Lifted

Telegrammed by The Master
Railway Eye readers may remember that Ruth Kelly was subject to much ridicule when she told the Transport Select Committee that her department had safeguarded the route of a non-existent closed railway between London and Birmingham.

Well we may owe the Secretary of State an apology as it's obviously an easy mistake to make!

After all, even those fonts of all railway knowledge (trainspotters) get it wrong sometimes.

Hence this interesting interpretation of the news that has appeared on a railway forum with the rather appropriate name of Going Loco:

Chiltern Railways have announced a 200million scheme to reopen the line from High Wycombe to Oxford, which has been shut since 1964. A Transport & Works Act application will soon be made to move the scheme forward, with Chiltern Railways taking the lead in developing the project. Chiltern say that this will be their priority following the completion of Aylesbury Vale Parkway.

The ambition would be achieved by linking the Chiltern line to Bicester Town station, from where trains could continue through to Oxford. This would give Bicester new links both to Oxford and London, as well as providing further travel opportunities between Oxford and London, to compete with First Great Western

The link in question is a brand- new chord at Bicester which has never been shut because it's never been open!

Perhaps a career at DafT beckons...

Busted flush

After Metronet went bust it couldn't be long before the wheels fell off Tube Lines as well.

Today they have - see BBC piece here.

One piece of good news.

Metronet overspent by £2bn, Tube Lines by a mere £1.4bn

And the name of the two dullards behind the disastrous PPP scam?

Prime Minister Gordon Brown and Lady Shriti Vadera. Hang your heads in shame!

Diamond ring

An amusing story in the "Grumpy Old Man" section of the latest issue of Today's Railways.

The 9th August edition of 'Branch Line News', the The Branch Line Society newsletter, erroneously reported that the editor of Railways Illustrated was "Dumbo".

For the avoidance of doubt Mr Pip Dunn is the one who can't fly.

Shropshire ghosts

The Fact Compiler received an email yesterday from Keith Barrow, Associate Editor of the IRJ.

Keith wrote to point out the following story on the Ludlow and Tenbury Wells Advertiser website:

A49 closed after lightning strikes rail crossing
10:40am Monday 8th September 2008

THE A49 near Ludlow has been closed after a level crossing was struck by lightning. The road near Onibury has been closed in both directions between the A4113 and the B4368.

The Highways Agency confirmed that signals at the crossing had been damaged and that Railtrack is carrying out repairs.

Good to see that the Highways Agency can correctly name the other government agency (sorry private company) that it has multiple safety interfaces with.

Railway Garden Competition #9

The inhabitants of God's own county are renowned for being careful with the pennies.

Notwithstanding this Sheffield station staff have managed to put on a splendid display without incurring the costs of the usual hanging baskets.

The Fact Compiler is particularly impressed with this ensemble - complementing as it does the station which was recently refurbished at vast expense.

Saint Augustine refers

Telegrammed by our man at 222 Marylebone Road
To judge by the following passage from NR’s response to the ORR draft determination, the Director's bonuses are working as advertised.

'Network Rail has always recognised that an element of judgement is required in reaching a view on these matters and that our targets should be reasonably challenging’.

Perhaps they should have added “but not so demanding that we risk losing our incentive payments”.

As St Augustine said 'Lord make me chaste but not yet.'

100% safe

Telegrammed by our man at 222 Marylebone Road
Safety - what inconveniences are imposed in your name!

Only 13 lines into the Executive Summary of Network Rail's 400 page demand for more money with thinly veiled threats the dread phrase 'Safety remains our over-riding priority' appears.

If this were really the case Network Rail would prevent trains from running past high output machinery on adjacent lines while work was in progress, thus causing massive inconvenience to passengers and inflating costs of mega projects like the West Coast Route Modernisation.

Thank goodness that Iain Coucher and his board know that safety and economy have to be balanced and that a risk-free railway has infinite reliability and zero maintenance costs.

Because nothing moves.

Virgin avoids Labour pain

Telegrammed by our independent expert
What is it about Virgin and the Labour big boys?

Today, as the cabinet decamped by pendolino to Birmingham for their first meeting outside London since the days of Lloyd George, the Virgin website broke down and the faithful following in their wake were unable to book tickets.

Beardie will not have forgotten the notorious encounter with Labour bigwigs in 1998, when the train carrying them to the party conference in Blackpool was severely delayed and he had to endure a humiliating dressing down by John Prescott from the conference platform.

Mind you in those dim and distant days the brothers and sisters went to cheer Mr Tony.

Today, with Gordon's popularity at an all time low, party managers were absolutely delighted that the smelly-socks couldn't make it.

How long until Beardie gets the 2014 franchise extension he's been lobbying so hard for?

Conundrum

Why are these to be found in the vestibules of Class 455s but not on the platforms of the stations they serve?


The Fact Compiler apologises to SWT if the 'Securitate' now demand they be removed.

Glad I asked

The Fact Compiler would like to thank those readers of the Railway Eye who took the time to vote for their favourite term of abuse for the IEP.

Readers were invited to select one of the options below:
1. The Camel Class
2. The Frankenstein Train
3. Neither of the above.

As The Fact Compiler is new to these sort of ballots he has asked well known unionist Crow Bar to assist with the collation and announcement of the results.

Just over 2,500 people visit Railway Eye each month. Of which just 50 voted in the poll.

However, Crow Bar advises that these figures are unimportant and may in fact be numeracist, so probably best forgotten about.

Therefore those results in full. Crow Bar, if you would...

"Greetings comrades. A massive 64% of you voted unambiguously for the Frankenstein Train, totally and utterly vindicating our position on this piece of nomenclature and once again reminding the exploitative private sector management classes that our members will not lie down and accept anything less than the full term of abuse when referring to the IEP. Furthermore I put management on notice that attempts to divide my membership by waving Camel Class inducements or embellishments will be perceived as a direct assault on agreed machinery and will result in a dispute situation existing between ourselves and..."

Continued p94...

Smoking

US railroad company Iowa Pacific Holdings has bought RMS Locotech, the last remnant of ECT's unsuccessful foray into railways.

According to the ECT website the new company is to be called 'British American Railway Services Ltd'.

A sort of cross between EWS and British American Tobacco.

Communication

The Fact Compiler has been forwarded the following management communication to ticket office staff:

"For the benefit of Booking Hall staff and other helpful passers-by, if
the young lady returns, this envelope is in the Booking Hall in-tray
where it has been for the last week ready to be collected.

The in-tray is the one next to the white stick and the guide dog."

Who says the railway is not inclusive?

Gare de l'eau

There are still a number of fleets on the network without retention tanks.

As well as being a health risk to Pway workers and visually unpleasant in station environments there is a direct cost to Network Rail for cleaning up such effluent, estimated at £7.2m per year.

To address this Network Rail and ATOC jointly issued a consultation document today, proposing variable usage charges to recover these costs from TOCs.

The Fact Compiler wonders if this will come to be known as the Track Turd Tax?

Shanghied

Rumours of further changes to HSBC's rail division.

Having shot both the MD and Head of Customer Services the banking group is apparently looking to dispense with the Rosco's 'New Business Team'.

This is the team which only this July won £180m worth of business financing the new Siemens trains for Scotrail.

Looks like HSBC is supremely confident about DafT's promise of 1,300 new vehicles.

Clear as mud

Telegrammed by the Master
Virgin services out of Euston are just getting back to normal after being suspended (according to announcements) due to "a broken down freight train near Coventry"

- but I thought the Trent Valley had re-opened?

Yours, A confused punter...

Zontar at Barrow Hill

Railway Eye readers wishing to relive the golden moments of Zontar's visit to Barrow Hill's 'Rail Power 2008' event may find this of interest.


Those in a corporate environment may wish to turn the volume down and check the guv'nors not looking....

Nag

Oh dear. The ORR appears to be taking up where the old inflexible HSE left off.

Eight weeks ago in the Mountsorrell area of the Midland Main Line there was a pedestrian near miss on a crossing.

The crossing has been in continuous use for some 150 years.

The service pattern and line speed on this section remains the same as it was in the 1990s so the 'risk' today is as great as it was ten or twenty years ago.

This particular near miss involved a pedestrian who, in less politically correct times, might have been described as "doddery".

None the less the brave, risk averse, box fillers of the ORR decided that a prohibition notice must be slapped on the crossing with immediate effect.

Which leaves Network Rail with a problem as they are now obliged to find another right-of-way for those inconvenienced by ORR's knee jerk over-reaction.

In the normal course of events this would presumably involve the construction of a footbridge - at not inconsiderable expense.

Alas the crossing was no ordinary foot crossing it was in fact a Bridleway.

Leaving poor old NR to come up with an even more expensive design of footbridge capable of taking horse as well as foot traffic.

Meanwhile whilst one bit of ORR adds needlessly to the railway's costs another bit of the same organisation is demanding NR budget cuts of £3.3bn over the next five years.

As Asquith pointed out "Power without responsibility is the prerogative of the harlot throughout the ages".

Time for Chris Bolt to rein in some of his more over zealous 'safety courtesans'?

Sleeper

Rail magazine claims it is best for news.

The Fact Compiler believes that Rail is selling itself short!

Judging by page 24 of the latest issue the mag can also help you save on your household budget.

A sharp eyed Railway Eye reader has pointed out that in the bottom left of the picture below (just beneath the sign saying "High visibility vests must be worn beyond this point") there is a gentleman having a quick 40 winks.

So now you know - short of a pillow, use your hi-vi.

Midget gems

The Fact Compiler has received an email from a gentleman calling himself 'Pike'.

He writes: "Further to the theme of the vertically challenged may I draw your attention to the following Railnews website article which appears to show a dozen miniature engineers fettling the WCML!"

Stupid boy!

Double trouble

The latest edition of Rail Management contains an advert which seemingly reinforces a number of tired stereotypes about industry 'temps':

However, fans of inclusivity rejoice!

One of the ladies pictured appears to be as vertically challenged as Rommel's own editor.

Perhaps this is why the ad appeared twice?