Claude_Dreyfus

Pulborough again, and this time 73136 is doing the honours. Forming the 0Y73 11:35 Tonbridge West Yard - Eastleigh Works - 25th November.

Not on the bridge itself, I'm talking about the view point closer to the station. When I was there back in 2016 it was okay, but when I returned in 2018 it was a lot less salubrious. Still a great place to see trains, even if the variety of motive power is diminishing. I do wonder what difference all of those padlocks make to the overall weight of the bridge?

Thanks! Yes, the ED19 is a Kato model. They have just announced they are rereleasing it in the new year. https://www.traintrax.co.uk/30782-ed19-simplified-louvres-electric-locomotive-p-1994.html

A few more. The series 115 units were used up until 2014. This is a Kato model. The mainstay of Iida line freight - the ED62. Overall view of the cement works. The town and distant works, from the works loco shed.

Since the summer, not a great deal of progress has taken place on the layout. The main change was the addition of the level crossing gates (Tomytec), as well as some additional detailing around the cement works; for example, supports around the coal pile. The sun was out this morning, so a few photos were taken showing the variety of passenger trains which are available on the layout. The layouts timescale ranges between mid 1970s and the 1990s. It is a wide timescale, but lines like this changed very little for many years; save the stock being used. The replacements for the mixture of older units were the series 119. They ran on the line from the early 80s until 2012. A JR Central series 313 (Modemo); a little late for the layout, they arrived on the line in the late 1990s.

That is a great viewing location and one I haved used a few times. Sadly when I was last there it was littered with bottles and other detritus you wouldn't want to get too close to.

You can rule out that loco being 19 as it was released from refurbishment at that time (handed back to the WR 03/04/80), so would have sported a headlight when you saw it (and would have been pretty clean, but still in BR blue). Edit: It is 'Monarch'. Note the marks on the cab front match. Not my picture, linked from Flickr

73s on RHTT action, and the first this winter I have managed to catch. 73109 heads the 10:35 Tonbridge West Yard - Tonbridge West Yard southbound through Pulborough station. I quite like the fighter plane motif on the cabsides... 73201 was at the other end, seem here on the return journey.

73109 and 73201 ventured down the Arun Valley this lunchtime. A bit of an odd service; an out and back from Tonbridge to Arundel (the 10:35 Tonbridge West Yard - Tonbridge West Yard), with the reversal taking place at Arundel (using the cross over to the north of the station) with a London bound passenger train held in the up platform. This strange prioritisation presumably was down to the extensive timetabling of the Arun valley line, and the fact the stoppers from Bognor are chased up the line by the fasts from Portsmouth/Southampton, which join at Horsham. You don't want an RHTT sandwiched between the two sections of a London train and I guess there is no scope for overtaking if a Dorking train is in Platform 1. 73201 gallops towards Pulborough with the return leg. The RHTT set had picked up a flat somewhere out and about and hammered through the station.

Realtime Trains was reporting something interesting today. A mystery Southern service running between Hastings, Brighton, Bognor, and thence the Stewarts Lane. It was pathed as a diesel engine. Intriguing...and there was one candidate which came to mind; 73202, which I hadn't yet seen in its Southern Garb. Given the South west to North East direction of the Arun Valley line through my local station, the evening sun meant I needed to be a little more adventurous trying to get a picture. This picture was taken just below Pulborough Castle - basically a pile of earth. My hunch was right, and bang on time 73202 headed along the embankment across the Arun flood plain forming the 0Z53 15:18 Bognor - Stewarts Line TMD. Sadly a combination of light, zoom and the fact it was moving quite swiftly conspired against me, and the loco is a bit blurred. Still, you can tell what it is... Any bright ideas what the purpose of this manoeuvre was?

I finally managed to catch it! 37610 coasts through Pulborough with the 17:00 Barnham - Woking. Just beyond the platforms, the taps were opened, and a nice bit of thrash was heard as she headed away. Perhaps this is the final operation down here?

I saw that listed on RTT. Due to run again tonight...pity it will pass my local station after dark.

Thanks. That will be the same combination that passed through back in July then - see my post from 2nd July.

More track recording action at Pulborough. 73961 heads the 11:31 Tonbridge West Yard - Seaford on 24th September. I didn't catch the identity of its trailing class-mate.

I'm not forgetting, and I am not debating the rights and wrongs of working from home and the impacts being felt by the wider industries and non-office workers in cities. However office space in the city is extremely expensive and companies are already reviewing whether or not they renew leases on that extra floor, given the enthusiasm some quarters have the working from home. It is inevitable that some workers will never return to full-time in the city...simply because it is cheaper for employers to have work from home. I am not saying that cities will become ghost towns once this is all over...but the gradual drift to working from home from some workers has been happening for some time now, somewhat accelerated by the lockdown, and there is no reason to suggest this will reverse. Companies have invested heavily to support working from home; some to the point in purchasing monitors, laptops and docking stations etc, so that staff who can work from home can do so more efficiently. It is in the interests of the TOCs to recognise this change, both with operating patterns and fare structures.

Actually, whilst I suspect that commuting may change, it will actually be more suitable for the likes of HS2 in the future. Until March I was a daily commuter into London. I live in a small rural town, about fives minutes walk from countryside, and I have had a lot of colleagues saying they are fed up with living in London and the larger satellite towns (with the lack of space in their homes, as well as lack of green environs) want something more rural. For employers such as mine, I can see the working from home approach staying, with one or two days in the office and the rest at home. This will result in people moving out of London and other big towns, happy to put up with a long commute if it is only for a couple of days a week (and given many trains are now wifi fitted, quite a lot of work can be done on the commute). You hear of regular commuters to London from Leeds or Birmingham and I think this, and other further destinations, will become more regular. Especially given the disparity of house prices and other costs of living. I was in Hereford the other week. A nice city and surrounding area, and nowhere near as busy as Sussex. I found myself checking the trains to London to see if a regular (not daily!) commute is viable. This, of course, won't be the death of the suburban network and we won't see a wholesale move of city workers out to more far flung locations, but there will be a reasonable proportion who do, and it will be interesting to see if rail companies recognise and address this. For HS2, if they do achieve the journey time from Birmingham to London to 52 minutes, then anywhere within 30 minutes of the HS2 station in Birmingham becomes faster to commute than parts of West Sussex!

142061

66763 heads the 6M42 09:06 Avonmouth Hanson - Penyfford cement service across the Chirk viaduct - 14th September 2020. At this point it was running over an hour early.

Just back from a few days on the Llangollen canal, from which I saw the Cefn Mawr viaduct. Ideal for this thread! An unidentified 158 forms the 1V97 14:34 Holyhead to Shrewsbury across the viaduct in perfect weather. 14 September 2020

37219 dashes through Pulborough with the 09:31 Woking Up Yard - Woking Up Yard via Littlehampton. 9th September. Presumably carrying out some track recording in preparation for future engineering works. This is the first time I have seen a 37 here.

I'm sure this has been shared on here before. No idea how accurate the sound to picture mapping (probably not very!*) actually is, but it's a bit of fun. * Make that not at all!

Now that the main strictures have been completed, attention has been turned to adding the details - things like more greenery as well as grottifying around the cement works. The cement works still get regular rail services - both coal deliveries (normally from the foreground siding) and the collection of cement in the Hoki 5700 cement hoppers. The resident shunter busies itself with loading. It is still quite shiny - I need to pluck up the courage to tone it down a bit! Overall view of the cement works, which is now pretty much complete...just finer details to add to the site now. Early days on the Iida line; an ED19 brings a short freight across the road to the village. These venerable machines started life as the built Westinghouse ED53 in 1926, being converted to the ED19 in the late 30s (which, amongst other things involved removing the train heating and replacing the old Westinghouse pantographs). As the ED19 they shared duties on the Iida line with the English Electric ED18s (of similar vintage) until their displacement and withdrawal in the mid 1970s. The wide range of aged EMUs found their way onto the Iida line, running until the early 80s. The various details around these units are covered in the link I posted on the 10 June, but this really is archetypal Iida line - a Kumoha 42 driving carriage leads an afternoon train away from Kenekimura. Still plenty to do, especially around the finer detailing. The level crossing now has barriers and [non-working] lights.

66740 heads the 6G11 09:02 Eastleigh East Yard - Dorking across the Arun flood plains - 22nd August. A bit of an odd situation with this one. It was due through Pulborough at about 10:00 that morning, but was running just under 5 hours late at this point. I was tracking it on RTT as far as Havant, when it seemed to stop. A consult on Open Train Times (which is usually reliable) showed that it had been diverted up the Portsmouth direct, so I thought no more about it. I was actually after another engineers train when this one turned up, but I am not sure how it turned back and then found its way back long the coastway without a couple of run rounds (Guildford and Havant?).

But surely open-plan design does make it easier to evacuate parts of the train in an emergency as there isn't the bottle neck between each carriage; especially when the intermediate doors decide they don't want to open (not uncommon on the 377s)? I'd also suggest that for lone/vulnerable passengers the open design may be safer as they are more visible through the train, as opposed to being hidden away in an enclosed carriage. These are being designed as suburban units, so the open plan seems a sensible option.

Unidentified pacer action in the Calder valley. Heading west from Todmorden in April 2018, looking towards Gauxholme and Walden. An unidentified 158 heading east on the same stretch, just having crossed the Rochdale Canal.