Community passenger train along the Portbury branch

mow · Post by **mow** » Mon Oct 01, 2012 12:37 pm

For the future - commuters complain about over crowding on suburban services.

The Clifton Bridge.

Western venturer · Post by **Western venturer** » Mon Oct 01, 2012 3:08 pm

According to this there isnt/wasnt a 1309...

http://www.fgwevents.co.uk/

Robin Summerhill · Post by **Robin Summerhill** » Mon Oct 01, 2012 3:20 pm

Western venturer wrote:According to this there isnt/wasnt a 1309...

http://www.fgwevents.co.uk/

Circle squared

jules · Post by **jules** » Mon Oct 01, 2012 4:42 pm

Just goes to show - given sufficient time, organizing trains is easy. Organizing paths, stock, staff - all relatively easy - despite the fact you are asking those staff to do something completely outside of their ordinary day to day experiences, so cock-ups on the day can never be fully protected against. It is how they are dealt with that matters ...

Organizing passengers however is like trying to herd cats.

There might also be another angle in this: if I was FGW I would have had a few extra drivers/guards on there doing route learning. Too good an opportunity to miss. So perhaps the Henbury loop was always a planned working, but not made public. Then somebody maybe decided rather late in the process to "let the public go along for the ride ..."

A generous gesture if that was the case, but somewhat irregular ...

It would however explain where the units were supposed to be during the "missing" BRI departures.

Tagging the 153 on was also probably an unwise afterthought, which led to the little mishap at Portbury. A 153 is after all 76' long, almost 10' longer than a 150 and I suspect its use may not have been pre-approved

Just a theory ...

nickt · Post by **nickt** » Mon Oct 01, 2012 5:16 pm

[quote="Robin Summerhill
3. Bearing in mind that there will always be a few who won't turn up on the day, I would also have issued a few "standby" tickets to those who had just missed out, giving them permission to travel but only if seats were available on the day. If they wanted to come to BTM and run the risk of waving the train goodbye as it was full, that would have been their bad luck, but I would have done all I could.[/quote]

Well somebody must have read your mind, I was one of those non show persons for an earlier train,

but when I asked Vicky If it would be possible to fill an empty seat she issued me a new ticket from a (standby) pile in front of her, for which I was grateful. My ticket was not checked.
There was qiute a bit of chatter about the minor scrape at portbury on earlier trip.
To be honest there were a number of scrapes on Henbury run because being freight only I doubt much overgrowth trimming takes place.
Thanks FGW

Western venturer · Post by **Western venturer** » Mon Oct 01, 2012 5:23 pm

nickt I can assure you it was not a tree that scraped the 153 ... it was the gate at Portbury.. if I knew how to put pictures up I would show the damage caused to the side of the unit..

Robin Summerhill · Post by **Robin Summerhill** » Mon Oct 01, 2012 5:43 pm

jules wrote: Organizing passengers however is like trying to herd cats.

Off topic but it just reminded me of when I used to organise "Councillor's Days Out" back in the 90s - take 'em for a ride around the area once a year, and show 'em the new developments, the planning enquiry sites and so on.

I made it a rule never to let the buggers off the bus unless it was absolutely unaviodable, because you could rest assured that even a 10 minute PNB (to use railway parlance) would turn into a 25 minute stop by the time I'd rounded 'em back up again. Played havoc with my timetable that I'd given the coach company

My request to take a sheepdog along was turned down

But back on topic:

Western venturer wrote: http://www.fgwevents.co.uk/

I'd not seen that web page for a few weeks because it had been replaced with the "there are no places left" page, so I'd forgotten that the service was not hourly on the day - I simply based that statement on the fact that I was in BTM at 1505 to watch that train go out, and I was on the 1609.

The nearest that page comes to saying anything about anything other than the Portbury branch is:

FGW website wrote: Visitors will have the opportunity to see some of the railway routes that could form future additions to the Bristol passenger network, thanks to a special charter train that will run over lines currently used only for freight services.

Note the use of "routes" and "lines" (plural) - that's the only clue on there that something other than Portbury might be happening.

It also says: "each trip takes approximately 1 hour". It was therefore fully understandable that some people who were on the 1209 departure might expect to be let off the train when it ran back through BTM about 60 minutes later.

Robin Summerhill · Post by **Robin Summerhill** » Mon Oct 01, 2012 5:47 pm

Western venturer wrote: if I knew how to put pictures up I would show the damage caused to the side of the unit..

If you click on "quote" on mow's post at the top of the page you will see the code that you need to use. You then need to copy in a web address (such as, for example, the photo's ID page on Flickr) between the two sets of square brackets.

I hope that makes sense

mow · Post by **mow** » Mon Oct 01, 2012 6:18 pm

When I was sharing photos, Rich Eason advised me to paste code -

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/16582147@N07/8035597756/" title="portbury train by m.c.g.o, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8038/8035 ... 1e782d.jpg" width="490" height="500" alt="portbury train"></a>

Remove all the text up to http://farm...jpg

and from "width...up to </a>

stopblock · Post by **stopblock** » Mon Oct 01, 2012 8:48 pm

Was it the gates or was it their anti car bollards that are placed next to the lines at Portbury. The usual automatic gate has been forceably removed ! Not sure how or why but its nothing to do with the red teams trains.

Western venturer · Post by **Western venturer** » Mon Oct 01, 2012 9:04 pm

Heres a link to my pic of damage..

http://www.flickr.com/photos/82416876@N ... hotostream

You can see the Regional Railways Blue and white livery where the gate ripped the surround to the valve, or whatever it is, off..
its got to be about 8 ft off the ground so doubt if it was bollards.. definitely the gate..

Post by **madhattie** » Mon Oct 01, 2012 9:44 pm

To add pics from Flickr you simply click the 'Share' tab and choose the BBCode option. This will also give you the option to post at different sizes.

carpetcone · Post by **carpetcone** » Sat Oct 06, 2012 3:49 am

The dreaded SPAM emails have started arriving from FGW. In fact, they are sending me TWO of each....

I just knew it would happen

Western venturer · Post by **Western venturer** » Thu Oct 11, 2012 9:21 pm

Heres a video of the train, cab views included...

http://youtu.be/D9Y6sAB-33U

Thanks Alexis..

mow · Post by **mow** » Mon Mar 11, 2013 11:39 am

Headline on BBC Bristol page re clearance on line near Portishead.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-bristol-21738510

Earlier photos of some work in February.

http://www.portisheadrailwaygroup.org/