Sunday Variety

CHURCH LINK

SERVICE STARTS AT 1030

Today's service is live and ON-LINE
back in the Church.

 Click on this link (here),

which will take you to the YouTube page.

Then click on the icon for today's date.

-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o 

Building Better at Bristol (1)

fbb received a message from First Great Western Railway (GWR) warning him of engineering work at Temple Meads. The recent blogged notes about the use of Bedhampton station as a replacement terminus when Temple Meads is inaccessible had already hinted that exciting (?) things were in the offing.

Before our national railways were fragmented, BR would issue a comprehensive timetable booklet showing the various tables from the national timetable. These would appear in various guises to cover the various closure options date by date.

Nowadays passengers have a choice. They can either rely on Journey Planners or hope that the rail operating companies publish timetables. These days there is a good chance there will be no timetable, printed or on-line, and thus the journey planner is your only source of information.

So fbb visits the GWR web site where he first needs to excavate deep into the pages to find any notices about forthcoming disruption..

No he wouldn't! He would like to find out when his train is running.

Planed Engineering, almost an afterthought on the home page ...

... offers helpful updates for April 2021 ...

... and a more lengthy list for May. The significant changes for Bristol are summarised ...

Bristol Temple Meads to Filton Abbey Wood

Saturday 10 July to Friday 6 August

Bristol Temple Meads to Filton Abbey Wood/Keynsham

Saturday 7 August

all services via Bristol Temple Meads

Sunday 8 August

Bristol Temple Meads to Filton Abbey Wood/Keynsham 

Monday 9 to Friday 13 August

Bristol Temple Meads to Keynsham

Saturday 14 to Monday 30 August

all services via Bristol Temple Meads

Tuesday 31 August to Friday 3 September

... and it is a potentially bewildering collection. But to find "details" we are directed to another Bristol-specific web site link; where we get a slightly different version of the above list.

Additionally we are offfered this:-

Amended train services

Journey planners are currently being updated at around six weeks before amended services are due to run, including any replacement buses.

As a result, some journey enquiries made before that time may not be accurate – please check the details of your journey less than six weeks before you travel.

This means that amended services running from Saturday 10 July to Friday 6 August should be updated in journey planners by Friday 18 June onwards.

The amended services running from Saturday 7 to Friday 13 August should be updated by Friday 25 June onwards.

Finally, the amended services running from Saturday 14 August to Friday 3 September should be updated by Friday 16 July onwards.

So, all together now ...

... PLAN WELL AHEAD!

Oh, sorry. You can't.

More to Follow.

There Is A Bus In The Picture

This is the Dominion Cinema in Harrow, photographed in its heyday, the 1930s.

It was "improved" in the 1960s  by panelling over the wondrous art deco frontage, turning it into a VERY uninspiring box.

It was later renamed the Safari and even later closed.

But Harrow Council have just approved a redevlopment plan for a block of flats (inevitably) BUT, joyously, retaining the original frontage.

If the old man had to live on Station Road in Harrow, well placed for his daily commute, wouldn't it be just fantastic to have this as his front door?

The Victory Church (recent occupants of the Dominion/Safari) ...

... has moved to premises on an industrial estate at Wembley.

Personal Service From First South Yorkshire

Personal Service From First Wessex

It is comforting in the extreme to know that the good folk at First South Yorkshire/Wessex (delete where inapplicable) are on hand day after day to keep us all informed and happy in our local quest for local information from our local bus company.

You can shed a tear because they care so much!

It Is All About Image

Well, it is at East Midlands Railway

At least when Scotland takes over Scotrail there should be no change to the spotty livery.

Whoops! fbb forgot - the HSTs are notty spotty in Scotty-land.

Diesels Are (Technical Term) BIG

It doesn't look too big on a reasonably wide road - but on a narrow access back street ...

... Wowsers! Apparently the bloke who lives behind the green door nipped out to take the above photo.

Puzzle Pictures

This shows work on Bletchley Flyover, built in the 1960s to take trains to a planned marshalling yard at Swanbourne. A change in policy meant that Swanbourne never happened and the flyover was, realistically, useless.

Much of the old flyover has been demolished ...

... to be replaced with something very different.

There are two reasons for this major rebuild. Firstly, the old flyover was in poor shape and, secondly, the platforms for Bletchley on the re-opened route from Oxford to Bedford (to be extended to Cambridge) will be atop the flyover.

Bletchley bus station is top right in the above visualisation and just opposite will be a new eastern entrance to the station.

The other "puzzle" wasn't much of a puzzle. But remember that fbb was eyeing up Mrs fbb's pinking shears. The old man's plan was to cut thin strips of plastic with a pinked (zig-zag) edge as platform valancing.

But real valances are more complex in design.

That is when fbb found this pack on-line ...

... two of which were sufficient to valance the whole canopy.

Work starts soon on installing lighting and, as usual, it will need a bit of a bodge.

 Bank Holiday Quiz blog : Monday 3rd May