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We're all familiar with the inter-regional letters introduced with the 4-digit headcodes c1960. E, M, N, O, S. But why "V" for Western Region-bound trains? Was it because of possible confusion with the "M" for London Midland, if "W" had been chosen?
The phonetic alphabet wasn’t in railway use during most of the 20th century. My first railway recollection of it being discussed was in a briefing in 1999/2000.
TfW use V for southbound trains on the Marches route, and W on the northbound.
And the "inter-regional" letter codes don't really exist any more, with S and I think M being used for some domestic services in England.
There also the confusing I code in use too on TfW (towards Birmingham).
There's a good chance headcodes will change again soon, depending on how GBR structures itself.
One day maybe we will be rid of TOC codes too, consigning eg AW (TfW) and VT (Avanti) to history.
The four character headcode system was devised in the late 1950s and was implemented mainly in the June 1961 timetable change, though Brush Type 2 D5530 in 1959 was the first locomotive in traffic with a panel to display four character headcodes.
The alpha character headcode blinds omitted four letters: I, Q, U and W. Some blinds also did not have O.
I and O were potentially confusing because they could be mistaken for numbers instead of letters.
Q, U and W were potentially confusing because they sounded similar in an era when the phonetic alphabet wasn't used.
The Southern Region had their own two character codes and their locomotives, EMUs and DEMUs were equipped to display those. Only inter-regional trains going onto the Southern Region with traction provided by other regions needed the O character,. At that time there were not very many of those so the potential for confusion with O was limited.
The phonetic alphabet wasn’t in railway use during most of the 20th century. My first railway recollection of it being discussed was in a briefing in 1999/2000.
A phonetic alphabet has been used by railways for at least 100 years; it's on the first page of the 1924 LMS ''Telegraphic Code to be used for Telegrams' and probably introduced long before.
It is not the present one but generally used Christian names, and W is William. Still used on BR into the eighties at least.
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Possibly W not used because there would be a big area of white showing on illuminated headcode blinds so it wouldn't appear as a white mass.
The Southern Region had their own two character codes and their locomotives, EMUs and DEMUs were equipped to display those. Only inter-regional trains going onto the Southern Region with traction provided by other regions needed the O character,. At that time there were not very many of those so the potential for confusion with O was limited.
The Southern head codes were route codes, rather than train identifiers. So where I lived, we got two trains every hour carrying the headcode 94, for example.
I don't recall letters being used, only numbers. There could also be various types of bars above the numbers (solid bar, broken bar, etc) as well, I think to denote fast and semi fast services.
The Southern head codes were route codes, rather than train identifiers. So where I lived, we got two trains every hour carrying the headcode 94, for example.
I don't recall letters being used, only numbers. There could also be various types of bars above the numbers (solid bar, broken bar, etc) as well, I think to denote fast and semi fast services.
From (possibly unreliable) memory the 4 character codes on the LM after 1966 electrification were in some cases - particularly class 2s - also only route codes. I recall that, for instance, all the Euston - Rugby via Northampton services were 2B92 in one direction and 2B93 in the other. 2B94 and 2B95 might also have been involved. Unfortunately I don't have a WTT for that period.
From (possibly unreliable) memory the 4 character codes on the LM after 1966 electrification were in some cases - particularly class 2s - also only route codes. I recall that, for instance, all the Euston - Rugby via Northampton services were 2B92 in one direction and 2B93 in the other. 2B94 and 2B95 might also have been involved. Unfortunately I don't have a WTT for that period.
TfW use V for southbound trains on the Marches route, and W on the northbound.
And the "inter-regional" letter codes don't really exist any more, with S and I think M being used for some domestic services in England.
Inter-regional conventions are still followed - for example the Caledonian sleepers are 1S25, 1S26 going north and 1M11, 1M16 going south
But where there is little or no risk of confusion, the regional codes are often re-used for local services
SWR uses
S for services via Brentford to Woking or Weybridge (1Sxx and 2Sxx respectively)
V for Brentford roundabout services (anticlockwise - the clockwise ones are "R")
M for the Chessington line
E for Portsmouth - Southampton locals
O is used for several services, notably Merseyrail's Ormskirk line, Glasgow's Cathcart Circle, and London's District Line services running over NR tracks (in the latter case using the LU duty number prefixed by a 2 and with the leading zero or 1 represented by the letters O or I - eg 2O07 or 2I23)
I suspect it has more to do with the width of the letter W, as suggested by a previous poster. If using a metal stencil type display, as used on steam locos, it would either have needed every letter stencil made wider to accommodate the W (as the stencils all needed to be the same size to fit the holder), or the W shrunk in size (which would affect readability).
The Southern head codes were route codes, rather than train identifiers. So where I lived, we got two trains every hour carrying the headcode 94, for example.
I don't recall letters being used, only numbers. There could also be various types of bars above the numbers (solid bar, broken bar, etc) as well, I think to denote fast and semi fast services.
Most Southern Region passenger trains were numbers, though, for example, in 1965 the Waterloo-Swanage summer Saturday through train was C6 and the Brighton-Plymouth was G2. The letters were much more commonly used on freight.
From (possibly unreliable) memory the 4 character codes on the LM after 1966 electrification were in some cases - particularly class 2s - also only route codes. I recall that, for instance, all the Euston - Rugby via Northampton services were 2B92 in one direction and 2B93 in the other. 2B94 and 2B95 might also have been involved. Unfortunately I don't have a WTT for that period.
Most secondary lines had route codes for class 2 trains, including inter-regional services. For example Cambridge-Bedford/Bletchley was 2M78 and Bedford/Bletchley-Cambridge was 2E78.
I suspect it has more to do with the width of the letter W, as suggested by a previous poster. If using a metal stencil type display, as used on steam locos, it would either have needed every letter stencil made wider to accommodate the W (as the stencils all needed to be the same size to fit the holder), or the W shrunk in size (which would affect readability).
Yes, the WR/GWR system carried on locos was amended from 3 numbers to the 4 character code but omitting the train class (although I think only used on Class 1 trains) . The original stencil holders were used so the letters had to fit, so W could be a problem.
It was remarkable that the WR were early adopters of displaying the newly introduced head codes.
Most Southern Region passenger trains were numbers, though, for example, in 1965 the Waterloo-Swanage summer Saturday through train was C6 and the Brighton-Plymouth was G2. The letters were much more commonly used on freight.
If these were loco hauled services, were they taking advantage of the locos being able to display letters in order to display the four digit train numbers elsewhere?
Having worked with some of the early train describer equipment in signalboxes, my opinion is that the windows on signalling panels would have had to have been much larger in order to accommodate the letter W in a way that would be clear and easy for a signalman to read. This would take up more space on the panel, even if you used a wider unit only for the letter part of the four-character description (which would involve more spares), and this would multiply across the display and increase the length. Recollection is that the description box could could fit safely in a single tile of a Domino-type panel.
The subsequent use of V for trains not heading for the Western is due to the spread of the system and the need for so many numbers. It has also (I think) been ‘debased’: it was that V was used for inter-regional trains running to the Western and only for them, but now you use it in the same location for a Class 2 running locally, as long as you don’t have any Class 2 heading for the Western (and similar), while other classes can use V in the original way.
I think you malign the WR. They could be quite innovative when they needed to be, such as them being an early adopted of ATC. The problem was, once they had something that worked, they stuck with it like glue - such as their reluctance to give up ATC for something better! Likewise once they had developed their electromechanical train describer, they stuck to it long after other regions had moved onto electronic displays. I can remember visiting Reading and Old Oak panels and being amazed at the whirring sound of the cogs going round every time a description stepped.
I can imagine some disgruntled rumblings about having to change to this new fangled four digit system when their system worked perfectly well. But equally, mollified that at least it was developed from their idea, so they could still feel some sense of ownership.
A phonetic alphabet has been used by railways for at least 100 years; it's on the first page of the 1924 LMS ''Telegraphic Code to be used for Telegrams' and probably introduced long before.
Possibly so but I never heard the phonetic alphabet used in verbal railway comms in the decades as an operator before we all started talking about safety critical communications.
I did however hear lots of the words from telegraphic code books right through my career including the less common Byrag, Walnut, Rede, Gobi, etc..
The Southern head codes were route codes, rather than train identifiers. So where I lived, we got two trains every hour carrying the headcode 94, for example.
I don't recall letters being used, only numbers. There could also be various types of bars above the numbers (solid bar, broken bar, etc) as well, I think to denote fast and semi fast services.
The Southern had headcodes and train IDs. The term 'headcode' commonly used today is actually the train ID. Headcodes were allocated to the route; the train ID to the individual train
A phonetic alphabet has been used by railways for at least 100 years; it's on the first page of the 1924 LMS ''Telegraphic Code to be used for Telegrams' and probably introduced long before.
It is not the present one but generally used Christian names, and W is William. Still used on BR into the eighties at least.
In the early 1920s the experimental radio station 2MT at Writtle was phonetically called 'Two Emma Toc'; this seems to follow the British Army radiotelephony spelling alphabet used from 1900 to 1914 (according to Wikipedia)
If these were loco hauled services, were they taking advantage of the locos being able to display letters in order to display the four digit train numbers elsewhere?
SR locos (classes 33, 70, 71, 73, 74) had 2-character displays but, unlike units, they included letters as well as numbers. Most, if not all, passenger services had numerical headcodes, even if loco-hauled (after all, a DEMU might be required to deputise) Letters were used for freight services.
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The Southern head codes were route codes, rather than train identifiers. So where I lived, we got two trains every hour carrying the headcode 94, for example.
I don't recall letters being used, only numbers. There could also be various types of bars above the numbers (solid bar, broken bar, etc) as well, I think to denote fast and semi fast services.
fast and semifast were usually distinguished by diffferent numbers eg 80 for Portsmouth Harbour fast, 81 for semifast
Two-digit numerical codes were introduced in 1933 for the Brighton electrification, but single letters, first introduced in 1916, continued to be used on suburban routes until 1939. (see the famous "HOVIS" advert, with a line up of 3SUBs notionally going to Hampton Court, the Hounslow loop, the Kingston Loop, Horsham, and Shepperton)
These used stencils in front of an illuminated opal glass plate. To minimise the number of stencil plates required, some codes used the same plate in different orientations - eg "J" was actually a reversed "L", "d" an inverted "P" and "^" an inverted "V"
The full list of letter plates is H, I, J/L, N, O, P/d, S, T, U, V.
When 2-digit codes were introduced, again to minimise the number of stencils needing to be carried, multiples of 11 were avoided. These were later used for services on non-electrified routes, (such as 22/33 for Hastings, and 66/77 for the Oxted line - keeping to the convention of odd numbers for the City (Cannon Street/London Bridge) and even for west end (Charing Cross/Victoria) as all DEMUs had roller blinds.
Bars and dots were used to signify variations of route or stopping pattern, and headcodes were reused between, and even within, the three divisions where the routes did not overlap - for example "V" was the Kingston roundabout, Victoria - Epsom via Mitcham Junction, London Bridge - Selhurst via Forest Hill, Victoria - Sevenoaks, and Charing Cross - Dartford via Greenwich.
2-digit headcodes were likewise recycled between divisions, 70 for example being waterloo - Portsmouth & Southesea, Victoria - Crystal Palace - Selhurst, the Bexleyheath line, and Victoria - Orpington.
Railways south of the Thames have a long tradition of using route codes, as evidenced by the remarkably complex system of discs and lamps used by the LBSC, SECR etc.
Does anyone know if any of the Scottish (ex Caledonian) semaphore route coding ever got translated into numerical code?
If these were loco hauled services, were they taking advantage of the locos being able to display letters in order to display the four digit train numbers elsewhere?
The SR diesels and EDs only ever had 2-character route code displays (as did DMUs on other regions originally BTW). The letters were essential as the numerical codes were pretty much all in use (and 5-6 times over to boot) AND generally useless for freight routings.
TfW use V for southbound trains on the Marches route, and W on the northbound.
And the "inter-regional" letter codes don't really exist any more, with S and I think M being used for some domestic services in England.
There also the confusing I code in use too on TfW (towards Birmingham).
There's a good chance headcodes will change again soon, depending on how GBR structures itself.
One day maybe we will be rid of TOC codes too, consigning eg AW (TfW) and VT (Avanti) to history.
The W thing for northbound Marches services started around 20 years ago due to frequent wrong-routings at Maindee West Jn. Birmingham-bound trains stayed as 1Mxx.
Another inter-regional route that’s lost traditional descriptors is Cardiff - Portsmouth. Was always O & V in loco-hauled days but has been 1Fxx in both directions for many years. Portsmouth-bound are odds, Cardiff evens.
Possibly so but I never heard the phonetic alphabet used in verbal railway comms in the decades as an operator before we all started talking about safety critical communications.
I did however hear lots of the words from telegraphic code books right through my career including the less common Byrag, Walnut, Rede, Gobi, etc..
I now remember where I used it a lot; in jobs that involved writing (a lot of) quotes letters to customers which had to be typed. I used, at several HQs, the railway dictaphone system - in effect you dictated a text to a tape recorder which the typist then played back later. Because of the poor quality of the audio, abbreviations and proper names had to be spelt out and that's where the phonetic alphabet came in. All Christian names apart from Queen, Uncle, Xmas, York, Zero.
The telegraphic code book listed about 500 codes. Although the meaning of each code was listed (in alpha order of the code) finding an appropriate code to use was time consuming and some seemed to be of very limited use. Some were just random words, for example the very useful PINE but others were abbreviated portmanteau words. One example of the latter was FUNCO for 'Vehicle with funeral party and corpse on .... train'. Unfortunate if you were misled into expecting to meet a happy group in fancy dress with party-blowers...
One example of the latter was FUNCO for 'Vehicle with funeral party and corpse on .... train'. Unfortunate if you were misled into expecting to meet a happy group in fancy dress with party-blowers...
The problem was deciphering the code words if you didn't have access to a copy of the code book. It was only after a friendly C&W Examiner took pity on me and presented me with a much thumbed copy that I found out how I was expected to respond to messages ending "WALNUT, REDE"!
By the by, does anyone know if cancelled trains are still described as "caped"?
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