Bluebell Railway General Discussion

You've been spending too much time in mansions or round the few elite if you think those figures are accurate!.

 

Quite easy to spend that sort of money. £400 for a reasonable, entry level SLR (not the very basic version), same again for a reasonable zoom lens (because the kit lens that comes with most SLRs is cheap plastic tat). My stuff isn't top of the range, but once the cost of body, lenses, filters, memory cards, batteries, flash gun, etc etc, is all added up, I'd be looking at well over £4000 to replace it all! But because it's been purchased over several years, it was affordable.

I used to have a lineside pass for the Bluebell, back when you could turn up in the morning, pay a few quid, answer a questionnaire, then get given a lineside pass. Though to be honest I only really used it so I could use the railway as a footpath between shots! To get a lineside pass at the Bluebell these days isn't just tip up and get one when the weather's good, it has to be booked in advance, and it wastes most of the day getting one. So a £50 pass then becomes £100 once you pay for fuel and lunch, and that's without taking any photos! Fortunately there are enough spots in public areas at the Bluebell that you don't really need a lineside pass.

 

No. Same timetable as last year but with minor amendments, and one error - Service 2 11.00 departure arrives at Horsted 5 minutes later.

 

Adding an extra service to the timetable comes with two significant problems. Firstly, it increases locomotive and carriage mileage; and I think the C&W are already working very hard to keep up with the current level of serviceability required within existing resources (each carriage is running a bigger mileage because of the extra length, and we are typically running six coach rather than five coach trains, and seven round trips between two sets on Saturdays, rather than six. All of those factors put extra pressure on routine maintenance). The second problem is that any extra complexity in the timetable has a potential knock-on effect on the reliability of the service, and the message from both the BRPS and PLC chairmen is to improve on areas such as timekeeping. So I get the sense that for 2014, the desire is to run the same service better, rather than run a more complex service.

My guess is that the platform extensions at SP may come up the priority list so we can regularly run seven coach trains; especially now the loco fleet is moving back to a position of having enough motive power adequate for such loads. But that's just a guess, and in any case, can't do much to change the situation in 2014 at least.

Tom

 

Any detail on the landslip that has been reported?

 

As of the weekend it didn't appear to have moved any further compared to Christmas Eve. However there was still plenty of water still flowing out from underneath it and the rain this morning can't have helped matters. The service will remain restricted to Sheffield Park - Horsted Keynes f0r this coming weekend (4/5 Jan).

 

Video and photos from last Saturday's Sheffield Park-Horsted Keynes service behind the Black 5...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/alts1985/sets/72157632784810904/

 

Suggested on the Bluebell Facebook page that we should be back running the whole line through to EG from this coming weekend, though as usual keep an eye on the website to be sure.

Tom

 

From the Bluebell "What's new" page today (http://www.bluebell-railway.co.uk/bluebell/whats_new.html):

"Chris White has released this photo showing the cutting slip just South of Sharpthorne Tunnel, which has caused our line to be closed north of Horsted Keynes since Christmas. It shows the scene after initial tidying up at rail level last week.

The plan is to have sufficient short term repairs in place to safely open the railway for normal service on Saturday 11 January, which we are on course to do. Whilst the picture shows what appears to be a fairly small-scale slip, its position in the cutting, surrounded by numerous trees and with continuous surface water flow, means there is risk of further movement, which makes it a difficult and hazardous work site in view of the current poor weather conditions."




Tom

 

There should be a new mantra in railways DRAINAGE, DRAINAGE & DRAINAGE

 

Yeah, though currently it would be nice if the current weather wasn't RAIN, RAIN & RAIN!

Tom

 

Can"t argue with that.

 

Does the presence of tress in the cutting ameliorate or exacerbate the situation regarding landslips?

 

Has the cutting at Imberhorne behaved itself during the wet weather, ie no slippage on the newly -formed cutting sides?

 

I've not heard about anything other than the slip south of the tunnel. Obviously it has caused a lot of disruption to our post-Christmas running, but really it appears we have probably got away lightly when compared with the South Devon, or the mainline between Guildford and Haslemere.

Latest news seems to be that we hope to be running a full-line service (with steam) this coming weekend, but the final decision is still to be made; then the p/way team move to the scheduled work on HK 23 points / Freshfield Bank for the following three weeks, when the DMU service will run HK - EG at weekends. That DMU will apparently be out and about this weekend (in addition to the steam service) for crew training purposes.

Tom

 

It seems railways only realise this after they've had to close due to landslips, GWSR springs to mind, there wasn't even anyone looking at the drains most of the time before we got cut in half, now there's a whole new department and almost 2 million spent on repairing and preventing from future, as opposed to more like 500,000 if it was just preventing. whichever railway it is, if you get a chance, stick you head down a lineside drain, is it draining? if it isn't, sort it!

Glad that things havn't been too severe at the bluebell, My sympathies to the SDR, join the club of landslipped railways!

 

It was not just the GWSR. Lets not forget the SVR in 07.

The problem was. BR surveys only recognised culverts of 2ft and above diameter. Whilst repairing the SVR we found numerous culverts ranging from 6 inches to 3ft bores. That we didn't even know about.

Its a horrible, horrible situation to see your beloved railway in that state.

 

flyingscotsman123: Do bear in mind that there was another factor in respect of the GWSR's embankment slips, ie it became apparent that when originally built they had been done "on the cheap" so to say. Inadequate removal of the material at ground level on which the embankments were built, and using inferior materials for the actual embankments.
As you say though, keeping on top of the drainage situation now is of key importance. As others have mentioned, the SVR now do this with some vigour. I am sure others do as well.

The problem is though that you cannot always cater for water encroaching onto your infrastructure from land adjacent to your railway, as might be the case with this Bluebell slip.

The SVR report that they are in litigation with the owners of an industrial estate adjacent to, and generally "above" the SVR at Knowlesands, where the said owners--allegedly-- allow their surface water to drain onto the SVR formation and into the SVR drains installed after the 2007 washouts. The SVR are wanting the industrial estate owners to take steps to prevent their surface water so draining onto the SVR formation.

46118

 

The picture from Tom could be a little misleading, but it appears that the volume of water issuing at the toe of the landslip is far greater than would be expected for the 'slip' catchment. This implies that water is draining into the cutting from higher ground somewhere out of shot. If you telephoned me and described this situation, my advice would be 'stop surface water ingression into the slope by means of a ditch at the top of the cutting, and phone me back when this has be achieved'.

As others have correctly pointed out, slopes and water are never good bedfellows.

 

First off, I should preface things by saying I'm not an infrastructure expert and haven't actually seen the location of the slip since it occurred. But if it is where I think it is, immediately behind the photographer, the cutting gets progressively deeper all the way back to the tunnel, which is some distance behind. So I think that cess in the photo would be draining all the water entering the cutting (or at least on that side) back as far as the tunnel.

(If you look at this map: http://www.bluebell-railway.co.uk/bluebell/map_grad.html then I think the location of the photo is just at the entrance to the cutting south of the tunnel, looking south, some way north of Black Hut).

I could be mistaken, in that the way the drainage is set up is certainly not something I have ever studied in more detail than noting the cess as it passes by outside the cab...

Tom