A week ago (Sunday 15th November) I happened to be within sight of the railway about half a mile on the country side of Surbiton station, and saw a freight train travelling away from London. I can't remember the exact time, but it was approximately mid-afternoon. I didn't see the locomotive, but the train consisted of mostly-covered wagons with what appeared to be new cars visible through the gaps in the covers -- I'm guessing they were on the way to Southampton docks.
Revenue-earning freight trains are a rare sight at Surbiton. I presume that this one would normally have travelled via Staines to reach the main line at Byfleet and New Haw but had been diverted due to the engineering work that had closed the Feltham-Staines line that day. However, I was still curious to know more about it, so I tried looking it up on Realtime Trains, but I couldn't find any sign of it: http://www.realtimetrains.co.uk/search/advanced/SUR/2015/11/15/0600-2000?stp=WVS&show=non-passenger&order=wtt. Does anyone know where it was travelling from and to, and by what route? And does anyone know why I couldn't find it on Realtime Trains? -- I'm not that familiar with the site, so I could have done something wrong, but I'm not sure what. (Another puzzle is that when you click through to 3S84, the Effingham Junction to Effingham junction service which I presume is a railhead treatment train, it appears to have passed Surbiton several times that day, but only one of these passes appears in the search).
Revenue-earning freight trains are a rare sight at Surbiton. I presume that this one would normally have travelled via Staines to reach the main line at Byfleet and New Haw but had been diverted due to the engineering work that had closed the Feltham-Staines line that day. However, I was still curious to know more about it, so I tried looking it up on Realtime Trains, but I couldn't find any sign of it: http://www.realtimetrains.co.uk/search/advanced/SUR/2015/11/15/0600-2000?stp=WVS&show=non-passenger&order=wtt. Does anyone know where it was travelling from and to, and by what route? And does anyone know why I couldn't find it on Realtime Trains? -- I'm not that familiar with the site, so I could have done something wrong, but I'm not sure what. (Another puzzle is that when you click through to 3S84, the Effingham Junction to Effingham junction service which I presume is a railhead treatment train, it appears to have passed Surbiton several times that day, but only one of these passes appears in the search).
