January - Intercity Railway Society

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Railtour News The Old Curiosity Mystery Tour, 3 rd Dec. 2011 by Mark Richards: This tour on the Hastings Diesel unit 1001 on Saturday 3 rd December certainly lived up to its name with even those of us who knew the itinerary of the ‘mystery part’ surprised by where we ended up visiting! The tour started, as is usual, with an early morning departure from Hastings. I joined the train at Bromley South and it seems that it here when things started to go wrong, although surely that must have just been a coincidence. (Additional photos provided by Trevor Roots who intercepted the tour at Tonbridge and was able to view the goings on in the West Yard) The first incident into what was to become an eventful morning happened approaching Beckenham Junction with the driver incorrectly offered the direct route via Kent House instead of the correct route for our tour via the Beckenham Spur to the Hayes line. Fortunately the driver was able to stop and contact the signaller at Victoria and after a short delay we were on our way again towards New Beckenham. Shortly after, it was announced that due to an unspecified problem at Lewisham (never did find out what it was) we would be diverted instead via the Ladywell Loop on to the Up Fast at Parks Bridge Junction. 1001 sits at Cannon Street At 10.09 showing the ailing 60116 ‘Mountfield’ Mark Richards 16 Travelling at some speed on the fast, it was soon apparent that there was a more serious problem when an emergency brake application brought the Hastings unit to an abrupt stand near Tanners Hill Junction. This was due to an AWS fault on the leading power car 60116 ‘Mountfield’ which meant that the AWS warning could not be cancelled by the driver causing the emergency brake to be applied automatically. A temporary repair or isolation of the AWS was possible to allow us to resume our booked itinerary to London Cannon Street. However, considerable delay was caused to other Southeastern services in the area especially as the railtour had to be crossed via the Up Fast to Up Slow crossovers at New Cross to ensure that we were then on the ‘right side’ at North Kent East Junction for the run through London Bridge to Cannon Street. What should have been a brisk turnaround in Platform 7 at Cannon Street was not possible as there were no platform staff available to dispatch the train! This did fortunately offer the opportunity for a quick photo of the unit at a location where they would have once been a very familiar sight.
From Cannon Street our booked route took us via the Greenwich line to Dartford and onwards to Rochester via Gravesend. Needless to say by the time we had departed from Cannon Street we were out of booked path and following an all stations service to Dartford, proceeding most of the way on double yellow and single yellow aspects. At Plumstead, works are well advanced on the site of the exit portal for Crossrail services from Central London to Abbey Wood. Further evidence of Crossrail enabling works could be seen at Northfleet where the connection to the former Lafarge cement terminal has been reinstated. This will be the terminus for trains carrying excavated spoil from the Paddington portal tunnelling, starting next year. At Rochester there was the opportunity to alight from the tour and visit the very popular Dickens Christmas Festival or to stay on for the ‘mystery tour’ part of the day. The initial plan was to run to Hastings via Strood, the Medway Valley, Ashford International and Rye. However power car 60116 was still suffering from its AWS problems and would be leading for most of the planned route (following reversals at Strood and Paddock Wood). Additionally it had now developed an electrical fault understood to be affecting the headlight. After some anxiety that the tour may be cancelled altogether it was eventually decided that we would be permitted to run to Strood to reverse with power car 60118 ‘Tunbridge Wells’ then leading to Tonbridge where a loco would be attached. 1001 sits at Rochester at 11.37 showing 60018 ‘Tunbridge Wells’ with the Medway in the background Mark Richards This part of the journey was itself not without incident with a change of aspect on a signal approaching Cuxton bringing us to another abrupt halt whilst the situation was rectified with the signaller. On departure, a spirited run was enjoyed along the rest of the Medway Valley with the necessary crawl into Paddock Wood for the permanent speed restriction. The track layout here means that Up trains from the Medway Valley must travel on the Down platform line through Paddock Wood, using the crossover at the London end of the station to regain the Up road. To allow the locomotive attachment to take place off the main line, the tour was de-trained at Tonbridge before running into Tonbridge West Yard. A break of an hour here enabled liquid refreshment to be taken at the local Wetherspoons. During the break GBRf 73213 was attached to power car 60116 ‘Mountfield’ and brought the stock back into Platform 2 at 14.10 with departure a few minutes down on the planned 14.00 restart. A lively run was enjoyed to Ashford International on one of the longest sections of dead straight track on the UK railway network. Reversal at Ashford in Platform 1 was quickly undertaken, crossing the layout at the London end to take the Maidstone East line. 17
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January - Intercity Railway Society

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