Wikipedia calls contracts like the National Rail Conditions of Carriage / Travel a Standard form contract: A standard form contract (sometimes referred to as a contract of adhesion, a leonine contract, a take-it-or-leave-it contract, or a boilerplate contract) is a contract between two parties, where the terms and conditions of […]
Trains
32 posts
Greebo has to commute from New Mills Newtown to the city to get mice as she has scared all the local ones away.
Today MiniBoyGeek, Tas, and little lion went for a dog walk down to Coate Water, in Swindon. Being it was a Sunday with nice weather North Wilts Model Engineering Society were running trains at the Coate Water Miniature Railway. This is a video of our trip round (shot off the […]
Tas, MiniBoyGeek and I had a quick walk round the Steam Punk Spectacular at the Swindon Steam Museum (will have to do Photos of that some other time). Podpad Studios were there with some of their cool steampunk stuff, and some one (not sure who) brought a Caravan. The rest […]
Today I took MiniBoyGeek out on the big trains from New Mills Newtown to Manchester Piccadilly, on a Northern Rail train much much older than him (pre privatisation).
Everybody loves a train set and LEGO Duplo tracks make it very easy to build your own set, I have watched YouTube videos of peoples Lego Train Sets, and thought that they were cool however if you look at the price of Lego City Train sets, prepare to cry even […]
Recently there have been people claiming that they can steal money from your pocket (up to £30) by skimming your credit or debit card info using a EPOS (Electronic Point of Sale) or PED (Pin Entry Device). It said thieves could exploit a security flaw to steal key data from […]
Some more books, Book 13 I read on the train too and from work, I have got some more free Kindle books to read soon, and some other books to re-read and hopefully finish, but first: Book 13 – Titanic: The Story Of The Unsinkable Ship It has been more […]
Book 11 – Giles Andreae’s “Giraffes Can’t Dance“ Book 12 – Don Hale’s “Mallard: How the Blue Streak Broke the World Steam Speed Record” (book crossing ID 609-14374962) On 3rd July 1938 A4 LNER Pacific ‘Mallard’ achieved the world speed record for a steam locomotive of 126mph and in this […]
While on family holiday (narrow boat was being painted at the time), we went for a day trip to Beer Heights Light Railway Beer Heights Light Railway, Considered by many the finest 7¼ inch gauge railway in Britain, the B.H.L.R. first opened to the public on the 14 July 1975. […]
While reversing out of our mooring at New Islington Marina we suffered a slight technicals issue… the engine stopped making happy happy noises and started sounding sad. So to continue our way up the Ashton Canal to Packet Boat Company we had some help… A big thank you to all […]
Tas, Bob and I headed over to the National Model Engineering and Modelling Exhibition 2015 in Harrogate.
At Ellesmere Port train station (nearest station to the National Waterways Museum) is a Cycle rack full of Bike and Go bikes to ready to hire for the cheap cheap price of £3.80 per day! I mean how awesome would it be to rock up somewhere near the coast on […]
On the way back from the Model Boat Show, I had to change trains at Helsby station. Helsby has a Traditional signal box 😀 with windows into the frame room underneath 😀
For the last while me and my bike have been traveling between Manchester Piccadilly and Crewe, Virgin run an hourly service between these two stations using Class 390 Pendolino Stock, with most of the sets being brought into service between 2001 and 2004 (a latter set were made between 2009 […]
I have got so good at complaining to Train Operating Companies, that I write my complaint while in the process of being delayed, On Monday 12th I was delayed between Manchester and Horwich parkway, So I wrote the following email to First TransPennine Express <[email protected]> Subject: 08:15 Manchester piccadilly to […]
I have no landline, however most companies who want you to phone them insist in using 0845 / 0870 / 0GodWhereDidMyMoneyGo numbers, that are even more expensive from a mobile. Some of the oddest offenders of this are transport companies, you know the people who you want to ask the time of their service while […]
Last week GLaDOS (Genetic Lifeform and Disk Operating System (or more commonly known as the bike I sometimes ride)) was parked at Marple Station, She was located in the hatched area to the left of the Staff Only Space, in the corner, the hatched area is in place because the […]
I am reading the Swindon Masterplan Report (Draft Rev C), while the document is not all about canals; in fact very little of it is about canals, the Swindon Evening Advertiser would have you believe it was a well supported plan to make the City Town of Swindon into some kind […]
Seth wrote this post on his blog: “Eleven things organisations can learn from airports” its a list of 11 things that Airports do wrong, and I feel that it all too often applies to the UK rail network 1. No one is in charge. The airport doesn’t appear to have a CEO, and […]
At Manchester Piccadilly Station they have Toilets for the travailing public to use while they are on the station, This is not unushal; however since Manchester Piccadilly is a “Principle Station”, it is operated by Network Rail; and Network Rail have a policy for charging for the use of toilets… However they have […]
This is the sixth post in a series on UK Trains and Railways; this post is specificly about the terms and conditions that you aggree to when you purchase a ticket; previous parts can be read by clicking on these links: one, two, three, four, five, and my post on Social / Anti-Social Transport. […]
Some of you may think I have some hippy tendancys; being that I live on a boat, and that I plan to be as off grid as I can, bma and I have over a number of years had a smiler talk; he is a fan of Greenpeace, the Green party, and CND […]
One of those things that TOC’s seem to be fond of installing at Stations is ATGs (Automatic Ticket Gate see RIS-7701-INS – Rail Industry Standard for Automatic Ticket Gates at Stations). Ostensibly they claim that these are installed for revenue protection (reduction of ticket less travel), Reduce anti-social behaviour, and also seem to […]
Bustitution Etymology Blend of bus and substitution Pronunciation (UK) IPA: /ˈbʌst.ɪ.tjuː.ʃən/, SAMPA: /"bVst.I.tju:[email protected]/ Noun bustitution (plural bustitutions) (rail transport) The temporary or permanent substitution of a rail (train, tram, etc) service with a bus service. Usage notes Bustitution can refer to either the permanent cessation of the rail service, or a […]
In 2011 passengers contributed about £6.5bn and taxpayers £4bn a year to the running of the railways (ref). Now I will be the first to admit I don’t like how the Rail Network is set up at current [1, and 2]. However Let us quickly compare the cost and subsidy with the […]
I found this chart online at The Public Transport Marketing Blog’s Post, on the make up of the cost of a ticket (its originally here): I don’t know how accurate these numbers are; as despite the numbers being listed as coming from ATOC (Association of Train Operating Companies) but I […]