Bristol to Gloucester and back 1969 

Thank you for your kind words

Shame about Barrow Rd TMD. Another wasted asset.

Closed Boxing Day 1969

D1733 was the loco chosen to work with the XP64 set in 1964, and was finished in the experimental turquoise-blue, which was a distinctly lighter shade than BR Standard Monastral Blue. The BR logo was carried on self-adhesive flame-red panels under the cab side windows, and small warning panels were applied. It looks to me as though it is still in this livery, with the red panels removed, which would be interesting as I thought it had been repainted in standard blue well before 1969. See Class47.co.uk-Numbers.

You may appreciate this: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-VRZ09mgjJOU.html

There's an old British Rail report online somewhere from the early 90s about how dangerous the old doors were, it detailed how many deaths there had been from people falling out of trains and from memory it was about 50 per year in the 1980s. Plus many multiples of this number were injured by the old doors, often passengers waiting on the platform hit by people opening doors when trains were still moving. You can see why this was just not acceptable on a modern railway and had to be phased out when stock was replaced. Most European railways had power operated doors on mainline stock many years before the UK, we certainly lagged behind on that.

Westerleigh Junction itself is part of the capacity limitation, I think, being a flat junction, along with the rather slow curve between it and the old Midland route north thereof. Looking on the bright side, at least they’ve restored much of Filton bank between TM and Parkway. I can remember doing a few nightshifts on site when it was de-quadrupled in 1984, to save money etc.

@@johnkeepin7527 I’m sure you are right that it’s a bit more complicated than just the cutting - there’s long stretches of viaduct that would need to be replaced/widened as well as the junction to re-engineer. Reopening the old line is probably also difficult requiring the demolition of several Bristol developments and moving the Bristol ring road. All very expensive. I suspect a new London Wales line would be the best option. But given the political fight over HS2 if fear we are a long way off that.

I concur.

@@johnsmart964 it would get a lot of cars off the road going in to town on a morning.

From Lawrence Hill Jct (2.52) to Mangotsfield (6.00) we are on the route, which is now the Bristol to Bath Railway path.

@@BobBishopDiagonal thanks for replying Bob. That station / turn / junction sticks in my head as a cyclist as, when seeing it for the first time, was fascinated at how the platform splits in two different direction plus the building on the station is quite remarkable as well. When I saw it in the video I thought that had to be it. Thanks for confirming.