Searching For George Stephenson’s Bridge
One of the major components of the Northern Hub is the Ordsall Chord. This is so important it has its own web site.
Would you believe that where logically the curve should go, there is a Grade One listed bridge put up by George Stephenson?
The various heritage sites are shown here on the Ordsall Chord web site.
So I went to take some pictures of the area.
There are several bridges there and quite frankly none appears to have much elegance.
The solitary Salford lith was useless, as it only gave details about Salford. I was virtually outside Manchester Victoria station and that wasn’t shown.
Salford and Manchester may be two separate cities, but the rest of the world sees them as one and they should act as such, otherwise visitors will come back with tales of this impenetrable city and discourage their friends from coming.
Hackney Goes Back To The Future
I’ve posted about rebuilding the footbridge connection between Hackney Downs and Hackney Central stations before.
TfL have decided to replace it after seventy years and Hackney Council has approved the proposal as reported here. It seems to be positively received.
Hackney Central ward cllr Vincent Stops welcomed the news. He said: “It is quite exciting that this proposal remakes an historic connection between Hackney Central and Hackney Downs stations that was lost in 1944. It will greatly benefit Hackney residents and those visiting Hackney Central town centre. Now permission has been obtained I am determined that Marcon and Aspland Estate benefits both in terms of the re-provision of play facilities and that the green wall and tree cover really improves the outlook of residents and reduces train noise, a long standing issue for the estate.”
I wonder how long it is before TfL decides that the two stations are one and renames them to either Hackney or Hackney Junction.
I suspect that the renaming will get more objections than the five who objected to the footbridge. One was objecting that it might mean to a loss of car parking spaces.
The Zubizuri Bridge
The Zubizuri bridge links the two banks of the River Nervión.
It seems that these white bridges are becoming fairly numerous.
Along The Nervión River
The Nervión river runs through Bilbao and it was a good place to walk in the sun.
It may have been the time of year, but there were very few cafes along the river.
Over The Digswell Viaduct
As the train went over the Digswell Viaduct just north of Welwyn Garden City, I took a couple of pictures of the view. I usually do.
Over The Digswell Viaduct
But none in my opinion, are anywhere near as good, as this one, with the shadow of the viaduct on the valley floor below.
I would love to claim, I planned it all and actually booked a train north on a fine day, at the right time to get the shadow.
But it was all of course, down to luck.
I do bet though, that it’s not the first time, this picture has been taken. Perhaps with an iconic Stirling Single or a Gresley A4 Pacific blowing plumes of steam into the sky.
Out Of Charing Cross Station For The First Time
It may seem strange, but yesterday was the first time, I took a train out of Charing Cross station. Here are a few pictures, as the train travelled to London Bridge.
Note the Victorian replica of Charing Cross outside the station,one of the Golden Jubilee footbridges on the Hungerford Railway Bridge and Southwark Cathedral.
The Bold Millennium Bridge
The Millennium Bridge was not without controversy and many still call it the wobbly bridge.
But my walk shows how good the concept is and it was right to build a bridge there in the first place.
If you’re going to the Tate Modern, then in my view, it should be approached over the bridge.
It might be sensible too, to go back across using the new Blackfriars station, which is a bridge as well.
Or you could do as I did later and take the RV1 hydrogen-powered bus route to Covent Garden.
Through St. Paul’s To The Tate Modern
I went for a walk this morning, starting on the North side of St. Paul’s Cathedral and then over the Millennium Bridge to the Tate Modern.
I’d actually never been in the gardens of the cathedral before, which connect the two sides of the building. As it was fairly early, it would have been a pleasant place to sit around for thirty minutes or so.
There’s more on the blue trees here.
From Stockholm To Copenhagen By Train
I left Stockholm for Copenhagen late in the morning.
The journey should have taken just over five hours but the train was half-an-hour late into the Danish capital. A hotel manager I spoke to, said that the trains are always late. But I couldn’t find any published statistics, like you see on British stations.
The Stockholm to Copenhagen line is not very spectacular, except for the amazing crossing between Malmo and Copenhagen on the double-deck Øresund Bridge.
The Øresund Line, which is the high-speed rail line between Malmo and Copenhagen, illustrates some of the problems of running trains between different countries. This section called Border Technicalities in the Wikipedia article on the line, illustrates the problem. The electrification, signalling and train running systems are all different.
At least England and Scotland have the same systems and we’re vaguely the same as the French, Belgians and Germans, with respect to high-speed rail.
But then Ireland, including the North, use a different gauge.
The Swedish high speed train, called the SJ 2000, that I used on the journey has the luxury of running on 19th Century lines between Stockholm and Malmo, that were built relatively straight. But it is not particularly fast, going at speeds comparable with our Inter City 125s from London to the West Country. Our trains are thirty years older and diesel powered, but comparisons like this illustrate how good was the design of the Inter City 125s.
Do We Need Another Thames Crossing?
There have been plans released today about building another crossing of the Thames close to or downstream of the current Dartford Crossing. It’s all here on the BBC.
It will be of no use to me, as I think, I’ve only been over the current crossing, once since I moved here and that was because I was getting a lift home from Ipswich by a friend who lives in Kent.
Even my friend going home to the Netherlands on Friday, crossed under the Thames in the Blackwall Tunnel.
It could be one of those questions, where now, we might actually need the new crossing, but in say a couple of years, we might not.
London Gateway will be operational by then and will this cut down the number of truck movements around the M25?
Hopefully, there will be more trains from St. Pancras into Europe to new destinations like Amsterdam, Cologne and Geneva.
Will too, passengers for Gatwick be less likely to use a car to get there, when Thameslink is fully operational?
And who’s going to predict the effect of Crossrail?
It is a very complex problem and perhaps spending £5billion on a new bridge, might have better effect, if it was spent elsewhere?
The Anonymous Widower 