Great Western Coffee Shop

Sorting through some of my son's old school books, ready to be shredded or recycled, I noticed this rather graphic public safety page in the diary they were all given:

(http://imageshack.com/scaled/1024x768/32/2yaj.jpg)

Obviously, it's rather irrelevant for the railway tracks in our area, but I did think it was an impressive attempt to make young people aware of the very real dangers of trespassing on the track.

Does anyone know if it is being used elsewhere?

Would this have been part of the Network Rail Safety Education resources that are provided to schools throughout all Key Stages (1-4) of primary and secondary education?

Dorchester to Weymouth is "our area"!

And of course, Reading to Wokingham and Redbridge (Southampton) to Portsmouth Harbour/Brighton.

I think that's it for FGW workings over third rail.

Also:

Reigate to Gatwick Airport
Basingstoke area

<pedant>
Guildford area
</pedant>

The campaign ran nationally in 2009, there were two variants of the main 'coffin' poster, one for third rail areas, and one for the rest, but they both used the same image, only the text below was different:


I expect both posters were used in most of the SE, I certainly saw both at stations in SWT's area.

Paul

Did anyone else spot the fact that - erm - there's only two rails in the picture? Or is there some part of the country where they use a beefed-up version of the Hornby system?

I noticed the lack of a third rail too. The sleeper shape would also confuse tamper operators...

I still reckon that NR could take a leaf out of this Austrailian MTM train operator's approach.

http://www.dumbwaystodie.com/

Superb.

It was criticised (at least in certain enthusiast's forums) at the time of the original campaign.  A third rail should definitely have been shown on the 'DC' version in my opinion.  There is much anecdotal evidence that a number of accidents have occurred over the years because people thought it really did work like a Hornby set, and the rails were only live when a train was moving about...

However I know this for a fact because a good few years ago I got into a 'heated discussion' about this with some older teenagers who were kicking a ball around the car park at Swanwick, using the gate onto the platform as the goal.  Soon enough, their ball ended up in the 'six foot', resting against the nearer conductor rail. One lad simply glanced at the PIS display, jumped down onto the track and picked the ball up, with his legs astride the running rail and the conductor rail - one of his hands would have been within a couple of inches of the live rail.

So afterwards I tried to point out the risk being taken, and the group's initial response was that the line was not electrified - they pointed to the obvious lack of OHLE.  So I explained about the third rail, and it slowly dawned on a couple of them, but at least some of the group suggested it was OK as there were no trains passing.

At the end of the conversation though, they tried to have the final say, because I wasn't railway staff and it was nothing to do with me anyway...  ::)

Paul

  

Presumably it was a dry day? The outcome could have been quite different otherwise.

At the risk of pulling a very serious topic off-thread,  would I be right in thinking that on modern model railways the tracks may be electricfied at all times, with chips within the individual locomotives / power cars controlling when they're to run, and what speed and in which direction, based on signals superimposed on top of the voltage that's always being applied?

Of course, model railway sets even if electrified all the time don't carry lethal voltages.

Gosh, it hadn't occurred to me that people could really think such a thing, any more than they would think that it ran on 12V DC.

Edit:


Indeed - see this wikipedia article (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Command_Control)


I think the early ones (in the thirties) ran one 240v - with no earth leakage devices..!

It has certainly occurred to me that they sometimes should. The boss of Airtrack explained to me that they had to put OHLE across Staines Moor, because the proprietors of Heathrow T5 would not let any third rail into their shiny new terminal, for fear it would rot the steelwork. Given that this is indoors, there are a number of things that might be done to prevent ground currents reaching the foundations. But, if you still need to reduce any effect further, I couldn't see why any track there and further away should not be off except when a train was moving - even in small sections.

That was based on the idea that power semiconductors are now able to switch this kind of load. If that's true you might consider extending this "volts on demand" feature for safety reasons. It's probably been considered before (and I may even have read about it, and forgotten). 


When I was about five, I came very close to killing myself with ours. But it did take some ingenuity to do it.

I suspect that it was policy to show only 2 rails, lest people thought that tracks without a conductor rail were safe. Electrocution is unlikely on a non electrified route, but the risk of being hit by a train remains.

I am not aware of any mainline railway that uses the running rails to supply traction current as is done on model railways.

IIRC, the Volks narrow gauge electric railway DOES use the running rails to supply traction current, positive on one rail and negative on the other. At the remarkably low voltage of 50 volts. This requires special rolling stock with insulation between the wheels on opposite sides of the vehicles.

I think you've found an old web page.  A third rail has now been installed. [in 1886  ;D] - but it does show that you can't assume even a 2 rail system won't hurt you.

NR are running another - Think you^d know the direction of an oncoming train Wretch32 & GeorgeThePoet are put to the test.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N4ul6lh0XQ8

Are you certain, or does your post contain a typo, and you meant 1986 ? I thought that the Volks electric railway had only 2 rails when I visted, which could have been before 1986, but was after 1886 !

I did mean 1886 ... from Wikipedia;  I did a sanity check when you suggested 1986, but pictures such as this one:

http://www.medwaypier.co.uk/volks/h7.jpg

and others at

http://www.medwaypier.co.uk/volks/Routehalfway.htm

Look very much pre-1986, and show a third rail

So I'm going to stick with 1886 ... although I would welcome confirmation

I was reffering to the Volks railway at Brighton, I did not specify the location as Brighton, as I had no idea that another Volks railway existed.

AFAIK the Brighton one still uses 2 rails only

http://www.brighton-hove.gov.uk/content/parking-and-travel/travel-transport-and-road-safety/a-short-history-volks-railway (http://www.brighton-hove.gov.uk/content/parking-and-travel/travel-transport-and-road-safety/a-short-history-volks-railway)

It is the same one. For some reason (like a side effect of its hosting)  www.volkselectricrailway.co.uk (http://www.volkselectricrailway.co.uk) is mirrored as http://www.medwaypier.co.uk/volks/ (http://www.medwaypier.co.uk/volks/). If you look under "history", it does indeed say the third rail was added in 1886. There are gaps at crossings, so it may be missing from some pictures (or recollections).

Many pics of the Volks Electric Railway here:  http://www.flickr.com/photos/trolleyfan/sets/72157602736905548/  show the third rail...

Paul

I see now, sorry for spreading confusion