Great Western Coffee Shop

(https://i.postimg.cc/RhsM04Tb/curve-800.jpg)

Might need a tiny bit more by way of a picture Mark !...

(https://i.postimg.cc/13nY938T/curve-2-800.jpg)

I think we're playing catchphrase!

Were you in the North East of England?

GWR-land.

(https://i.postimg.cc/SNN0C9sz/curve-3-800.jpg)

Montpelier?

Yup! Montpelier station at school going home time yesterday afternoon. Station busy and train busier.

Does anyone have a photo of the track alongside the station before it was relaid some years ago? I think it was replaced to increase its resilience at the time that the railway was to divert Crosscountry trains via Avonmouth. The previous track was picturesque, with the shortest rail section I've ever seen causing it to threepennybit its way round the curve. By 'Short', one rail was either 45 or 60 foot lengths perhaps, but the other had had one of those replaced by two unequal pieces that were shorter still - at least I think that's what I recall. The current track's nailed down to prevent lateral movement.

Mark

(https://i.postimg.cc/NGn0GGXS/curve-montpelier-800.jpg)

I really like the format of this quiz, Mark A! I got it as soon as you added the chimney, but thought it best to let the others have a go. I do spend a fair bit of time there for one reason or another.

Can't help you with an old pic though, I'm afraid!

Yes, these trains can be pretty packed at school times. My son has taken to checking Realtime Trains, and cycles to school if it's a two-car unit because they find the overcrowding unbearable.

tl:dr: an account of the somewhat disrupted journey back to Bath.

*    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *

Think this one was three and it needed to be. Passengers quite good at generally making it all work though.

Returning to Bath, yesterday's disruption meant that Bristol Temple Meads was having an extended moment with a fair bit of conflicting information as to where trains would be.

The 16:00 to Paddington, cancelled, was sitting at its platform with seat reservations showing, and with the doors not locked, with only the main display on the platform announcing it as cancelled, so, understandably, many people were going aboard and being instructed to get off again. The 16:03 to Weymouth arrived across the way, and overfilled. Some of the overflow made their way to... the 16:22 to Portsmouth Harbour, which already had a large crowd pursuing it as previous trains hadn't run.

Its original departure platform announced at Platform 12, which is the country end of 11, and both 11 and 12 already had trains alongside, so that wasn't going to happen, and a minute before it was due, a platform change announced, but thankfully only to 10, so several hundred people sprinted the length of platforms 9-10 / 11-12. The Portsmouth train then sat there, rather full, until the 16:30 to Paddington had left from Platform 3, departing in the same style as the last ever departure for London from Nottingham Victoria*.

Around 16:35 a driver came aboard at a gallop to take the Portsmouth train on its onward journey, during which a certain passenger regaled everyone in hearing with a blow-by-blow account of their experience of the Salisbury train crash, as they'd been in the leading carriage of the train from Portsmouth and had been evacuated onto the track via the end door and then a bit of a hike back to a road access point.

Reached Bath in time for the once-every-several-hours 620 up the hill, avoiding the hike across town to First's offering that no longer serves the station.

Mark

*Veiled reference that the current handling of the railways must be really difficult for many staff.

Remind me - what is the maximum train length that the stations can cope with these days, and (if I suspect it's 3 cars) when and why it was reduced from 5 or 6.

I think the Severn Beach line is able to take 5-car trains; leastwise that was the spec for Portway Park&Ride. I have never seen a service train with more than 3 cars; going back to the 70s 1 car was not uncommon.

It was a quest for a key with I think a 1/4" hexagonal socket that took me to Bristol.

No luck, so a walk up the Gloucester Road and under the viaduct. A bite to eat and drink at a 'More-than-a-bar' called the Gallimaufry which was unexpectedly lovely and then, the roads having more or less come to a halt, to Montpelier station, past a piece of world-class street art, and then a short wait for the train, which was a little late - but more time to browse once again the extensive artwork at the station.

Mark

There are a couple of shots in this video, starting at 4.11... but they may be going back too far for you?

No link visible?

Ah, good point. Here it is: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wVKbKqyJMj8

That is quite the collection of images, thanks. The Montpelier selection certainly hints at threepenny bit track... and that's possibly the same track that was replaced in the 1990s, by which time it might be that one of the rails alongside the platform had suffered a defect and as far as I can recall about 15 feet of a 60 foot length was removed and replaced - and in due course, three rail joints in quick succession allowed things to turn very picturesque as the track aged further.

Mark