Gold plated stations - Chesterfield

This from the Wicked Weaver...

I wonder if I might share with Eye readers these photographs of the new platform 3 at Chesterfield station.

Observe the miles upon miles of Coucher Memorial Fencing here...


...and here...


The new platform also hosts some exciting new features - perhaps some of your readers can guess what this one is for?


A Zimmer frame bolted to the ground? Obviously the safest way for the infirm to negotiate highly dangerous stations in these safety conscious times.

Of course the piece de resistance is the dedicated fire escape from the end of platform 3 that runs almost the length of the new structure, just in case all that metal, glass and tarmac suddenly bursts into flame...


In these straightened times it is good to see that no expense has been spared to protect the passenger.

Perhaps the only disappointment is that despite the vast expense it's still not in use yet.

UPDATE: This from Geo.Stephenson (Retd), Clay Cross

I fear I must point out, Sir, if no more immediate source has done so yet, that there are reports this new Passenger Wharf was used on 29th July to accommodate trains after a passenger was taken ill and the train he was travelling on detained in platform 2 awaiting paramedics.

Yours, laying tracks faster than the gricers can grice!

UPDATE: This from Chionanthus virginicus...

..and it's only been constructed for use during engineering works !!!

Pointless signs - Rail replacement bus stops

Darwin Award - Puffer-nutters yet again

This from Eye's friends over at Steam Railway magazine...

I thought Eye readers might be interested in this picture taken from a legal vantage point by a Steam Railway photographer...

Taken on Sunday 25th July it shows two photographers (shurely 'trespassing idiots'? Ed) in the six foot at Shotlock Hill Tunnel.


This was on the return trip after they had already crossed the line once to take a photo of the 8F on The Waverly.

Railway Garden Competition - Entry withdrawn

Shocking news from Retford!

Regular Eye readers will recollect this image of Retford in all its arborial glory taken in May of this year:


In a shocking act of wanton vandalism (shurely good housekeeping? Ed) this delightfully restive pastoral scene has been reduced to this:


It had taken many months of willful neglect for this particular Railway Garden to reach the required standard.

This disgracefully high handed action by Network Rail explains why so many in the industry consider the company to be both arrogant and (cont p94)...

Value for Money - tips and tricks

Telegrammed by Leo Pink
This for our DfT readers...


Although it's £40 million too late it might prevent further excesses.

Lookalike - DB's international aspirations

This from Tommy Atkins...

According to the Railway Gazette nationalised Deutsche Bahn plans to run an ICE3 to Britain this year.

The article is helpfully illustrated with a map entitled "DB Bahn international long-distance routes".

The map appears remarkably similar to one illustrating a previously unsuccessful attempt at increasing the size of the German rail network.


I wonder if the two versions are in any way related? (No they are not! Ed)

UPDATE: This from Sir High Trevor Ropey...

I note with some concern that Swiss neutrality is at risk.

I'm sure von Moltke the elder would have urged making the Channel Tunnel the schwerpunkt, focusing on the drive to the west.

Perhaps the Fuhrer's Diaries can shed some light?

UPDATE: This from Eastwestdivide...

Well the comparison would have been funny in 1970, but I really thought we'd moved on since then.

(No, I'm not Cherman)

Auf wiederemailen.

UPDATE: This from Mizter T...

Sounds like Eastwestdivide's biennial humour overhaul is rather overdue.

Anyhow, given that DB is currently struggling to run beyond Aachen into the land of the perpetually micturating little boy, it remains to be seen how successful their cross-channel extraterritorial ambitions will be.

Plus they'll have to get passed the friendly chaps and chapesses at the UK Border Agency too...

The Big Society explained...

So.

Ministers have today written to voluntary, community and social enterprise organisations asking for their ideas on how to reduce the deficit.

Minister for Civil Society, Nick Hurd, said:

"We know that it is local people and organisations on the ground that often know what needs changing and we want to tap into their knowledge and experience to help us identify ways of doing things better and more efficiently so we can do more for less."

Indeed.

But what's this?

At almost exactly the same time that this exciting announcement was made what should drop into The Fact Compiler's inbox but the following missive from the Association of Community and Rail Partnerships:

As you are possibly already aware, our quarterly publication Train Times is currently suffering under the embargo placed upon government department publications (as it is currently funded entirely by the DfT). We are exploring ways of funding Train Times otherwise but it has become apparent that any solution will not come in time to allow us to maintain our normal schedule.

So here, in place of Train Times 59, which we would still hope to produce at some stage in the future, is Train in Between Times in which we cover the various news stories which would have appeared in TT59 had it appeared on schedule.

TiBT will not appear in printed form – this is it!

Feel free to distribute it far and wide. It’s also on our website. (Not yet it's not - but here is a link to their publications page for when it is. Ed)

Clearly there is a saving to the Department in no longer funding a hard-copy version of Train Times.

However, without Train Times, how can ACoRP effectively seek ideas from the voluntary members of Community Rail Partnerships about how to reduce costs on the railway?

No doubt the ORR and Sir Roy McNulty have already consulted all the 60+ community rail partnerships and rail promotion groups that form ACoRP's membership....

Strange train times indeed!

Darwin Award - Puffer-nutters... again!

This from Matt's Trainpics site, with a bowler tip to @stephenrees, via Twitter...



According to Matt "At Vigo bridge there were around 20 people trespassing within sight and I suspect at least double that for this 2 mile climb from Bromsgrove."

Expect NR and the British Transport Police to review kettle operations after yesterday's Duke of Gloucester run.

Happily, if spared by natural selection, the trespassing puffer-nutters will be able to recall precisely where they were when steam was finally banned from the mainline...

In the four foot, the six or the cess.

'Nuff said.

ATOCballs - adding insult to injury!

This from Darby and Joan...

Senior Railcard holders have just received this e-mail:

Dear Darby

We’re offering you the chance to win £100 worth of travel vouchers by simply answering a few questions about your friendships, for a piece of research we are undertaking.

We’re keen to find out how often you keep in touch with your friends, whether you use Facebook and Twitter to do this and how long your average friendships last.

To complete the survey click here.

All completed surveys will be entered into the free prize draw to win £100 worth of travel vouchers to spend on UK rail travel.

Closing date for completed surveys is Thursday 30 September 2010. Terms and conditions apply.

Whipper Snapper
Senior Railcard

What a sad indictment of our society that ATOC's wet-behind-the-ears railcard team assumes that older people only keep in touch with friends by Twitter and Facebook and that their friendships are so ephemeral that enough fail to last the course for an 'average' period to be calculated.

Even worse, given the demographic being addressed, recipients of this e-mail are at a time of life when you find long standing friends shuffling off this mortal coil in increasing numbers.

So it's not exactly a sensitive request for information.

And if the grim reaper spares your friends, you can't see them as often as you like because of the complex structure of prohibitively high fares, increasingly hedged around with restrictions - even for those with Senior Rail cards.

New rolling stock strategy explained

UPDATE: This from Bill Hoole...

Why do drivers need a large plaque in the cab telling them the sort of train they are driving?

So long as you can find the Regulator and the brake when you get in the cab, that's all you need to know.

UPDATE: This from Sir Humphrey Beeching...

As some of my departmental colleagues might quip - it's the regulator that's the problem.

If Pollyanna would only get out of the cab the railway would run so much better...

Pointless signs - Twyford

Railway Garden Competition - Preston

This lovely garden sent in by D0260...

Note how it is cleverly offset with a cutting disc, a few rubber trackpads and a pot of paint.

The pièce de résistance is the unsavoury-looking detritus in the foreground.


Beautiful, just beautiful.

DfT abstention on NR bonuses - Explained

To recap...

According to the Guardian report on the Network Rail AGM: 'There were 37 votes in favour of the pay report, 31 against and nine active abstentions, including the Department for Transport's single vote'.

Eye understands that no less a figure than Cameron himself turned up at NR's Annual Meeting to warn Coucher that DfT would vote against his bonus.

As these exclusive Eye pictures reveal all did not go according to plan...


'After' picture with a bowler tip to p2 of the Sunday Times' Business Section...

UPDATE: This from @Captain_ Deltic, via Twitter...

Are you sure that's not Quentin Willson with Cameron?

Villiers vignettes... on the benefits of privatisation

Telegrammed by Our Man at 222 Marylebone Road
That Bourbon moment...

Theresa Villiers: on 22 July. "The hon. Gentleman's views on the railways are well known, although I am afraid that I do not share them. It would have been impossible for there to have been the significant growth in passenger numbers that we have seen since privatisation without the benefits that private sector innovation and enterprise have brought. Reversing things and renationalising the *railways* would be a retrograde step."

Oh bliss, John Major lives!! Talk dirty to us, Theresa

But why did you miss out 'entrepreneurial flair'.

And where was the obligatory side swipe at 'deeply inefficient British Rail'?

The key to good retro lies in the detail. So, sadly, only 7 out of 10.

But thanks for trying.

UPDATE: This from Leo Pink...

Surely the bulk of the growth came after the Strategic Rail Authority was subsumed into DfT and the state took control of timetabling, rolling stock policy, franchise service specification.

UPDATE: This from Captain Deltic...

Isn't "rolling stock policy" an oxymoron?

UPDATE: This from Steve Strong...

So how does Theresa explain the growth on state owned London Underground over the same period which was equal to, if not greater than, that experienced on the privatised BR network?

Hammond - all talk and no trousers

Telegrammed by Ithuriel
To recap on Bonusgate...

According to the Guardian report on the Network Rail AGM, . 'There were 37 votes in favour of the pay report, 31 against and nine active abstentions, including the Department for Transport's single vote'.

Oh yes, DfT is indeed a member.

And Mr Hammond has been writing to Ricky Haystacks asking him to go easy on the Iain Coucher Classic Car fund payments.

Not only that but the Prime Minister's spokeswoman said that Mr Cameron was 'disappointed'.at the news of the vote in favour of moolah-all-round.

So come on Phil - why did DfT abstain?

Pointless signs - Norwich

And which 'footbridge or subway' might that be then?

Fenchurch Street to close in 2011?

It appears that an email is doing the rounds of c2c customers announcing that Fenchurch Street is going to be closed for 8 months in 2011 for refurbishment work.

Sadly The Fact Compiler hasn't seen the offending message - but it is clearly being taken very seriously by C2C who have felt obliged to issue the following denial to all their customers...

From: c2c Alerting Service
Date: 22 July 2010 16:58:31 GMT+01:00
To:
Subject: London Fenchurch Street Station - A message to all our customers

London Fenchurch Street station - A message to all our customers

I would like to reassure c2c customers who have contacted us in recent days after having received emails from friends or colleagues claiming that London Fenchurch Street station is to be temporarily closed in 2011 for a period of months as part of a proposed redevelopment of the station and surrounding area. The e-mail is entirely spurious and its original source is unknown, but it has been widely circulated and has caused understandable concern to those people receiving it.

I can categorically confirm that this rumour is totally untrue. There are no plans whatsoever for any such major closure of London Fenchurch Street either in 2011 or later.

I hope this clarifies matters and reassures all our customers. There are no plans to close Fenchurch Street .

Julian Drury
Managing Director
c2c

Truth travels like a tortoise, rumour like a hare.

IPSA - Why we should care

The Fact Compiler shared the fury over troughing MPs in the last Parliament.

Stung into action by the near universal opprobrium being heaped upon them, MPs passed a measure in haste creating the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority (IPSA).

The new body was set up to oversee the allowances paid to MPs and the salaries of the staff they employed.

As with so many measures enacted in haste by the last Parliament there is now plenty of time to repent at leisure.

And MPs are not happy with the new system.

Of course many will say that MPs had it coming, whilst others are pleased that MPs now finally realise that the legion of new laws which they so joyously enacted are now buggering-up their own lives not just ours.

No matter.

IPSA is now preventing MPs from serving their constituents and this is bad for both democracy and democratic accountability.

As one Westminster insider put it "IPSA makes NR's Members look useful".

In an attempt to explain the new MP's expenses scheme Tom Harris, Co-Chair of the APPRG, has provided the following helpful video on his blog.



For full details of the disaster that is IPSA and why we should all be concerned read more here.

"The Prime Minister will be deeply disappointed"

So.

According to the Number 10 spokeswoman in the Lobby today "The Prime Minister will be deeply disappointed" by the decision of Network Rail's Members to rubber stamp director bonuses.

Indeed.

But what are we to make of this from Network Rail's press release on today's disappointing proceedings:

Network Rail today held its annual general meeting in Manchester attended by 59 of its 100 members... with 77 members voting.

So 41 Members of Network Rail couldn't be bothered to attend the company's Annual Meeting.

Clearly they know the game is up.

Whilst 23 couldn't even be arsed to vote at all!

What a testament to Network Rail's fabulous corporate governance.

So what difference did these 23 abstentions make?

Only 54% (of the 77 who did bother to vote) approved the Directors' Remuneration Report as set out on pages 30 to 49 of the Company’s Accounts for the year ended 31 March 2010

Oh shame on those Members that abstained - you know who you are.

What earthly value are you to man or beast?

The abolition of the rightly named 'Members' cannot come soon enough!

Come on Phil, put them out of our misery and that right soon.

UPDATE: This from the Gruaniad...

There were 37 votes in favour of the pay report, 31 against and nine active abstentions including the Department for Transport's single vote.

A word on today's ticket machine story.

This from a Mr Malins...

Did I not hear the Passenger Focus man Smith berating the TOCs for their failings on Radio 4 this morning?

Consider then that the response of Bus Barons and DafT to this failing is to install ticket barriers to "recover" the money for the tickets the TOCs did not sell properly in the first place!


With stockade station - HMP Walton-on-Thames the result.

UPDATE: This from Globetrotter...

I wonder whether the latest Passenger Focus survey is investigating the symptoms rather than the cause?

Does the dissatisfaction expressed by ticket machine users really reflect concerns over the problem of using the machines themselves, or is it really a reflection of the complexity of the current fare structures?

Given that a substantial number of booking office staff seem to have problems explaining and selling all the different ticket options, it is not surprising that passengers have problems navigating the system when left to do it themselves.

Particularly now that ATOC has helpfully 'simplified' the process by giving all the different ticket types the same names.