The Bristol Railway Archive

I came to work in Bristol in 1984, after four years at Westbury depot hauling limestone from the Mendips.
Although still a freight guard, I did get the chance to work the odd passenger turn, mainly those that the passenger guards didn't want.
Typically these were the Severn Beach jobs and the Taunton stoppers, hard work with an Omniprinter ticket machine. In 1986 I joined the elite and took my place in a passenger link, thereby earning much better money on "mileage" jobs, working HST's to such exotic locations as Paignton, Derby and, of course, Paddington.
Those were great days and there was a great camaraderie amongst those who worked at Bath Road depot. I recall the time when a certain guard would never put his kit bag away, leaving it in the lobby for everyone to trip over. I emptied the contents of his bag and placed a class 47 brake block in it, before putting all his kit back in on top. He put his bag away after that!.
The upheaval of privatisation saw me working firstly for the Great Western shadow franchise, then the full-blown private sector. That wasn't too bad: GW was quite like a family firm until First took us over and morale dropped like a stone .
I left FGW and Bristol over two years ago, and now work for Virgin at Birmingham New Street, although I still get to work to and through Temple Meads on the odd occasion.
I have very fond memories of my time at Bristol and the great people I worked with there. I have lots of photos too, so maybe they'll get posted here in the future.
Regards,
Andy

Mitch wrote:I have very fond memories of my time at Bristol and the great people I worked with there. I have lots of photos too, so maybe they'll get posted here in the future.
Regards,
Andy

Cheers Andy,

I love reading stuff like this. I'd love to see the pics too!

One July day back in the eighties I was working a class 150 Sprinter back from Taunton to Bristol at around tea time. On arrival at Weston Super Mare the whole world and his wife, who had taken advantage of the one sunny day that year, attempted to board the train. Kids, prams, pushchairs, donkeys, whatever; they all wanted to go home on my train.
We left Weston packed solid and I decided not to check tickets, but to remain in the back cab.
Soon after leaving Weston Milton there was a knock on the cab door and an irate old lady told me I'd have to do something. "What's the problem?", I innocently asked. A young lady was the problem: she was obviously very drunk, had stripped off to her underwear and was enjoying the attention. I tried to reason with her and asked her to get dressed, with some success. A little later there was another knock on the cab door and the irate old lady was now fuming: "She's causing chaos out here!". So she was: having stripped off again she was now crawling around on the floor in her undies. I arranged for the police to meet us at Temple Meads, for her own good.
As we arrived at platform 12 at Temple Meads I saw two officers walking towards me. "What's the problem?", they asked. "A drunken young lady with no clothes on". "And you're complaining?". "Not me, it's the rest of them".........
The officers covered her up and took her, and her near-empty bottle of Pernod, away. I bet she hated herself next day.
Later that evening I bumped into a Cardiff Guards' Inspector who couldn't wait to tell me about what he'd heard had happened. Nothing travels faster than a rumour on the railway!.
Cheers,
Andy