Things we don't see at stations these days

[Trainlog]

Do many stations still have metal TRTS plungers now and analogue "OFF" indicators? Most that I've seen are either push-button or key

Maidstone West has one.

 

[Islineclear3_1]

Large black triangles on multiple unit cab ends

 

[Pinza-C55]

I don't remember seeing video arcade games on stations, although I must admit that there weren't buffets at most of the stations that I used. But mentioning these games brings up a question I've never had answered: what happened to all those Space Invader machines there used to be in pubs and other places? There were thousands of them. All of a sudden they just disappeared; the invaders must have staged a strategic retreat to whence they came!

There's an evangelist church in Cranbury Park Road in Kingston that has a big sign with a religious message for train passengers to see and presumably to reflect upon. (My favourite church sign was one in Kennington near to where I was living in a squat 40 years back: it read in huge letters, 'Jesus in still healing arthritus', which I thought was remarkably specific.) I also remember seeing Bible-bashing posters with a wide range of biblical quotes back in the 1980s; they were posted up on most stations all over south London.

I remember seeing lots of them when coming back from holiday in Devon in the early 1960s. My dad said they were advertising Strong's beer. I read somewhere that in the USA, the Burmashave company used to advertise their shaving products with similar big hoardings, but along the main roads.

I believe many of the game cabinets were given new artwork and circuit boards when the games went out of fashion but eventually most were scrapped. An online auction site has a couple of original complete games for £1500 and an original 1978 Space Invaders for £5000.

 

[Forty29]

i

I suspect that might have been for Brakspear's brewery in Henley.

Yes probably.

 

[yorksrob]

These were positioned at strategic locations in Hampshire alongside the ex-LSWR main lines advertising the beers brewed by Strong & Co's Romsey brewery. IIRC, the brewery was taken over by Whitbread in the late 1960s or early 1970s, after which the trackside signs rapidly disappeared. However one of them has been restored and re-erected behind the Up platform at Ropley on the Mid-Hants Watercress Line.

A sad development, given what's become of Whitbread.

 

[ChiefPlanner]

Religious tracts - sometimes placed in glass frames , changed quite often.

(replaced in part by similar on metal plates clamped to railings at traffic lights at locations in urban areas - to be perused when waiting a green signal)

Large black triangles on multiple unit cab ends

Southern Region only !

 

[Ken H]

Religious tracts - sometimes placed in glass frames , changed quite often.

(replaced in part by similar on metal plates clamped to railings at traffic lights at locations in urban areas - to be perused when waiting a green signal)



Southern Region only !

LT tube, trains, up to and including the 1938 stock, had A and B ends and there was a small plate by the drivers window to say if an A or B end. After that each axle had a letter, so trains and an A or D end. Later they had trains that were double ended but that complicated the couplers.

I think the standard Southern Region trains could couple any way - there was no 'end' designation on EPB,s CIG,s VEPS and Cl 33 for example
I dont know if earlier stock with different jumpers could couple either way. Did 4-SUB's need to be coupled the right way round?

On stations I used to love watching trains being coupled. The brake hoses (Vacuum and air), steam heat, ETH, control jumpers, the RCH lighting jumpers.

 

[Pinza-C55]

Brass models of Stephensons Rocket, as this one seen by me at Bridlington station in 1978.


Bridlington {9} 17.12.78 by A1 Northeastern, on Flickr

 

[Trainlog]

Brass models of Stephensons Rocket, as this one seen by me at Bridlington station in 1978.


Bridlington {9} 17.12.78 by A1 Northeastern, on Flickr

Didn't some stations used to have models of their companies locos in cases that where coin operated back in the steam era to run on a rolling road? (20s-late 60s).

 

[D6130]

There used to be a beautiful scale model of LNER Class V4 2-6-2 No. 3401 "Bantam Cock" in a glass case on the concourse at Helensburgh Central. Unfortunately someone stole it sometime in the 1990s and it has never been recovered.

 

[calopez]

i

I suspect that might have been for Brakspear's brewery in Henley.

More likely to have been Wethered's of Marlow, who were bought out by Strong's in the early 1960s (I think), and thereafter used similar signage. Both breweries later shut by Whitbread, of course.

 

[virgintrain1]

Staff wearing hats

 

[Krokodil]

Timetables

 

[Pinza-C55]

Didn't some stations used to have models of their companies locos in cases that where coin operated back in the steam era to run on a rolling road? (20s-late 60s).

I believe but never saw them. There was in the early 2000s a Stephensons Rocket machine in a corridor of the Royal Station Hotel in York but don't know if it is still there.

 

[Rescars]

I believe but never saw them. There was in the early 2000s a Stephensons Rocket machine in a corridor of the Royal Station Hotel in York but don't know if it is still there.

Never mind models! IIRC a long time ago some stations had the real thing. This is probably beyond living memory now, but wasn't Locomotion on a plinth at Darlington for many years and Shannon similarly on show at Wantage Road? Is there still the lifesize replica of Trevithick's Coalbrookdale loco at Telford Central?

 

[Pinza-C55]

Never mind models! IIRC a long time ago some stations had the real thing. This is probably beyond living memory now, but wasn't Locomotion on a plinth at Darlington for many years and Shannon similarly on show at Wantage Road? Is there still the lifesize replica of Trevithick's Coalbrookdale loco at Telford Central?

Locomotion was on the plinth up till 1975 when the Stockton & Darlington 150 celebrations but removed not long after , I think.

 

[D6130]

Never mind models! IIRC a long time ago some stations had the real thing. This is probably beyond living memory now, but wasn't Locomotion on a plinth at Darlington for many years and Shannon similarly on show at Wantage Road? Is there still the lifesize replica of Trevithick's Coalbrookdale loco at Telford Central?

I remember "Locomotion No. 1" and "Derwent" on the plinths behind the buffer stops of the bay platforms at Darlington. IIRC, they were removed in the early-mid 1970s....prior to the Stockton & Darlington 150 celebrations in 1975.

 

[greyman42]

Timetables

Cross Country have just re-introduced a paper one for their services!

 

[Pinza-C55]

I remember "Locomotion No. 1" and "Derwent" on the plinths behind the buffer stops of the bay platforms at Darlington. IIRC, they were removed in the early-mid 1970s....prior to the Stockton & Darlington 150 celebrations in 1975.

I checked it up and they were removed in September 1975.

 

[Rescars]

I checked it up and they were removed in September 1975.

Ah. Thanks for this. A bit remarkable that they were kept like this until the 1970s. Another example was Old Coppernob, which was on show at Barrow, but was given greater protection after suffering shrapnel damage during an air raid during WW2.

 

[Merthyr Imp]

I photographed them both in the early 1970s - possibly in 1974:

 

[70014IronDuke]

I have just put this into the A4 thread, but thought it worth repeating here.


One of the things missing from stations today is surely trainspotters' graffiti laments. These were not massive spray paint things, of course, mere ball-point scribblings that normals would not normally see.

I remember that at Sandy, on the branch line platform south end, there was a white-painted post with dozens of anguished lamentations along the lines of: "I died here waiting for Streak 9."

<Explanation for young straplings - 'streak' was trainspotter-speak for the streamlined A4 pacifics. Hence Streak 9 meant 60009, named Union of South Africa. This was one of those allocated to Haymarket (Edinburgh) which rarely graced the southern end of the ECML.>

It's difficult to be sure now, but from memory they nearly all involved Haymarket A4s, though some may have mentioned even more elusive, evocatively named Carlisle Canal A3s or perhaps some of the Scottish-based A2s such as Sayajirao and Blue Peter.

Sadly, it's one of those things that nobody ever deemed worthy to photograph, as far as I know. Perhaps I should copy this onto the 'Things you don't see on stations today' thread.

 

[Pinza-C55]

I have just put this into the A4 thread, but thought it worth repeating here.


One of the things missing from stations today is surely trainspotters' graffiti laments. These were not massive spray paint things, of course, mere ball-point scribblings that normals would not normally see.

I remember that at Sandy, on the branch line platform south end, there was a white-painted post with dozens of anguished lamentations along the lines of: "I died here waiting for Streak 9."

<Explanation for young straplings - 'streak' was trainspotter-speak for the streamlined A4 pacifics. Hence Streak 9 meant 60009, named Union of South Africa. This was one of those allocated to Haymarket (Edinburgh) which rarely graced the southern end of the ECML.>

It's difficult to be sure now, but from memory they nearly all involved Haymarket A4s, though some may have mentioned even more elusive, evocatively named Carlisle Canal A3s or perhaps some of the Scottish-based A2s such as Sayajirao and Blue Peter.

Sadly, it's one of those things that nobody ever deemed worthy to photograph, as far as I know. Perhaps I should copy this onto the 'Things you don't see on stations today' thread.

Many of the tunnels around the area between King's Cross and Welwyn/Hertford North had "* **** is bent" sprayed on them. He was a Kings Cross guard and I worked with him. I think the graffiti was sprayed on by a disgruntled secondman he had an argument with.

 

[LowLevel]

I have just put this into the A4 thread, but thought it worth repeating here.


One of the things missing from stations today is surely trainspotters' graffiti laments. These were not massive spray paint things, of course, mere ball-point scribblings that normals would not normally see.

I remember that at Sandy, on the branch line platform south end, there was a white-painted post with dozens of anguished lamentations along the lines of: "I died here waiting for Streak 9."

<Explanation for young straplings - 'streak' was trainspotter-speak for the streamlined A4 pacifics. Hence Streak 9 meant 60009, named Union of South Africa. This was one of those allocated to Haymarket (Edinburgh) which rarely graced the southern end of the ECML.>

It's difficult to be sure now, but from memory they nearly all involved Haymarket A4s, though some may have mentioned even more elusive, evocatively named Carlisle Canal A3s or perhaps some of the Scottish-based A2s such as Sayajirao and Blue Peter.

Sadly, it's one of those things that nobody ever deemed worthy to photograph, as far as I know. Perhaps I should copy this onto the 'Things you don't see on stations today' thread.

At places like Water Orton and Trent there is still plenty of "heritage" graffiti from cranks lying around if you know where to look for it.

And of course the legendary West Midlands "Tojo the Dwarf" painted on a canal bridge between Wolverhampton and Birmingham, reportedly by local railway workers so a certain irritable signalman at Wolverhampton powerbox who was short in stature and prone to blurting out "I told you... = I tode you = Tojo" in a local accent down the phone could see it on his way to work

 

[John Luxton]

Didn't some stations used to have models of their companies locos in cases that where coin operated back in the steam era to run on a rolling road? (20s-late 60s).

Used to a Rocket in the enquiry office at Liverpool Lime Street 60s / 70s though the stand was original varnished wood. I wonder how many of these existed?

I checked it up and they were removed in September 1975.

As far as I know as I have not been there for 10 years but Cork Station had an early Great Southern & Western locomotive on display on the concourse.

 

[Pinza-C55]

Used to a Rocket in the enquiry office at Liverpool Lime Street 60s / 70s though the stand was original varnished wood. I wonder how many of these existed?


As far as I know as I have not been there for 10 years but Cork Station had an early Great Southern & Western locomotive on display on the concourse.

I seem to remember someone saying there were 27 but that may have just been on the NER. About 25 years ago I was offered one minus the wooden stand for about £1000 by a railwayana dealer. I've never seen any others for sale.

 

[Matey]

Not actually on stations. "Prize Length Section" signs. There was one on the Forres /Dava section in 1960. The certificate was pinned up in the plate-layer's hut at the summit of Rafford Bank for some years afterwards.

 

[GarethW]

Maidstone West has one.

Fareham too.

Last place I heard a bell for approaching train was Fratton but it went a few years back.

 

[Pinza-C55]

Not actually on stations. "Prize Length Section" signs. There was one on the Forres /Dava section in 1960. The certificate was pinned up in the plate-layer's hut at the summit of Rafford Bank for some years afterwards.

There's one at Goathland Station on the NYMR.

 

[The exile]

Didn't some stations used to have models of their companies locos in cases that where coin operated back in the steam era to run on a rolling road? (20s-late 60s).

BristolTemple Meads still has (although it’s probably behind all the hoardings atm).

Have we had rows of phone booths?