THE NORTH WALES COAST RAILWAY NOTICE
BOARD
Rheilffordd Arfordir Gogledd Cymru Bwrdd
hysbyseb
37 425 looking good at Rhymney on 26 April. Picture by John
Myers - more below.
This site is dedicated to all our regular contributors and
supporters, and especially the rail staff of North Wales.
Edition of 05 May 2005
Steam
times for 7 May
See the uksteam.info
website for full timings of the 'Irish Mail' charter to Holyhead
with 71000 Duke of Gloucester on Saturday 7 May. - 5 May
DRS news
If anyone has a picture of the westbound DRS train on 3 May, please
could they get in touch? Due to problems the Class 20 from this train
was left behind at Valley, leaving 37 259 ro return with the train. It
is planned to return the dead Class 20 to England on Friday 5 May's
train, sadnwiched between a pair of 37s, which should make an
interesting shot. - 4 May
Cambrian Coast line back
to Normal
The normal train service resumed on the Machynlleth - Pwllheli line on
1 May following completion of repairs at Friog. - 4 May
The Two Avons - last
chance
The Mid-Cheshire Rail Users Association have a few tickets left for
their special train to Bath, Salisbury and Eastleigh on 14 May. The
train pick up along the Mid-Cheshire Line, then Chester, Wrexham,
Gobowen and Shrewsbury. Details and booking form are on www.mcrua.org.uk/form.pdf.
- 3 May
Typographical notes, and
other 37 gossip.
Thanks to James Webb and Simon Cross for following up
our comments on the style of numbers applied to the repainted 37 425.
It seems that the correct face was not available at Toton in time for
the press 'photocall' on 12 April. They used standard EWS 'Gill Sans'
characters as a temporary measure, but these were replaced on 13 April
with the current numbers as seen on the pictures on this page. It's
been said, and we have to agree, that these replacement numbers are too
small, and not quite the correct 'rail alphabet' ... but even so,
everyone is surely pleased to see large logo blue out and about again.
Arriva would, it is said, like to name the loco with an appellation
appropriate to the area, perhaps with Welsh and English versions either
side. You are asked to send your suggestions to RAIL magazine at
rail@emap.com. Caerphilly Castle is an obvious choice, but this
may be used on 37 411 which should be around in BR green any
time now.
37 422 Cardiff Canton was turned out, with 37 427,
by EWS on a Pathfinder railtour to Cumbria on 2 May, despite having not
worked for a while, but unfortunately (and perhaps not
surprisingly) failed and was removed from the train at Preston on the
outward journey. - 3 May
Steam to Chester,
1 May
For the second year, the Mid-Cheshire rail partnership ran their May
Day steam shuttles, with two return trains from Altrincham to Chester
and back, worked by Ian Riley's 'Black 5' 4-6-0 4540, which nor proudly
bears the name Lancashire Fusilier. The even was again a great
success, with all tickets sold and no problems with the train running.
Northern Rail entered into the spirit of the thing by offering half
fare travel on their normal trains for the day.
Here is the stock for first train, the 10:35 Altrincham - Chester,
arriving at Altrincham. (Robert Hardwick)
Departure from Altrincham, watched by an appreciative audience (Robert
Hardwick)
45407 waiting to leave Chester with 2Z54, the 18L10 Chester -
Altrincham. (Laurence Wheeler) The reception at Chester included
a performance by the school band from Lörrach,
Germany, a twin town of Chester.
The Stanier-designed loco really digs in to the climb from
Mouldsworth to Delamere with her ten coach load. (Laurence Wheeler)
45407 leaves Altrincham with 5Z54, the 19:40 empty stock train
Altrincham - Carnforth. The steam engine was to be detached in the
Manchester area to go to Bury before returning to the North York Moors
Railway at the end of the week.
A portrait of the loco crew taken at Chester by Roy Norry, who
has a full feature on this train on his Railway Showcase website.
Roy writes to tell us that the North Wales railway site is among those
indexed on his www.northwaleslinks.co.uk site which is full of
interesting local information. - 3 May
Cardiff Class 37
cornucopia - report by John Myers
Business took me to Cardiff on 26 April, with an opportunity to spend
the evening sampling the 37/4 loco-hauled diagrams on the Rhymney
branch.
Unable to reach Cardiff Central in time for the 16:50 departure, I
joined 2R38 at Cardiff Queen Street and enjoyed a lively all-stations
run to Caerphilly behind 37 405.
Right departure time needed to be waited, so there was time to take a
short sequence of departure shots that were reminiscent of when our own
37 hauled services could be seen departing under the road bridges at
Rhyl.
Would that they could continue but, meanwhile, it would be a great
improvement if ATW could install dot matrix information screens, of the
type seen on Caerphilly platform, at stations on the North Wales Coast
main line and the associated branches. How about it, please?
The layout of the barriers and footbridge at Caerphilly make an
opposite platform shot, and the subsequent sprint to get aboard,
decidedly difficult so I had to shoot the next arrival (2R42 17:11
Cardiff Central Rhymney) from the bridge itself and where a fellow
enthusiast, standing next to me, also was from North Wales, as
was another on the platform. We all were rewarded with the
recently repainted 37 425, still without nameplates but looking
a true credit both to Arriva Trains Wales and those who had carried out
the work at Toton. Thank you and well done to all concerned.
After arrival at Rhymney, 37 405 assisted with shunting the empty stock
and, later ...
... 37 425 did the same once 37 408 Loch Rannoch
reached the terminus with the 17:48 from the Capital, reporting number
2R46 and with stock still bearing the Virgin logos. By this time,
a pleasantly sunny afternoon had deteriorated into a very wet evening,
the proper footpath leading to the pedestrian crossing of the line
being quite muddy.
Once again, it was a great pleasure to enjoy such classic traction on
the superb gradients of this line and I'm hoping that a few more
chances will remain for such visits to be repeated before the
inevitable happens. At least five of the ex-Scotrail 150/2 units
were observed during the course of the day, albeit one of which was
operating the Crewe-Chester shuttle service.
The run back down the branch by a Class 142 Pacer was uneventful,
providing a connection into a 153/158 combination forming the Milford
Haven-Crewe service at 20:44, itself affording me a look at the Down
Caledonian Sleeper on arrival before joining a Class 175 on 1D99 back
to Rhyl, and with our arrival being into Platform 1 on account of
overnight engineering works. The service departed towards Abergele
& Pensarn wrong line and with a pilotman in the cab. - 3 May.