Recent content by White Ant

This is one for the rail historians from the early days of the London to Birmingham link. There is an article in the Railway Times of 30th December 1848 which discusses the London and North Western Railway appealing a Poor Rate for the village of Church Lawford, near Rugby - the Railway passes...

Both delays were due to lineside fires - and there was plenty of evidence of charred vegetation for those who had rover tickets. Having been to many rail gala this was my first visit to a gala on the KWVR, and I was surprised at the huge numbers of the "hi-vis" brigade who were allowed to wander...

Maybe not - but they should be made to consider these at an early stage. If they build something decent but impose serious parking charges / access charges people will baulk against it.

There is now a set of information flyers and links available at https://ask.warwickshire.gov.uk/insights-service/rugby-parkway/ along with an online survey about the new initiative. They include an observation that the current station is limited by its Town Centre location. Thats a very moot...

You have done an excellent job there, and one wonders why the relevant authorities couldn't have done similar - and at least have a plan in place for one of these alternatives by now. In the longer term the issue at Kempston Hardwick could easily be removed if the station closes due to the...

It seems the various planners will have egg on their faces, having built a link road from the new Houlton Development at considerable expense that is focussed on access to the existing Rail Station - with all kinds of restrictions on access to and from other routes - and yet now they want to...

Details here - https://www.warwickshire.gov.uk/news/article/3711/first-look-at-plans-for-rugby-parkway-station-have-your-say Lots of new houses on that side of town in the Houlton Development on some of the land formerly occupied by Rugby Radio Station / Hillmorton Radio Masts. Not sure it...

It wlll be interesting to see what form of rebranding might be done. As someone who vowed never to book another excursion on Steam Dreams after suffering a "tough luck" response when suffering a Diesel substitution some years ago, I will be watching what sort of reputation the operation might...

Ah - that makes perfect sense. Thanks.

I wonder if anyone can enlighten me regarding a short little freight train I saw between Coventry and Rugby this afternoon. Looking at Real Time Trains it seems to be "UID H00060, identity 3J01 TSC 95762000", and it seems to go all over the place - Brum-Rugby-Stafford-Bletchley-Bedford-Euston...

That did occur to me when I saw the first one at Rugby, but having seen the third one yesterday, all at stations on the West Coast Mainline, and all walking the complete length of the platform, I thought it must be something the train company was behind. Perhaps you are correct though.

Being familiar with the hi-viz guys at Bletchley or Berkhamsted, I was wrong footed when I saw a girl in street clothes with shopping bag walking the length of the platform opposite me at Rugby. I’ve now seem different women doing the same thing at Tamworth and today at Northampton. I’m all in...

Given two of the three highlighted stories on Google when you search for Avanti West Coast are now negative ones, their Marketing people can't be too impressed if their IT people have failed to stress test the systems (or indeed offer at least as much functionality as their predecessor).

I was interested to spot this thread, as the "Revenue Protection" people at Euston are the only people I've really taken a dislike to in 40+ years of Rail Travel. I was travelling through Euston when pretty much every train was affected by bad weather, and every departure on the boards with the...

This problem also applies to Eurostar trains, with people in the furthest coaches really struggling to reach them ahead of departure time, as they are only allowed onto the platform shortly before departure time. I thought this might be to ensure people didn't get on the wrong train until I...