Now I would have said the Penydarren Engine was better known - and not just because this stands just down the road from me:

 

But it was in France not really a UK railway problem

 
Former Russian Transport Minister Roman Starovoit has committed suicide on the day of his dismissal.
Starovoit's death was confirmed by the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation. They reported that the former minister's body with a gunshot wound was found in the Odintsovo municipal district in his personal car. Russian investigators say they are investigating the circumstances of his death.
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Telegram channels report that a firearm was found next to the body, and the preliminary cause of Starovoit's suicide is a possible criminal case involving violations during the construction of fortifications in Kursk Oblast.
Mash reports that Starovoit signed a decision by the region's operational headquarters to allow the Kursk Oblast Development Corporation to spend 19 billion roubles (US$241 million) and select subcontractors itself.
In addition, the investigation is checking the possibility of Starovoit's involvement in violations in the procurement of medicines for hospitals in the oblast and in the "failed transport reform" in Kursk, which failed to repair tram tracks and deliver new carriages.

Starovoit was testified against by the former head of Kursk Oblast, Alexei Smirnov, who was arrested in a case involving the embezzlement of 1 billion roubles (US$12 million). The same was done by the former director general of the corporation, Vladimir Lukin, and former Kursk head deputy Maxim Vasilyev, who was involved in the construction business. Both are currently in pre-trial detention.

Russian leader Vladimir Putin dismissed Starovoit on the morning of 7 July.

 

Glad to have met your expectations. 

 

Just as I suspected.

 

The Class 76 (EM1) and Class 77 (EM2) locomotives used on the Woodhead route predate the Class 81. They were 1.5kV DC. The Class 81s were the first fleet of 25kV AC locomotives.

 

No evidence that I can post. 

I to have seen the latest joint communication.  I would have grave concerns regarding the process if I was a GWR driver.  Let’s just say, your DDC isn’t as strong as it use to be. 

 
Mr Hutson must have a holiday booked for next month. Plans for cable-cars and pods - nice touch sort of combining them - usually come out in August, when the Post traditionally has nothing else worth reporting on.

 

Not for the airport (though it might manage gradients) but do not rule out the Wuppertal system for suspension about the Avon - I have suggested it for Bath in the past, from Park and Ride at Batheaston Meadows to the Park and Ride at Newbridge.   Hands will be thrown up in horror of course, though I would bet that if it had been installed in Victorian times, it would be a major part of the cit's heritage and hands would be thrown up in horror at taking in down / closing it.   It is, of course, steel wheels on Steels rails, Red Squirrel - just that the rails are above the passengers not below them!

 
I thought people just wasted their time with stories like that on April Fools day

 
The system's capacity of 480 passengers/hour seated (or 780 with some extra standing) could arguably be said to be inadequate for a mass transport system for an increasingly busy airport.  Also sharing the route above the main line between Parson Street and Bristol Temple Meads may raise a few eyebrows at NR/GBR.

 
This, for what it's worth, seems to fit into the category 'Dangleway' according to the Gareth Dennis flowchart. For those who haven't come across it before, it's here:


Image ©Gareth Dennis (see https://x.com/GarethDennis/status/1534621173027323904)

 

It's striking that this is now commonplace. Historically, the railway ran on the principle of infrequent services with a lot of thought put into ensuring that these ran to time - and this carried over into the age of more frequent train provision: the quieter parts of the network didn't experience multi-hour gaps in service caused by cancellations.

As far as certain parts of the rail network goes, in the south west in particular, this principle seems to have gone out of the window. Given the inflexible costs involved in a railway operation, the industry's position on this is... odd.

Mark

 
Perhaps he could link up with Barry 'crash mats' from the Portishead busway PLC to provide a soft landing for derailed podders.....

 
Here we go again.  Bristol Live reports on an inventor calling upon Bristol transport planners to adopt his pod based aerial rail system to link Bristol to it's airport.  The claim is that it would be both quicker and cheaper to build than conventional trams or trains.
A sort of hybrid between a cable car and the Wuppertal Schweberbahn?  Here's the link:

Plan for 'Aerial' transport system to link city with Bristol Airport | Bristol Live https://www.bristolpost.co.uk/news/bristol-news/plan-aerial-transport-system-link-10320952

 
On the £5 note I would definitely have 'Catch Me Who Can' - not Trevithick's first locomotive but probably the best known - because everything else has followed from that.

 

Totally agree.

 

True, but that's not much consolation for those hanging around at intermediate stations in Cornwall and Devon for a couple of hours at that time of night waiting for it to arrive - remember the customers Graham?

 

 
Not fit for purpose ...

 

It started 111 minutes late ... on such an easy schedule that it has just passed Slough only 16 minutes late.  It's now around 05:00 in the UK, due in to Paddington in 4 minutes. Journeycheck is still forecasting an 06:58 arrival, and real time trains 05:18

 

Well, er, no.  I’ve read the joint communication from the negotiating teams and understand where we are with the process. 

A fair way until any offer might go to a vote.

Unless the negotiators are lying, and I can see no reason why they would.

Though I’m all ears if you have any evidence that the DfT have rejected a deal that’s not just gossip and hearsay?

 

The crew travelling down to Penzance were heavily delayed because the lines outside Plymouth were shut because a driver reported striking two individuals on the track.

https://www.plymouthherald.co.uk/news/plymouth-news/emergency-services-respond-railway-incident-10323460

 
21:15 Penzance to London Paddington due 05:04

21:15 Penzance to London Paddington due 05:04 will be starting late from Penzance and is expected to be 60 minutes late.

This is due to the train making extra stops because of service disruption.

 
21:34 Swindon to Westbury due 22:16
21:34 Swindon to Westbury due 22:16 will be cancelled.
This is due to a shortage of train crew.

 
True, but I'm not sure how the Bank of England issuing notes with Alsthom /Siemens Eurostars and Hitachi IETs would go down with the little Englanders...

Scarily,  158s are knocking on for 40, and not far off the same age as Evening Star was in the year 2000.

 
Before Pilning lost its footbridge, it was served by two trains a week. Having lost its footbridge it is still served by two trains a week.

So the question is not about building a footbridge, it's about whether Pilning can justify a useful service. If it can, then it is likely that the cost of a new footbridge will be a fraction of the cost of the full package of improvements required to deliver this service.

 
France has a lot of rural lines that were built too late to have ever been worth it. In this case the line from Guéret to Ahun was built quite early, in the 1860s, to serve mines (long since closed). The next section was agreed just before and caught up in the Plan Freycinet of 1879, which led to the government trying to fill in all the gaps in the network. Ussel was a sub-prefecture of the Creuze, and all of those were seen to deserve a railway. Note that's more a matter of political dignity than economic need. However, implementing the plan took so long that the parts to Felletin and on to Ussel were opened in 1882 and 1905.

By the latter date road vehicles had already appeared, and soon would take over local goods and passenger transport on level ground, though here in the mountains that happened from the 1920s. In fact, Ussel got another railways (of sorts) even later, onward to the prefecture at Tulle. This was the Transcorrézien, a narrow-gauge steam tramway, which only lasted until the 1950s. Part of the Felletin-Ussel line closed in the 1980s when a tunnel was found to be unsafe, at which date there was still significant goods traffic. That's now gone ...

 

I struggle to reconcile standing beside Evening Star at the NRM and the experience of walking through Devonshire Tunnel and imagining *that* rounding the curve, uphill, in the dark, and passing a refuge in the tunnel wall.

Also, this has put me in mind of the preserved railway at Martel in France, where passengers ride in open sided carriages behind a steam loco which climbs what's basically a cliff face before passing through... a curved tunnel on a gradient, something the loco was doing at fairly slow speed but without much fuss, but it was curious to see the loco exhaust follow some law of physics and rise obediently to the tunnel roof, where, much to most people's relief, it stayed.

Mark