Saturday Variety

 Ballachulish's Big Bridge ...

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... opened with appropriate ceremony in 1975 ...

... but, unlike yesterday's Connel Bridge, it was built for two way traffic!

It replaced a ferry which had been operated for passengers only since 1773. Unlike at Connel, however, there was a road round Loch Leven which allowed the parsimonious or adventurous to avoid the ferry,

As we saw at Connel, there was a railway to Ballachulish which has its very own station for interchange with the ferry.

The interchange was not lavish. 

The line continued beyond the above to a station called Ballachulish Glen Coe.

Ballachulish Ferry was not at Ballachulish whilst Ballachulish Glen Coe was not at Glen Coe! But, if you were very lucky you might catch a MacBrayne's bus up the hill!

So it was that cars were carried, precariously, from the early 1900s.

Rather them than me, opines fbb, at the thought of aiming a heavy motor car up two planks!

More on ferries and bridge in tomorrows blog.

Farewell Conductors

Birmingham 'Metro' Trams began, as was trendy at the time, with self-service ticket machines at tram stops.

There were problems with the machines so they were removed and conductors arrived.

Now the operator is going back to the future. Off-tram ticket machines have been around for a while but ...

... the news now breaks that conductors are being removed and "transferred to revenue protection duties".

What, all of them? No chance; as then there would be no point in getting rid if conductors.

Brummie locals are not happy. They prefer a member of staff accessible in every tram because the driver us inaccessible in his cosy cab.

Sheffield Supertram ...

... had ludicrously complex machines where you bought a ticket and then had to validate it as a separate action. 

The technology was unreliable AND confusing, so when Stagecoach won the operating contract, it was onwards and upwiars with conductors.

How long will it be before conductors are back in Birmingham?

News From Ulaanbaatar

This is certainly the first ever item in an fbb blog from Mongolia. There it is, comfortably (?) sandwiched between Russia and China. Frankly, fbb wasn't sure!

To cope with busy freight routes via the capital city ...

A brand new by pass line is being built.

We are told that the line will pass close to the airport ...

... presumably to the south thereof, and that it will reduce train congestion in the city.

The Next Step

Remember Velvet? At their launch we saw just part of a new train, soon to be delivered (!) for "Open Access" services in France.

Cunningly, Velvet had only stuck sticky-backed plastic on the front section of a borrowed driving coach!

Well, positive things are now happening.

This does NOT mean that Velvet will run any trains, but it does mean that they have passed initial tests to be an acceptable contender to submit bids for track access paths.

Keep plodding on, folks!

A Line of Coopers

It was a collage of Walsall buses from Pinterest that guided fbb to the 'Cooperline' web site.

There was grandfather ...

... a railway photographer and modeller.

Father ...

... was a prolific painter of buses and commercial vehicles as seen in the Walsall collection.

The "boy", Dave Cooper, is into the Art of the Natural World.

The Cooperline web site us well worth an extended perusal. Prints are on sale there.

First 10 Quiz Answers

Correct response in BLUE

Brylaine

Nottingham Playhouse

Crystal Palace, London

London Underground heritage specials

British Coachways

Stroud, Gloucestershire

Reading

Brighton

Hereford

Southdown

Maidstone

The second set of answers will appear tomorrow.

 Next Variety blog : Sun 6th Sept