Sunday Bits and Bobs

Thousands of our Readers Have Asked ...
Well two have. So here is the first batch of "answers to April 1st "Fake or Fact" blogs.

Yes, a real loco looking very much like this "toy" worked in the Dowlais iron works ...

... situated near Merthyr Tydfil.

The Hornby version is a remarkably accurate model - for a toy! Can we have one modelled as "king George V, please?

Oliver Bullied's Leader class was a wholly unsuccessful steam locomotive design for the Southern Railway . It did improve visibility for the driver, however.

Sadly, no. But it would have worked albeit at a slow speed!

Whilst the Sinclair C5 was real enough, the suggested test run round the North Circular Road did not take place; unless anyone knows better?

Volk's "daddy long legs" was real enough. At low tide you can still sometimes see the track base - but our Magnus did not take account of the force of wind and waves which soon ended the project. Pity.

More tomorrow.

Real Railways Often Have BIG Scenery

This picture popped into fbb's microchips unannounced.

At first glance it looks real. The actual location is the Edge Hill cutting and arches a short distance outside Livepool Lime Street station.

10000 is a model but running through scale scenery. Here is a real train in a similar shot top that of the model.

And another taken through the windscreen of a train leaving (?) the Merseyside terminus.

Most railway modellers only have space for weedy sized scenery (e.g. fbb's layout) - you need much fine gold to build something as big and as good as the model pictured above.

A Majestic Classical Colonnade ...

... In South London.

After starring in Albert's "Great Exhibition" the Crystal Palace was moved to Crystal Palace (although it wasn't called that then). It stood with a frontage on Crystal Palace Parade.

Opposite the crystal and steel marvel was Crystal Palace High Level station; a grand building to match the magnificence opposite.

The two buildings sat well together.

To join the two was a subway under the busy road. But what a subway!

You can just see it marked opposite the "L" of Crystal. The branch closed in 1954.

Amazingly it is still there, tended by a team of volunteers who would like to see it fully restored and opened permanently.

Currently the colonnade is opened a few times a year.

The Society has worked hard to preserve and make safe but surely there should be some kind organisation that would offer grants to fully restore this delight.

The best you can do when it isn't open is to peer thoughtfully over the wall or fence.

The High Level station closed in 1954 and there is little evidence left of its grandeur.

But the other Crystal Palace station is still worth a visit. Much reduced in size for today's simplified railway, there are still plenty of signs of the station's former magnificence.

For those less familiar with lines in the Crystal Palace area the CartoMetro map (online and downloadable) is an excellent resource.  Here is the area in question ...

... withe the former High Level branch shown in grey. Above Lordship Lane and Forest Hill we see the branch joining the existing network at Nunhead.

Stagecoach X6 Reprise

Yesterday's blog referred to the "courageous" new hourly service between Sheffield and the neatly names Sheffield Doncaster Airport (formerly RAF Finningley). In the early hours fbb added Roy's picture of the very first X6 yesterday morning. Here it is again, this time complete.

Apparently the vehicles with dedicated livery were "not ready" for the first day. And a close-up of the destination "display".

DSA is the IATA code for the airport.

And Two Mystery Pictures
What is fbb up to here? Has he poured his bedtime cup of hot milk over some trackwork?

More tomorrow amongst other things.

 Next bits and bobs blog : Monday 8th April