How to be Safe from Falling Concrete Mixers
After vreading this story, you obviously need to be in a train!
It’s not really too practical a solution as you don’t often have a train handy, when you see a concrete mixer falling out of the sky!
Luckily no-one was seriously hurt!
How to Survive Tragedy
Alan Dickinson, a solicitor from Sudbury, was nearly killed in a train crash at Little Cornard two months ago. Today, the East Anglian Daily Times reports how he got back on the train again.
Mr Dickinson, a partner with Tomlinson and Dickinson solicitors in Sudbury, faced his demons today as he boarded the branch line at Sudbury for the first time since the crash.
“I need to get the monkey off my back,” he said.
Waiting on the platform to board the 9am train this morning, Mr Dickinson said he had no fears of returning to the scene of the smash, which almost claimed his life.
“Rail travel is very safe, I have no concerns,” he said.
Mr Dickinson was the worst injured in the crash, in which he was struck in the chest by the table in front of him in the carriage.
Despite walking off the train with fellow passengers, Mr Dickinson was flown to Colchester Hospital then the Royal London Hospital with internal bleeding.
But just two months after the smash, Mr Dickinson, who has lost a stone in weight since the incident, was once more aboard the Sudbury train.
He also bears no ill-feeling towards the tanker driver, who has admitted causing the crash.
He has certainly got all his dignity back too!
Incidentally, in the paper he is shown holding a copy of the Racing Post, so perhaps he knows something about luck and the real odds in life!
It’s Only a Small Step for Beccles
There was news today, that the government had put forward funding to create a loop at Beccles, so that the frequency of trains between Lowestoft and Ipswich can be doubled.
This is very much to be welcomed and does it mean that we’ll start to see more developments on East Anglian railways.
We also need some new trains, to replace some of the crap.
Gerard Fiennes and Delia Smith Get Coupled
They were really scraping the barrel for trains tonight from Cambridge to Ipswich tonight, as all they had was two of the one-coach Class 153; Gerard Fiennes and Delia Smith, coupled together. Interestingly, the Class 153s were created by splitting a Class 155 in half. so that was a bit of a waste of time and money.
Gerard Fiennes and Delia Smith at Dullingham
The New Kings Cross Station Takes Shape
Before catching the train back to Suffolk from King’s Cross, this afternoon, I walked between the station and St. Pancras and took this photo of the new station.
King's Cross Takes Shape
Hopefully, it’ll be ready in time for the Olympics. At least though, they’ve filled in the hole left by the Nazis in the Second World War.
Peak Restrictions in Children’s Holidays
This half-term it would appear that the restrictions on rerurning on busy trains out of London have been removed. I suppose it’s not a bad idea to make up for the lost revenue because lots of people won’t be commuting.
There were quite a few kids on the trains today, so if it gets them into the habit of travelling by train, it is probably not a bad thing!
The Netherlands By Rail
I was looking at Eurostar, as I want to go to Berlin at some time to see the new museum.
When I went to The Netherlands last time on the train, I had to wait for about an hour in Brussels to buy a ticket to get to Den Haag, as it was impossible to buy one before I left London. Now though you can buy a ticket from London to any Dutch station. All you have to do is get to Brussels Midi and then take a Dutch domestic service within 24 hours! The rules for return, are that you can take any Dutch domestic service that arrives within 24 hours of your Eurostar departure.
That sounds like a really sensible way of travelling. You could catch the next train to say Rotterdam and save time or you could catch a morning train to Brussels, have a look round the city and perhaps have a good lunch as I did in the spring and then take an evening train across the border.
It would seem to be cheaper too, as my ticket last time to Den Haag from Brussels and back would have cost 60 Euros in Standard Class. Looking today and going in a couple of weeks, it looks like I can do the whole journey both ways for about £120 or less. That price was for next week, so I suspect, you could beat that if you booked further in advance.
Incidentally going by Thalys to say Amsterdam from Brussels on the same dates, doesn’t have a very good choice of trains and costs twice the price! I suspect you might save a few minutes on the journey, but because of the connections, you would probably have to leave London an hour or so later. That is not my style, as I’ve always been one for an early start! I always think that you can get a good lunch in Brusssels anyway. Or you could visit the falcons in the cathedral.
It all sounds to be a good deal to me! But one that won’t be too good to be true!
Airdrie to Bathgate
Modern Railways also has an article about the opening of a new electric railway between Airdrie and Bathgate, which effectively creates a fourth link across Scotland’s central belt between the two main cities of Edinburgh and Glasgow.
I’ve read the article in detail and it states that a new station is being built at Drumgelloch to serve just 3,700 local inhabitants. This really shows how different rules starve East Anglian stations of money. Bury St. Edmunds for example has a population of 35,000 and the best thing that could be said about the station is that it compliments the Abbey Ruins. Haverhill has a population of 22,000 and no train station at all.
I think East Anglia could take a leaf out of Scotland’s book and reinstate the line between Sudbury and Cambridge. But that will never get done in my lifetime, despite the fact it could probably be done for a lot less than Airdrie to Bathgate.
The only thing we get is other areas’ hand-me-downs and a virtual busway.
Felixstowe Sets a Record
In the week of the 26th September this year, the Port of Felixstowe handled a record number of 10,764 containers or about 1,500 a day. A quick calculation says that moving those boxes by road would create a queue of trucks nearly 40 miles long every day.
So that may be contributing to a perceived reduction in trucks on the A14. There are now upwards of twenty container trains a day to places like Glasgow, Manchester and Birmingham.
When the Felixstowe to Nuneaton freight upgrade is completed in a couple of years time, we should see even more.
