Category: Britain

Four years after its promised transformation was begun with the pensioning off of the 1938-vintage Class 483 units on 3 January 2021, it is fair to say that things have not gone too well with rail services on the charming Isle of Wight.

An investment of £26 million in the 8½-mile route from Ryde Pier Head to Shanklin and the arrival of a new five strong fleet of two-car Class 484 units – created from former London Underground District Line D78 stock – were meant to herald a bright new future for Island Line.

This is my sixth annual look back at a year on our railway, as seen through the lens of my trusty Canon camera, a year that began with the sad loss of mechanical signalling at Par, Lostwithiel and Truro in Cornwall and ended in a chance to travel on the first weekday services to run on the Northumberland Line, one of two lines to re-open on our network during the course of the year.

It was a year too, when I paid visits to two locations where there is nothing but freight action and semaphore signalling, as well as paying return visits to a number of my favourite photographic locations, including Kingussie and Auchterarder in Scotland, the Poacher Line to Skegness, the Cumbrian Coast Line, Burry Port and Holyhead. Continue reading “Images of 2024”

Railway re-openings look like being a thing of the past if the Labour Government continues to snub all the longstanding revival plans that had been coming to fruition, so after a trip earlier in the year to Leven I felt compelled to take a trip on the only other section of line to be re-opening in 2024.

Like the link to Leven in Scotland, the 18-mile Northumberland Line from Newcastle to Ashington has been the subject of a longstanding revival campaign, in this case stretching back more than a decade, and first raised by a former local Labour MP, Denis Murphy in 1999 and then in a Commons debate in January 2007.

Continue reading “A trip on the Northumberland Line”

Re-signalling of the South Wales Main Line between Swansea and Carmarthen is running late, so after my latest feature on the surviving semaphores at Pembrey & Burry Port, it is a great pleasure to be invited by Network Rail to take a look at all four of the signal boxes that will be closed when the Port Talbot West 2 (PTW2) project is completed.

This is a remarkably varied quartet, with the most traditional being Pembrey and Ferryside, which both retain lever frames and semaphores, one at Kidwelly that is a curious hybrid, where a 1950s top has been built on an 1885 GW base, and finally the most modern of all being a BR (WR) structure from 1956 at Carmarthen Junction.

Continue reading “Four South Wales signal boxes on borrowed time”

One year on from my last visit and the lure of seasonally cheap hotel accommodation tempts me to chance my luck with the weather and spend a couple of days in North Wales, to witness the ever-changing railway scene and some of its surviving semaphore signals.

Basing myself at the Holyhead Travelodge (27-29 November 2024) my aim was to photograph some of the new Avanti (AWC) Class 805 Evero bi-mode units that are now replacing Class 221 Super Voyagers on Euston-Holyhead services, along with the seasonal Class 56-worked RHTT and an HST-powered NR test train.

Continue reading “New and old in North Wales”

More than three years after my last visit (June 2021), the irregular appearance of a Class 43-powered Network Rail test train makes the perfect excuse to pay an overdue return on Thursday, 21 November 2024 to delightful Heckington, first station east of Sleaford on the Poacher Line to Boston and Skegness.

Having been lucky enough to see another NR test train, the Class 37-powered Ultrasonic Testing Unit (UTU) at Skegness in October, my main aim this time was to photograph a different type of test working passing both the down distant signal, which is only pulled off for trains not calling at Heckington, and the up distant signal some way east of the station.

Continue reading “Working semaphore distant signals at Heckington”

Trains testing and treating the track brought some rare loco movements to Skegness on Monday, 28 October 2024, with two special workings on behalf of Network Rail visiting the remarkable station, at the coastal end of the Poacher Line, in the space of less than an hour.

Shortly before midday came the distinctive sound of “tractor” 37610, which is operated by Colas Rail and is in British Rail blue livery, hauling Network Rail’s Ultrasonic Testing Unit (UTU), with DBSO 9714 at the rear. This had travelled from Derby on its monthly visit to the Poacher Line.

Continue reading “Rare loco action at bracing Skegness”

Further delay to what is known as the Port Talbot West 2 (PTW2) re-signalling project in West Wales means that the semaphore signals at Ferryside and at Pembrey & Burry Port will live on until at least the end of 2025, well beyond the last estimated date for completion of the re-signalling.

An update provided to railwayworld.net by Network Rail on 15 October 2024 confirms this latest delay, which it puts down to the geographic size of the project and difficulties in gaining access to the railway.

Continue reading “Another year for the South Wales semaphores”

Plan a rail trip from Swansea to Shrewsbury and you will be presented with rather differing fares and journey times, depending on whether you pick the main route to Cardiff and the Marches Line via Hereford, or the slow and very scenic Heart of Wales Line via Llanelli, Llandovery and Llandrindod Wells.

Pick the main route and you will pay significantly more for a faster journey on one of the new Class 197 units, but opting for the Heart of Wales Line will give you a much cheaper fare, and the chance to spend around four hours trundling through some of the Principality’s most beautiful scenery in an aged Class 150 or single car Class 153 unit.

Continue reading “Getting to the Heart of Wales”