but in the end no orders went ahead (I've heard, but cannot source, that there problems with...