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What's the purpose of this rail?

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TW1306

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What's the purpose of this odd single-rail setup seen at 5:01? At first I thought it might be trap points but there's only one rail, and the location wouldn't make sense anyway.
 
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hexagon789

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What's the purpose of this odd single-rail setup seen at 5:01? At first I thought it might be trap points but there's only one rail, and the location wouldn't make sense anyway.
Partly disconnected turnout?
 

Flying Snail

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The line to the right has obviously been relaid recently, the points removed and plain line put in. Probably just did the minimum on the camera view line to keep it operational, most likely that is also due for plain line renewal so it would be extra work to patch the partially removed point only to rip it up again for full replacement.
 

Bletchleyite

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Fairly major work was done at that end of Bletchley when the 12 car extensions were built across the old turnouts between P4 and the carriage sidings. I forget what else was there at the time (despite having spent a lot of time standing there while commuting!) but it's quite possible there was one going the other way from the up and down slows to P5/6 as well.

Having had a look at Traksy, it could well have been the connection from the Up Bletchley to P6, which was used when I boarded a 350 in P6 which had come from MKC a number of years ago, quite possibly a one off and indeed no longer possible in the current layout, as despite having wires there's no way to get from the Up Bletchley or the sidings to 6, so anything going into or out of service has to go through 5 now.
 
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mr_moo

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I agree with the others.
On the left side as viewed from the camera, (which would be the right side of the points as they are 'handed' when standing at the toes looking towards them), you can see the baseplates for what would have been the switch rail are still mostly in situ, as there's no need to remove them. The running rail will most likely still be the original stock rail, as it's still fit for purpose. Its just the switch (moveable, thinner) rail that's been removed.
On the other side, this direction of travel would have been using the switch rail, which cannot remain in situ once the points have been decomissioned and the detection removed. Thus, the switch rail baseplates would have been replaced with with standard baseplates through this section.

The key thing is to remove the moveable rails, as the set of points will have been removed from the signalling system, and thus they are no longer being detected, so they cannot safety remain in track for any long period of time. Sure, they could be clamped, padlocked, and very regularly inspected, and that's sometimes used if they will remain for a week or so, but much longer and you need to do this kind of thing.

As for the crossing, there's no moveable components here, and no removed detection equipment (as there's nothing to detect), so there's no risk from just leaving this in situ. Thus, it's just left there.

At some point, this will be wholly removed from track and replaced with plain line, but this is a way of removing any significant time constraint on that happening. The biggest issue is that the crossing will still need to be inspected and possibly ground/weld repaired etc as per any other crossing, so it still has a higher maintenance requirement than plain line track, but it's a good compromise to allow a programme of works to leave something like this in place and come back at a later date when possessions and programme allows.
 

swt_passenger

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The line to the right has obviously been relaid recently, the points removed and plain line put in. Probably just did the minimum on the camera view line to keep it operational, most likely that is also due for plain line renewal so it would be extra work to patch the partially removed point only to rip it up again for full replacement.
Recently as in the video, but not in reality, because although YouTube says it’s only been uploaded a month ago, I think it’s well over 10 years ago? I expect @Bletchleyite will probably have an accurate idea how old it is?
 

Bletchleyite

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Recently as in the video, but not in reality, because although YouTube says it’s only been uploaded a month ago, I think it’s well over 10 years ago? I expect @Bletchleyite will probably have an accurate idea how old it is?

It's during the 12 car extension work (you can see it in progress), so probably something like 10 to 15 years ago. Silverlink ended 15 years ago in 2007 (and when the unit is reversing in Bletchley P6 a "London Midland service" is announced), and as LM branding is in place it is probably more like 10 than 15.
 
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