Railway General Knowledge.

[Spamcan81]

Glasgow & South Western?

That’s no.3. Just one more to find now.

 

[RDP]

LB&SCR?

 

[Spamcan81]

LB&SCR?

That’s the fourth.

 

[Spamcan81]

Gloster got two so I declare them the winner.

 

[Gloster]

The SNCF X3800 railcars had a well-known nickname. What was it?

 

[Calthrop]

Picassos?

 

[Gloster]

Picassos?

Oui.

It is widely accepted that they gained the name because the driver sits in a little turret near one end, but it ain’t so. When the type appeared in 1950 they had a rather dull livery and were not easy to see by those on the track; there were a number of near misses and one PW man was run down late in the year. SNCF started experimenting to find a more visible livery and ended up with the standard red and white: it was the angular notch in the end that gained them the nickname.

Votre tour.

 

[Calthrop]

It was a pure guess -- the only nickname for a variety of SNCF railcar, that I knew of !

Merci -- je vais essayer ce jour, a penser de quelque chose pour une question.

 

[Calthrop]

What rail-administration event took place in these islands, exactly a hundred years ago; mirroring on a smaller scale, a corresponding such event exactly 102 years ago?

 

[Peter Mugridge]

What rail-administration event took place in these islands, exactly a hundred years ago; mirroring on a smaller scale, a corresponding such event exactly 102 years ago?

102 years ago was Grouping so I would hazard a guess that in 1925 a few "straggler" companies were grouped into the Big Four?

 

[Calthrop]

Afraid not -- essentially a "bigger-picture" thing, than that.

 

[Gloster]

Would it be the creation of the Great Southern Railways in Ireland?

 

[Calthrop]

That's right -- the Irish Free State's equivalent of our Grouping two years earlier. All railway companies totally within the Free State, were merged to become the Great Southern.

With the blessing, 'tis yours to be afther setting the next question.

 

[Gloster]

What railways were amalgamated into the Great Southern Railways on 1 January 1925? I want a precise answer.

 

[Calthrop]

Well -- according to one source, the GSR had 25 constituents; some generally reckoned "mad and nonsensical". Without outright cheating or attempts at same: I can come up with a -- probably not precise enough -- number in the mid-teens.

5' 3" gauge:

Great Southern & Western; Midland Great Western; Dublin & South-Eastern; City of Dublin Junction (doubtful -- reckoned to be, to all intents and purposes, part of the D&SE); Cork, Bandon & South Coast; Timoleague & Courtmacsherry; Cork & Macroom Direct; Waterford & Tramore. And I think there was a weird notionally-independent "joint-something" broad-gauge concern, involving Rosslare.

3' gauge:

Cork, Blackrock & Passage; Cork & Muskerry; Schull & Skibbereen; Tralee & Dingle; West Clare; Cavan & Leitrim.

And the hapless Listowel & Ballybunion Monorail, which was not brought into the GSR: as at mid-1924 it was still running, though physically and financially in a bad way -- those doing the sorting-out re the shortly-to-be-set-up GSR, refused to have any truck with something anyway so barmy, and basically in a state of ruination; it closed in October 1924. (One feels that this was rather unsporting and Scrooge-ish on the part of the embryonic GSR; can, however, see their point of view.)

 

[Gloster]

Well -- according to one source, the GSR had 25 constituents; some generally reckoned "mad and nonsensical". Without outright cheating or attempts at same: I can come up with a -- probably not precise enough -- number in the mid-teens.

5' 3" gauge:

Great Southern & Western; Midland Great Western; Dublin & South-Eastern; City of Dublin Junction (doubtful -- reckoned to be, to all intents and purposes, part of the D&SE); Cork, Bandon & South Coast; Timoleague & Courtmacsherry; Cork & Macroom Direct; Waterford & Tramore. And I think there was a weird notionally-independent "joint-something" broad-gauge concern, involving Rosslare.

3' gauge:

Cork, Blackrock & Passage; Cork & Muskerry; Schull & Skibbereen; Tralee & Dingle; West Clare; Cavan & Leitrim.

And the hapless Listowel & Ballybunion Monorail, which was not brought into the GSR: as at mid-1924 it was still running, though physically and financially in a bad way -- those doing the sorting-out re the shortly-to-be-set-up GSR, refused to have any truck with something anyway so barmy, and basically in a state of ruination; it closed in October 1924. (One feels that this was rather unsporting and Scrooge-ish on the part of the embryonic GSR; can, however, see their point of view.)

Sorry, far too many: the question was precisely phrased.

 

[Calthrop]

Sorry, far too many: the question was precisely phrased.

Call me dim: but I really don't understand, here.

 

[xotGD]

Precisely all of them.

 

[DerekC]

I have Googled and put myself out of the running, but if I have got it right, I think it might be clearer if the question said "Precisely how many railway companies were amalgamated to create the Great Southern Railways Limited on 1st January 1925?"

 

[Gloster]

I have Googled and put myself out of the running, but if I have got it right, I think it might be clearer if the question said "Precisely how many railway companies were amalgamated to create the Great Southern Railways Limited on 1st January 1925?"

Your Googling has found the point at issue, but I did want the railways’ names.

 

[Gloster]

To provide a small clue: the around two dozen small companies were not amalgamated, but were, to use the correct term, absorbed by the Great Southern Railways.

 

[Spamcan81]

GSWR
MGWR
DSER
Cork Blackrock and Passage

 

[Gloster]

GSWR
MGWR
DSER
Cork Blackrock and Passage

Only one of these is correct.

 

[Gloster]

Well, nobody seems to be going for this one, so I will give what would have been two separate clues at the same time in the hope that something will click in somebody’s mind.

The s on the end of Great Southern Railways is important, as is the date given.

 

[Calthrop]

As with another participant in this question: I've consulted the authorities, and thus disqualified myself from further submissions.

 

[Gloster]

I will put this out of its misery. The Great Southern Railways was formed on 1 January 1925 by the amalgamation of the Great Southern Railway (itself formed on 12 November 1924 by the amalgamation of the Great Southern & Western Railway, the Midland Great Western Railway and the Cork, Bandon & South Coast Railway) and the Dublin & South Eastern Railway. The D&SER had not been included in the first amalgamation as there was the little matter of an unrepaid loan of £100,000 from the L&NWR and the division of shipping receipts.

Source: The Dublin & South Eastern Railway, Shepherd, David & Charles, 1974.

So…open floor.

 

[xotGD]

If I may...

Which class of train had the nickname "Dusty Bin", and why?

 

[Peterthegreat]

The 321s from the TV show of the same name.

 

[xotGD]

The 321s from the TV show of the same name.

Correct - you avoid the booby prize on said gameshow of Dusty Bin, from which the nickname comes.

Your turn to be Ted Rogers...

 

[Peterthegreat]

Thank you.
Where is the longest (single) escalator in the UK?