Barmouth / Y Bermo bridge

[mailbyrail]

Certainly plenty of on-track activity around Porthmadog and Criccieth on Monday and a coach waiting for on-time departure from Pwllheli in Sunday evening - only thing missing seemed to be passengers. Even advertised stops at Abererch (where I'm staying) which hasn't had trains for a while due to covid.

 

[LSWR Cavalier]

There were many media reports recently about Fairbourne, it may be abandoned in a few decades because of rising sea levels.

Perhaps the line could be raised to allow for that, or is it not yet time to act? My idea would be to extend the bridge on a long curving incline to Friog with a new Arthog high-level station.

 

[Ken H]

All these replacement buses. Wonder what happens when there are no drivers available? There is another thread on shortages of bus drivers.

 

[Tomos y Tanc]

All these replacement buses. Wonder what happens when there are no drivers available? There is another thread on shortages of bus drivers.

That won't be a problem in north west Wales. The problem will be where will the bus drivers live when the holiday home owners and relocators drive the native population out.

 

[Mcr Warrior]

I've just returned to Aberystwyth, having travelled to Harlech and back, and I can confirm that there are two types of services from Machynlleth.

One is a direct service which stops at the major stations (Tywyn, Barmouth, Harlech and then, I think, a few more stations to Pwhelli; this is a coach. The other is an "all stations" stopper, which is a minibus.

Is the "all stations" rail replacement minibus also calling at the shorter platform stations that were being skip-stopped by TfW during the height of COVID-19?

 

[krus_aragon]

Is the original not Theseus' Ship?

It used to be Theseus' ship, but people have replaced so many little bits of the story over time, it's hard to tell now.

 

[EbbwJunction1]

Certainly plenty of on-track activity around Porthmadog and Criccieth on Monday and a coach waiting for on-time departure from Pwllheli in Sunday evening - only thing missing seemed to be passengers. Even advertised stops at Abererch (where I'm staying) which hasn't had trains for a while due to covid.

There weren't many people on the two coaches I took yesterday, but the mini buses looked to be fuller from Machynlleth and Harlech.

All these replacement buses. Wonder what happens when there are no drivers available? There is another thread on shortages of bus drivers.

All the coaches / minibuses at Machynlleth seemed to have drivers for them in the morning.

Is the "all stations" rail replacement minibus also calling at the shorter platform stations that were being skip-stopped by TfW during the height of COVID-19?

The timetable contains information on where the bus stops, but without going to them, it's difficult to know how close they get to the actual station.

 

[zwk500]

It used to be Theseus' ship, but people have replaced so many little bits of the story over time, it's hard to tell now.

Very good!

 

[adrock1976]

They should get the Sugababes to reopen it

Which version though?

None of the original members are part of the present day (or most recent) line up, and have not been for a good number of years.

 

[30907]

Is the "all stations" rail replacement minibus also calling at the shorter platform stations that were being skip-stopped by TfW during the height of COVID-19?

Yes.

 

[mrcheek]

Which version though?

None of the original members are part of the present day (or most recent) line up, and have not been for a good number of years.

That was basically the joke I was making

 

[EbbwJunction1]

I finished my last trip on the rail replacement bus services yesterday afternoon.

I will say that I have been pretty impressed by the organisation of all six journeys. I've travelled from Machynlleth to Harlech, Tywyn and Fairbourne and back over three days, using both the coaches and the minibuses, and things have gone pretty much as planned. Some of the timekeeping has been a bit tight, but I haven't missed a train from Machynlleth to Aberystwyth because of this.

Full marks to TFW and NR, as well as the bus companies and their drivers, for their work!

One other thing: I was able to have a fairly closeup look at the Bridge yesterday, and they seem to be cracking on with the work quite well. I can't give you a technical report, but there's certainly a lot of the Orange Army on site.

 

[splashoutradio]

Not sure if he's been mentioned elsewhere, but the Cambrian News are running the story that the opening of the Cambrian Line between Machynlleth and Pwllheli has been delayed until December 29th, due to "engineers finding the condition of the timber structure was worse than anticipated."

Full article: https://www.cambrian-news.co.uk/article.cfm?id=138284

 

[snowball]

Not sure if he's been mentioned elsewhere, but the Cambrian News are running the story that the opening of the Cambrian Line between Machynlleth and Pwllheli has been delayed until December 29th, due to "engineers finding the condition of the timber structure was worse than anticipated."

Full article: https://www.cambrian-news.co.uk/article.cfm?id=138284

Probably based on the NR press release:

Barmouth viaduct restoration extended as engineers discover damage much worse than feared

Network Rail has apologised to passengers and the local community as its £30m restoration of Barmouth Viaduct is being extended after engineers found the condition of the timber structure was worse than anticipated.

www.networkrailmediacentre.co.uk

Network Rail has apologised to passengers and the local community as its £30m restoration of Barmouth Viaduct is being extended after engineers found the condition of the timber structure was worse than anticipated.

The work to refurbish the Grade II* listed viaduct is the biggest and most ambitious in its history with the three-year programme scheduled to replace more than 1,000 timber and metal parts of the bridge, which are rotten and decaying.

The railway will now reopen on 29 December, 17 days later than planned, so engineers can safely carry out the additional repairs.

As work has progressed this autumn, Network Rail engineers have had the opportunity to thoroughly examine the condition of the structure. Unfortunately, a number of additional timbers under the railway and the walkway have been found to need replacing due to deterioration.

 

[1955LR]

Must admit I am not entirely surprised. A lot of the timbers are hidden from each other.

 

[robert thomas]

I wonder how many people are seriously inconvenienced by this, people living/working on opposite sides of the river, not necessarily train passengers.

I had an aunt who lived in Llwyngwril and although she had access to a car always used the train to travel to Tywyn or Barmouth as it was so much quicker(and cheaper}

 

[1955LR]

For info. I just had this from Network Rail regarding opening of the footbridge, dated 8th Feb. 2022

OFFICIAL​

Good Morning Mr Spooner,

Thank you for contacting us about Barmouth Viaduct.

We will be opening the bridge again to the public on Saturday 19 February at 7am.

I hope this helps but let me know if you have any further queries.


Kind regards,
Olivia

	Olivia Bauer
Community Relations Executive Gweithrediaeth Cysylltiadau Cymunedol

 

[markymark2000]

I know I am late to this discussion but oh well. Just wanted to pick up on a few points.

It really annoys me that providing for one set of disabled travellers (wheelchair users) has been done at the expense of a far more common set of disabled travellers (those requiring frequent toilet access, be that due to Crohn's, IBS or similar or simply age) by putting low floor buses on very long RRB runs instead of more suitable coaches. PSVAR really makes no sense applied to RRBs; a more railway-like requirement for provision rather than every vehicle would make much more sense. Indeed, it makes no sense for scheduled coaches either - if the service car is accessible, duplicates really don't need to be.

The Coaches, as far as I know all had toilets. Whether they were locked out of use is a different matter but all of the coaches on the limited stop runs has toilets. The minibuses meant to serve little stations, didn't but to be fair, most people didn't travel end to end on either of the trips. Barmouth had toilets and buses often waited there for people to go if the bus had time.

I do think it is worth noting that the road conditions and bus stops need service buses or minibuses and so to get these with toilets wouldn't happen anyway.

All these replacement buses. Wonder what happens when there are no drivers available? There is another thread on shortages of bus drivers.

There were local firms and some from far away. Pats from Wrexham, Lakeside from Ellesmere, Cymru Coaches from Swansea and Watts from Cardiff. To name a few. It wasn't all local drivers.