FROM THE RAILWAY MAGAZINE ARCHIVES
100 YEARS AGO DECEMBER 1922 Fish Traffic at Padstow
PADSTOW, served by the London South Western Railway, is rapidly becoming one of the chief fishing ports, certainly in the West Country, if not in the British Isles. During the brief season of about 11 weeks, which ended in May last, over 40,000 packages of fish were dispatched, weighing 2500 tons, with a rail charge of over £10,500. To convey the loads, 750 special vehicles were required, and inbound, 737 trucks of coal were used for bunkering the fishing fleet.
50 YEARS AGO DECEMBER 1972 Flying Scotsman venture lacked support
APPEARING before the London Bankruptcy Court on October 31, Mr A F Pegler, owner of preserved LNER Pacific No. 4472 Flying Scotsman, said that his venture taking the locomotive to USA had been let down by American colleagues and his attempt to promote Britain’s export drive had been given no help by the British Government. Mr Pegler had bought the locomotive in 1963 for £3000 and later formed an American company, in which he and his son were shareholders, to operate the locomotive and train in the States, where it is now at a US Army depot at Stockton, California. He disclosed total liabilities of £132,383 and a deficiency of £4,159.
Alfreton to reopen
ALFRETON STATION, Derbyshire – closed to passenger traffic from January 2, 1967 – is to be reopened from May 7, 1973 with a new station on the old site costing £92,000. There will be a weekday service of seven trains to London and eight from London, and a Sunday service of three trains each way. All trains calling at Alfreton will also serve Sheffield, Chesterfield and Leicester, and all but four will call at Nottingham. [Note: The station reopened on May 7, 1973 as Alfreton and Mansfield Parkway, but reverted to just Alfreton when Mansfield’s own station reopened in 1995.]
Romford-Upminster line reprieved again
PROPOSAL to withdraw railway passenger services between Romford and Upminster has been refused by the Department of Environment. A previous proposal to close this 3¼-mile line was refused in September 1965.
20 YEARS AGO DECEMBER 2002 WCML upgrade scaled down
ASPIRATIONS of 140mph tilting trains on the West Coast Main Line have been left on the drawing board following an announcement on October 9 by the Strategic Rail Authority of plans for a 125mph railway with full-tilt capabilities costing £9.8bn. It has been well documented that the cost of the WCML upgrade to cater for Virgin’s new 140mph ‘Pendolinos’ was spiralling towards the £13bn mark through a combination of underestimating the amount of upgrade and renewal work needed to the track and signalling, as well as poor asset management and a lack of project leadership.
‘Voyagers’ sunk by sea water
OCTOBER 9 can only be described as a terrible day for Virgin Trains with a mass of failed ‘Voyager’ sets on the Dawlish sea wall section. Mountainous seas engulfed trains and water seeped into electrical equipment. Electrical resistors for the braking system, which are mounted on the roof, became contaminated by exhaust carbon. This is not usually a problem, but the water and salt made a highly conductive substance that short circuits the resistors, and the onboard computer shuts down the power supply on grounds of safety.