Kite's Transport Potterings: 17th January - 19th January. SWR stuff, Manchester & Cambridgeshire

17th January - 19th January. SWR stuff, Manchester & Cambridgeshire

17^th January – The Road to Stockport

I decided to have a little trip to Manchester on the 18^th January, as usual I booked up a room on the Friday night in the Stockport Travelodge and booked a cheap seat on the 20:40 service from Euston towards Manchester, this gave me a few hours to play with within London, a good chance to revisit some more SWR stations I needed for photographs. After finishing work, and getting home it was a gentle walk to the station for the 14:59 service to take me to Woking, 158885, 159008 & 159004 formed this 8 coach service.

I had a tight (and very unofficial) connection at Woking to board a pair of 450s from Alton (450032 & 450050) for the single stop to West Byfleet, followed by a short wait for the Woking – Waterloo stopper (455860 & 455920) to take me to Surbiton, West Byfleet was a bonus station score as it saves me a job for another day. At Surbiton it was a visit to the toilets, before heading over to board the Hampton Court train (455739, 455903 & 456011) for the 2 mile trip onto the Hampton Court branch to visit Thames Ditton. 20 minutes later the same triple set returned from Hampton Court to take me towards Raynes Park, for a platform swap to board a Kingston loop service.

450050 (back to its original number after being 450550) departs West Byfleet

A roundabout under a little 2 arch bridge at Thames Ditton

This service (456014, 455901 & 455723) took me just over five miles back into zone 6 and to Teddington, where I crossed over the footbridge to board the next “Via Wimbledon” service (456010, 455866 & 455868) a couple stops to Kingston, followed a few minutes later with the next service to Norbiton (455863 & 455715). This station has had barriers fitted since the last time I was here and you can no longer cross between platforms without having to exit the “paid” area, also the subway is still in Stagecoach colours. Sadly this is when my rough plan went a bit wrong as the next Shepperton service was running a few minutes late.

Stagecoach lives on at Norbiton

Eventually the Shepperton service arrived (707006 & 707005) to take me to Fulwell but the connection was lost, I did have an idea to walk to the nearby bus stop to take a bus to Twickenham, but the bus I was hoping to catch either didn’t exist, was running late or running early, so it was back to the station to fester before the next Waterloo service arrived (455741 & 455735). This took me to Earlsfield for a short wait before the next service (455870 & 455750) to take me into Waterloo, keeping one eye on the time I decided to call it a night, swinging via Tesco outside the station for dinner, before taking the Northern Line (51570/51571) to Euston, and festering around the top of the ramp where the 20:40 were depart from, being one of the first to board 390123 for the run to Stockport via Crewe.

After-all the only run on a Pendo which beats non-stop to Crewe is non-stop to Warrington, although the service did lose some time along the way so was around 5 minutes late into Stockport, and 5 minutes after arriving I was checking into the hotel to relax and sleep. A handful of SWR stations visited on a quiet evening.

One good thing at staying in the Stockport Travelodge is passing the magnificent Stockport Viaduct

18^th Jan – Greater Manchester Day

The idea I had when I threw together a rough plan for today was to revisit several stations I needed for photographs within the Greater Manchester PTE area, the ticket I would be using is the GM Rail Ranger product (one reason why I selected Stockport instead of Macclesfield as both places were the same price). I checked out of the Travelodge, popped into the 24 hours McDonalds for breakfast and headed to the station, buying my rover from the TVM before heading up to await the first Manchester bound service.

A very quiet (and required) 331002 rolled in from Hazel Grove to take me to Salford Crescent, not enough to push this 331 straight over ten miles, but 8 miles is better than 0. I crossed over to the opposite platform to board 156459 for the mile leap to Salford Central, mainly for a time wasting move before 150116 arrived for the trip to Kearsley. A station stuck in time, all be it with shelters with the sides smashed out, there was even a sign saying “British Rail” by the entrance at the road side. This is one of those stations which are under wires but served only by diesels (I believe), but this is the time of day there is a random call on a Rochdale service from Blackburn, so it was onto 142036 & 158845 for the trip via Manchester Victoria to Castleton.

British Rail lives at Kearsley!

15 minutes (or so) later (time I spent by popping to a nearby Co-Op to waste time), the pacer + sprinter combo returned from Rochdale to take me one stop back towards Manchester to Mills Hill where my plan was to wait for the unit from Leeds which has a random additional call here, but the next Rochdale bound service was running 5 minutes late which allowed me to make the connection, with 142055 & 158791 to the bay platform, sadly it was a bit of a waste as the next Leeds stopper got cancelled at Manchester Victoria due to staff shortage so I had a longer fester here before the Blackburn bound service rolled in, with 150120 & 150143 taken to Littleborough.

The end of Greater Manchester, beyond lies dragons!

The platform to platform change at Littleborough isn’t the easiest to do on a tight connection, but I made it to the opposite platform in plenty of time before a Wigan bound 150141 rolled up to take me across Manchester to Atherton where I had to jump across the platform in a hurry to board 150277 which had just arrived from Kirkby to take me to the hourly served Moorside (brings back memories of hanging around here in November 18 awaiting for a late running bus to take me to Clifton). A short connection here at Moorside before 150128 rolled in to take me back to Atherton, this time I could take a few pictures before 150123 popped up to take me to Daisy Hill. Another short fester (enough time to pop out of the station for some pictures) before 150141 returned from Wigan to take me to Manchester Victoria. My original plan was to bail at Salford for a Hazel Grove bound service but that was running late, and besides I was now ahead of my rough idea [due to making the tight connection at Moorside].

The canopy at Atherton

A very crowded 185106 took me around the curve to Manchester Oxford Road where I had a couple options to visit a couple stations I needed on the airport line, either East Didsbury or Heald Green, on looking at RTT highlighted the train from Blackpool which would call at Heald Green was running late and would likely miss the connection to the Liverpool train at the airport, I decided to do East Didsbury first, so it was onto 175101 bumping into two very dodgy characters at Piccadilly (*Waves at Stu & Paul*). We alighted at East Didsbury for a short fester before winner 195114 arrived from Liverpool to take us to Manchester Airport for a short fester for the Blackpool train to arrive. Well the good news was it arrived and was a pair of required 331s, but the bad news is that the call at Heald Green had been removed due to late running (we will ignore the fact that it lost a couple more minutes after the Airport due to being behind the Liverpool 195), so it was onto 331016 & 331001 for the non-stop (ish) run to Piccadilly. I ditched Heald Green as that could wait for another day as I had spotted something else I could do which would save time for another visit.

After grabbing lunch and saying a quick farewell to Stu & Paul, it was onto the New Mills Central bound service, with 150134 taken to Ryder Brow. The weather was nice and so I had a gentle walk to Reddish North, coming across the Fallowfield Loop cycle path along the way. At Reddish North it was a short wait for a busy 150126 to take me to Romiley, where I switched platforms to wait for 150106 to arrive from Rose Hill to take me one stop to Woodley. Another platform change and it was onto 150133 to Rose Hill Marple, and after a quick photograph it was back on the same unit for the run to Gorton. A short fester here before 150106 returned from Piccadilly to take me to Guide Bridge, where I crossed platforms to board 150274 to Fairfield. When I first did this station back in December 2015, the timetable gave a very tight connection at this hourly served station (something like a plus 1), thankfully the connection has increased to give me a chance to look at the reduced station, evidence of the former platforms for the extra lines still in existence, but it wasn’t long before 150133 returned to take me to Guide Bridge.

Fairfield, a bit bleak and featureless

Time to say farewell to the diesels, and hello to the electrics, I was still half an hour ahead of my rough plan so this allowed me to tick off a bonus station with 323235 taken to Broadbottom, crossing the footbridge to board 323229 (first experience of a refurbished 323, seems to be a decent job) to Newton for Hyde. Back to the Hadfield bound platform and for a short wait for 323225 to arrive to take me to Hadfield, before remaining on board via the reversal at Glossop to Dinting. 323229 returned to take me back to Glossop where I confused the barrier staff at wanting to exit and return a short while later (sadly the Co-Op which was outside the station a few years ago is now a B&M). 323229 returned from Hadfield to take me to Piccadilly where it was time to grab dinner. I was going to linear hop to Stockport, but on noticing the crowds of kickball fans I decided to take my seat on 390126 nice and early. Back to London via Crewe, the idea when I booked this train was that it gave a nice connection to the 22:20 Salisbury at London (or even the 21:50), but due to the engineering works, like the previous week I booked a room at the Croydon Travelodge to avoid the crawl via Staines.

At London, it was a short walk to St Pancras, getting lucky with the first southbound service being both for Croydon (Gatwick Airport terminator) and being a low mileage unit, 700052. I took this 700 all the way to East Croydon, walked to the Travelodge, and relaxed in the room, reflecting on a productive day in Greater Manchester. Yes I lost out on Heald Green but I gained Ryder Brow & Broadbottom which means those lines are cleared [just need New Mills Central plus a couple towards Sheffield]. On balance Heald Green is easier to do than Ryder Brow (3tph instead of 1tph), and can be planned for a GM Wayfarer day later in the year.

150106 at Guide Bridge, no Northern logos.

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19^th January – A Trip to Cambridgeshire

I had a few ideas what I could do on this Sunday, in the end deciding on a trip to Cambridgeshire to revisit the stations I needed on the Hitchin – Cambridge branch, the weather was sunny (but a bit chilly) which was a nice bonus as I had a couple long festers. The day began at East Croydon with 700115 taken to London Bridge where it terminated, meaning it was to the Northern line to carry on my trip to Kings Cross (51525/51717). I arrived with time to spare to look at the engineering works and to notice the dreaded words “formed of 4 coaches” for the first Cambridge train from Kings Cross...

Needless to say when 387125 did roll in a few minutes late, it was a free for all, I ended up in first class as it was the door I was at, and considering it was standing all down the aisle it was probably declassified, absolutely hopeless at providing a single unit for the first train. Anyhow it was a speedy run north to Cambridge where the train emptied out (and I shifted to standard class) and the unit continued to Waterbeach. The level crossing was being worked on and the platform extensions to allow 8 coach units to call are coming along well, and it was back to Cambridge on 387129, where it was time to change to a stopper.

Trains at Cambridge

387116 was on the next Kings Cross stopper which I took to Meldreth for a nice hour fester, not a lot around the station itself, but the sun was out and I had a book to read, the time passed before low mileage 700054 was up next to take me to Ashwell &Morden for another gentle fester, interrupted by passing trains (as the ECML was closed there was an hourly LNER & additional Hull/GC services passing). Next up was 700017 to take me to Foxton where I had a nice gentle walk to Shepreth, returning on 700017 to Baldock.

A 180 passing Ashwell & Morden

A busy 700145 was up next (a Hull Trains service had terminated at Cambridge due to late running, so everybody transferred to this 700), which took me one stop to Letchworth Garden City, for a short fester before low mileage 700024 rolled in from the sidings (starting from Letchworth instead of Peterborough) to take me to Stevenage, where progress on the new platform 5 was coming along well. A low mileage 717018 took me one stop to Watton at Stone where I got bowled out with the next train being cancelled (it made it to Hertford North but got turned around due to no driver), and Watton isn’t the best station to hang around due to the poor seats in the shelter. Eventually winner 717015 arrived to take me to Stevenage, transferring onto low mileage 700018 to take me a few stops to Hatfield, stepping back to winner 717003 for the trip to Finsbury Park.

At Finsbury Park it was down to the Victoria Line with 11053/11054 taken to Oxford Circus, with 3567/3265 taken to Paddington, where I had a few options to reach Reading. I decided on 800021 & 800012 for the run to Reading, and a short transfer onto 158885 working the Salisbury train to take me back to Grateley.

Overall a productive day, Kings Cross to Waterbeach is now cleared for station photographs, I just need two stations between Hitchin & Peterborough, plus everything Ely – Kings Lynn, a few more 700s into my book for mileage, plus mileage boosts for a couple 717s, other than the delays and the overcrowding of the first Cambridge it was a nice day. Some pictures are below