- Swindon Panel Society

Transcription

Swindon Panel Preservation
Update 10. April 2015.
Foundation Complete!
Hello and welcome to the latest newsletter from
Swindon Panel Society. Thank you for your
interest; we very much appreciate you showing
your support by joining, following, liking,
tweeting and every other way in which our
rapidly expanding Society interacts!
Firstly, I apologise for there having been no
newsletter in the spring. Things have just been
so busy in the Society over the last few months,
including lots of ups and downs recently, as
you’ll see from this newsletter, so read on, and
see what we’ve been up to……….
Looking over the
site from the
back. A visiting
FGW unit and a
‘teddy bear’ wait
by the loco shed.
Maybe
they’re
visiting the SPS
tent?
More details always available at www.swindonpanel.org.uk
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Panel Closure
Now a Registered Charity
Unfortunately at the end of March Network Rail
advised us that it was highly likely that the
Swindon Area Signalling Renewal, and associated
decommissioning of Swindon Panel, would be
deferred for a third time. It was confirmed the
decommissioning was definitely off about four
weeks later.
In an early Christmas present for us all, Swindon
Panel Society became a registered charity in
December!
It is not yet clear when the work will be deferred
until, this is something that Network Rail will no
doubt need to work out. We will report further
details as soon as we know them and report as
soon as we can on how this affects our plans and
expectations for the future.
As you will be aware the building at DRC (on
which the foundations have now been
completed and brick-laying is soon due to
commence) is only planned for completion by
the end of this year, so provided the delay to the
closure of the panel is not too great it should not
significantly affect our planned development at
Didcot. As we have said before (and seem to
now be saying with disappointing regularity)
delays to the panel arriving in Didcot are a
benefit in that they reduce the burden of finding
somewhere to securely store it until the building
is ready to receive it.
Huge apologies to anyone messed about by this
news, we hope you understand the
circumstances that until the day we take hold of
the panel we will be governed by Network Rail’s
much higher level plans.
Sincere apologies to those who had agreed to
give up their time for the panel recovery
programme which will clearly now not take
place. If you have arranged time off work that ca
not be undone please let us know, there are
Our registered charity number is 1159646.
This has been a huge amount of work over
several months, so thank you very much to
everyone who contributed to the process. As
many members will know the process required us
to hold an EGM in the summer to make some
minor changes to our constitution in order to
satisfy the Charity Commission.
always other tasks in progress and we will make
sure you’re gainfully employed.
We understand the news is not what anyone
wanted to hear, but while we are frustrated by
the delay in obtaining the panel for preservation,
we ask all members of the Society and the
Swindon Panel family to remember that the staff
of Swindon Panel and TVSC are affected in a way
far more disruptive to their own lives and
careers than us and we should treat this
situation with the sensitivity the circumstances
require.
We intend to still hold our AGM on 27 June, at
Didcot, and plan to include a members’ BBQ as
well. In the more immediate future, to help you
get your Swindon Panel fix, we will have our
exhibition stand at all the bank holiday gala days
in May at DRC, so do come and get involved in
helping us with that as well if you can. We look
forward to seeing you soon!
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dug away at over the previous few
weekends.
All this hard work and exciting
progress can be viewed at any
Swindon Panel Day at DRC,
especially on the steam and diesel
gala days on May 2, 3, 4, 23, 24, 25,
when our exhibition stand, including
photos and ‘demo panel’ will be
present. Why not come and visit us?
Or better still, join us on the stand
for an hour or two!
Well done to everyone at Swindon Panel Sunday
29 March, and to everyone involved in the work
on the site since last September, as the building
foundation is now completed!
The site is now completely flat, with very little
left to do before brick-laying can commence.
The sleepers used as shuttering around the edge
of the site are now being removed and recycled
and the ground filled back in (lest we should end
up with a moat around the
building!) The first brick-course will
be laid out dry initially to obtain
the correct spacing etc, and then
cemented in. Contractor bricklayers will be carrying out the brick
-laying, so we should see the walls
rise fairly quickly!
Left: Standing in this position in the
future you’ll be standing in the
Bristol Room looking through the glass wall to
the west end of the panel. You’ll be able to see
the backs of the group of visitors enjoying an
explanation and demonstration of the panel
workings! [James Nelhams]
Below: A view of the path (minus tree trunk) to
where the front doors will be. The path on the
left leads to an air-raid shelter (just in case).
[James Nelhams]
SPS and GWS volunteers also
managed to uproot a large tree
stump obstructing the walkway
from the main platform through
the site to where the building
doors will be. This had been slowly
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Swindon Panel Days
Well done to those who braved some chilly
and damp days to join in the New Year Brick
Cutting Party at Didcot Railway Centre!
The GWS Civil Engineering Group and SPS
volunteers have met regularly on weekends
since the autumn.
The bricks for the new building were
delivered to DRC some while ago and are
stacked up near the Wantage Road bus
garage. The new building will be built of
bricks in an English Bond pattern, which
requires a large proportion of half-bricks. So
over the new year period the working
groups set to work with a brick guillotine,
and started nibbling away at the pallets of
bricks.
We found the ideal number of people to
work with the machine was three or four, in
order to get a good production line, but
without getting in each others way. One
person inserting bricks into the machine and
removing the halves, one person operating
the machine handle, and one or two people
stacking the half-bricks. The half-bricks
produced create quite a volume, so efficient
stacking onto pallets is important, as the
pallets will be lifted by the steam crane to
the building site, so it’s no good if they all
fall off as soon as the pallet is lifted!
The required size of brick is slightly less than
half, so each brick required at least two cuts,
the narrow middle portion being rejected
(although these will later be used in other
building works as hard-core). Some bricks
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required an extra cut as a ‘trim’, if one of the
first cuts wasn’t straight.
The guillotine is a clever machine that exerts
about three feet of mechanical advantage in the
handle into a movement of the ‘blade’ of about
1/4 inch. The blade doesn’t cut all the way
through the brick, it just cracks it from the top.
This, combined with the specially-shaped plate
on which the brick rests gives very good results,
and by the end of the sessions we had a
frequency of about one brick every five seconds.
The morning of New Year’s Day was quite wet,
and progress was hard during that time. The
team fashioned a roof over their area out of
corrugated sheeting. The afternoon was dry and
cool, which was ideal weather for the work we
were doing. We soon built up speed (and sweat),
and were so enthused that we carried on well
after dark (the normal natural stopping time),
until about 5.30. We set ourselves several
targets (end of this pallet, etc.), but each time
we reached the target
we still wanted to carry
on!
4512 halves. Just over 7800 halves are required.
The remaining 1250 bricks to cut were
completed in the CE days on Saturday 17 January
and the Swindon Panel Day on Sunday 18
January. Thank you to everyone who took part.
Later in January there were two groups on the
site: the GWS Civil Engineering Group
concentrating on tree branch felling and pruning
in the area of the branch line, where the large
wooden gate is at the line connecting the branch
line to the rest of the site; and a small group (of
three) working on constructing the reinforced
cages for the foundations of the site.
Thirteen such cages are required (in various
combinations of design), and we completed the
eleventh and twelfth.
The eleventh was slightly more complex as it has
a ‘boot’ sticking out the bottom. This boot runs
around the outside edge of the foundation, and
is the bed on which the first brick course will be
laid.
The days were very
enjoyable indeed. The
work isn’t massively
hard, and doesn’t require
much in the way of
technical skill, but it is
just jobs like brick-cutting
that need to be done,
and can be achieved as
volunteers, to minimise
the overall cost of the
building.
On the New Year period
we cut 2256 bricks into
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suspended square hoops and fastened to the
bottom two inside corners of the square hoops,
and the mid-point of the bottom side of the
square hoops. All the while being careful not to
build it around the trestle and make extraction
impossible!
All the re-bar cages started as the following
components: individual round bars about 5
metres long, square hoops and U-shape hoops,
and small straight pieces about 18 inches long
with a hook on each end. They are constructed
by laying three 5-metre round bars horizontally
across two trestles and suspending about 15
square hoops vertically from them. The square
hoops are spaced at 200mm centres and two of
the round bars are attached to the inside corners
all the way along using lengths of wire about 6
inches long and a hand-held tool for twisting the
wire tight. The third round bar is attached in the
same way to the mid-point of the top side of the
square hoops.
Three further bars are then inserted into the
Two bars are then fastened inside the cage
diagonally to hold the arrangement square.
Hooked, straight pieces of bar are then inserted
vertically through the cage from the middle long
bar on the top to the bottom, and, again,
fastened in place. This provides strength through
the cage.
Mike and Richard working on the cages.
Where required, U-shape hoops are then added,
protruding outside the cage, to make the ‘boot’
round the bottom of the foundation. These are
the fastened to the cage co-incident with the
square hoops.
Each cage takes about 140 fastenings, plus an
additional 90 if a boot is required. It’s not
difficult work, and we found that once we had
got into a rhythm we worked quite quickly and
efficiently.
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Unfortunately our camera batteries ran out half
way through making a video this week, so we
only managed to film half a video! Videos and
photographs of all our Swindon Panel days are
stored on the Society website for everyone to
see.
A great deal of levelling with a wooden bar with
two handles on takes place throughout the job
to continually level the concrete. This is
particularly difficult when there is limited space
to stand, and also when, in the last concrete
pour, the area was longer than the levelling bar!
A few days later, the second of six sections of
the foundation were poured with concrete. This
section is the front left corner of the building (as
you stand in it looking towards the front doors
and engine shed), and will be the first part of the
“Bristol Room” that visitors will arrive in when
they first enter the building.
Several further days saw several move concrete
pours in order for the foundation to be
completed. The concrete is mixed in a large
In this case an intermediate wooden former was
laid so that there was something to level against.
The site is now ready for brick laying, a huge
achievement for all those involved in the
foundation construction and to whom we are
hugely grateful. Our enormous thanks are due to
the Civil Engineering group of the Great Western
Society, led by Richard Antliff, who have
contributed the great majority of the manpower
and resources of the building construction.
mixer in the Centre Sidings, near the site, and
the transported to the site in two dumper trucks
working in MGR fashion. The dumper trucks
cannot drive on the reinforcement bar, so they
stop at the back of the site and the concrete is
decanted into wheelbarrows for the short
journey to where it is required. As the sections
being concreted fill up from front to back, the
later concrete can be tipped in straight from the
dumper truck.
Watch this space now for the start of bricklaying!
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In the News
SPS
gained
some
excellent
exposure
recently with coverage
on BBC Wiltshire’s Ben
Prater Programme being
interviewed by Ashley
Heath at 8 o’clock in the
morning.
We were then on BBC
Points West television
news that evening.
We are very grateful to
be Network Rail for also taking part in the BBC news interview.
We were also the subject a large article in the Swindon Advertiser, a newspaper that covered the
opening of the panel in 1968. This is reproduced on the next page.
Above: BBC Points West’s Laura Jones tells the story.
Swindon
Panel
Visit — 9 May
Thank you to Network
Rail for allowing us to
arrange a Society visit to
Swindon
Panel
on
Saturday 9th May!
All the places on this visit
are now booked (but we
are maintaining a reserve
list in case of any dropouts)
Full joining instructions
will be circulated to those
who have booked places shortly. And we look forward to seeing you all there. [Photo: Jack Boskett]
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In the News
We were the subject
a large article in the
Swindon Advertiser,
a newspaper that
covered the opening
of the panel in 1968.
Here is the article
which
shows
a
picture from the
opening of the panel
in 1968, and a
picture
of
the
Tewkesbury Railway
Club visit facilitated
by SPS. [Photo: Jack
Boskett]
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Spring Raffle Draw Now Open!
Our Spring Raffle is now open!
There are some fab prizes to be won, and all funds will
be used for the move and restoration of Swindon
Panel.
Top prize is a pair of First Great Western tickets, first
class, or even on the Paddington to Penzance sleeper
train!
Other prizes include
2. A family entry ticket to Didcot Railway Centre
3. A family ticket on the Gloucestershire
Warwickshire Railway
4. A copy of Adrian Vaughan’s brand-new latest book
‘Railways Through the Vale of the White Horse’
5, 6. Swindon Panel Society Ties
7, 8. Swindon Panel Society mugs
9. A selection of vinyl depot stickers
Tickets £1
Thank you very much indeed to all our friends for their most generous donations of prizes:
First Great Western
Didcot Railway Centre
Crowood Press
The Gloucestershire
Warwickshire Railway
Raffle tickets are available:
from Society officials | at the Gathering on 25 April | at the Panel Visit on May 9th
at the SPS stand at the DRC steam gala on 2, 3, 4 May and the DRC diesel gala on 23, 24, 25 May
you can also purchase online via the SP website.
(Raffle tickets purchased online will not be posted out (to maximize funds for Swindon Panel), but
we will advise you of your raffle ticket numbers by email.)
The draw is on Monday 25 May at 1pm at Didcot Railway Centre. Winners will be notified shortly
after.
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And now for our exciting occasional feature….
Our favourite asker of questions Robin from Southampton keeps
us on our toes by asking the questions you never thought to ask!
Dear Aunty Swindon Panel...
I know that each signal box has its own prefix used in its signal numbers, such as SN for
Swindon, R for Reading, OX for Oxford, etc, but I see a lot of signals around, across numerous
signal box areas, with prefixes such as ‘UM’ and ‘DR’. What do these relate to?
Love your work!
Robin.
Dear Robin, I’m glad you asked!
The Western had an excellent system for signal numbering. Controlled signals — those that were
operated by the signalman and whose normal position was danger — were given numbers with a
prefix relating to the signal box, as you described, R for Reading, SN for Swindon, etc.
Automatic signals (those that were controlled by the passage of trains and whose normal position is
generally proceed) were given a different system of numbers. The prefix component is the initials of
the line to which the signal applies. The number component is the lower of the two mile posts
between which the signal stands. So DM72 is an automatic signal that applies to the Down Main and
is between the 72 and 73 mile posts. If there were two signals between the same two mile posts an
A or B suffix would be applied. Ie, UB106A, and UB106B (UB=Up Badminton in this case). Between
Newport and Cardiff there are several sections where there are three signals between two mile
posts, so a C suffix is used. I have never known of the suffixes reaching a ‘D’ (but if anyone knows
please write in).
Lines names that I can think of that had auto signal prefixes: UM and DM for Up Main and Down
Main, UR and DR for Relief, UG and DG (Goods), DB and UB (Branch), UW and DW (Westbury), UK
and DK (Kemble), UB and DB (Badminton, Bristol, Barry), UC and DC (Charfield, Caerphilly), UA and
DA (Athelney), US and DS (East Somerset), UF and DF (Filton) (and UFR, DFR, UFM, DFM (Filton Relief
and Main)), UT and DT (Tunnel, Torbay, Treforest, Trowbridge), UH and DH (Hereford), UX and DX
(Oxford), UD (District). I don’t believe there are any DD prefixes on the Down District.
Hope to hear from you again soon! Love from Aunty Swindon Panel.
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Farewell Slough Panel
SLOUGH PANEL, Swindon Panel’s
older sister, signalled its last train on
the night of 2/3 April.
The panel, a Henry Williams /
Western Region turn-push panel
exactly the same type as Swindon,
opened on 13 October 1963, as part
of the Reading-Hayes MAS scheme
and in its early life it signalled exGWR steam trains. It controlled from
from West Drayton East, where it
fringed with Hayes, to White Waltham, between Maidenhead at Twyford.
As part of the scheme a new box was opened at Maidenhead to control the mechanical connections
for the branch to Bourne End (which still had a passing place at Cookham), and West Drayton West
Box was recycled as ‘West Drayton’ to control the Staines branch there.
As with all railway locations the layout has been rationalised a lot over the years. There was
originally a running junction between all four lines between Burnham and Taplow, and at West
Drayton East. (Both have since been removed and now West Drayton East has been re-instated in all
but name at Stockely Bridge!) There was also a sizeable loco depot on the down side at Slough. It is
hard to believe that back then the signalmen would have looked towards across from the panel
towards the east loop and bay line, and what is now just two simple tracks would have been lost
inside a mass maze of railway either side of it!
The panel shows off three
types of train describer at
once. The Sodeco mechanical
describer on the Relief lines;
Neon
“union
flag”
or
“calculator” train describer on
the Up Main; and VDU train
describer in the process of
replacing both temporarily
positioned on top of the
panel. Saturday 16th January
1993 with the signalman on
the on the Control phone.
[Phil Bellamy]
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Left: Across all four lines at Maidenhead East from
the Down Main to the Bay Line. [Phil Bellamy]
In later years of course steam gave way to diesel
and the popular and long-serving HST, and the
fringe boxes at Hayes and Twyford West boxes
gave way to panels at Old Oak Common and
Reading. The box was finally fringed on both sides
by the Thames Valley Signalling Centre.
The West Drayton area was resignalled at
Christmas 2013 and is now controlled from the
Hayes desk in the Thames Valley Signalling Centre.
The new Slough desk opened over the Easter
weekend and will take over the remaining area of
control, from Iver to Waltham. This will fill a gap in
the TVSC’s area of control, giving it continuous
route coverage all the way from London
Paddington to Culham, Uffington and Lavington.
The panel has always had a great community of
present and former signalmen/signallers. Many
Slough PSB staff progressed on to Old Oak Panel,
Reading Panel or Slough IECC and still work on or
around the area. We wish all the present and past
signaller of Slough PSB the very best with their
future careers.
Below: A panoramic shot of Slough Panel by signaller Andy Stuart.
For more photographs of Slough PSB, see our photo website.
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Newbury Emergency Panel arrives
at Didcot
After a long wait since it was decommissioned in
November, we have recovered the emergency
panel from Newbury.
The emergency panel was provided when MAS
came to Newbury in 1978 and was provided in
case of a failure of the remote control link from
Reading Panel (see the article on Remote
Controls in the newsletter 9). If the link failed
the interlocking could be controlled locally by
means of this panel.
The Great Western was not anywhere near as
generous as some other regions in providing
‘slave’ or ‘emergency’ panels, and why Newbury
gained one is not fully clear (if anyone knows
please let us know!)
Other emergency panels on the GW were
installed at Weston-super-Mare, Swansea High
Street and Bromsgrove. In the recent past one
has been installed at Filton Abbey Wood,
although that was more for testing during the
installation than operating resilience.
The controls and indications on the emergency
panel are not anywhere near as comprehensive
as they are on a Henry Williams panel (of which
Reading and Swindon are both types). Two red
lamps are provided for each track circuit and a
very basic white route light system.
The panel is an OCS panel, not NX like Swindon
and Reading. This means it has a switch for each
route from each signal. So if a signal has four
routes it will have four switches. The emergency
signalman must select the route that is required
on the instructions of the signalman at the
panel. The interlocking is still route-setting, so
the points operate in sympathy with the routes
requested.
Left: The emergency panel in its original
position. It was possible to switch the
indications on without switching the panel
controls in. [Danny Scroggins]
Right: Tim loads the panel into the back of the
car. Years ago it could have travelled direct
from Newbury to Didcot by train. [Tim Miller]
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have not been re-attached.
We have no immediate plans for the
Newbury Panel, and anything we do
with it will come after our Swindon
Panel work is done. It will remain a
static exhibit for now.
The emergency panel could control from Bulls
Lock (between Thatcham and Newbury
Racecourse) to Enbourne Jn (between Newbury
and Hamstead Crossing) and there were many
occasions on which it was switched in under the
instructions of Reading Panel.
In 2010 when Reading Panel started to close,
the relay interlocking was re-controlled to the
Thames Valley Signalling Centre, yet the
emergency panel remained! There were one or
two occasions when Newbury was switched in
in the TVSC era for testing or training, but it was
never switched in in anger for a failure of the
remote control from TVSC. There was one
occasion where it very nearly happened, but the
signalling manager who will
remain nameless (but who is
an SPS member!) sent a
signalman from Didcot to
switch the panel in with the
wrong key!
Although, admittedly, a tiny bit of scope
creep from our Swindon objective, we
felt the Newbury Panel was worth
rescuing due to its rarity in WR MAS history.
We are very grateful indeed to Network Rail for
their continued support of our project in
allowing us to preserve the emergency panel.
The Newbury Panel will be on display at our
stand at DRC during the steam and diesel galas
over the May bank holidays, so come and have a
play!
Above: Thank you to Andy Harris for making an
excellent video of the arrival of the panel
(available on the SPS site and YouTube.)
Below: Detail of Newbury Middle. Only basic
indications are provided. The panel is in very
good condition as it was hardy ever used. [Ian
Lynagh]
The panel and legs are
extremely
heavy.
Almost
unnecessarily so! It was quite a
job to recover, which was
carried out by Tim and Danny
on 11 April. The legs were
removed for transport and
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Past, Present & Future
We were delighted to
welcome a number of former
and
present
Swindon
signalmen, and those involved
in the future of Swindon
Panel, at the Great Western
Hotel last weekend.
About 30 people joined us in
the afternoon/evening, for a
very interesting get together
and re-acquainting of some long-parted colleagues. Some of those present worked in the mechanical
boxes at Swindon before the panel opened!
It was great to see everyone getting to know each other, and the Society made a lot of new and
interesting contacts.
I am hopeful that we will be able to repeat the get-together in a future year, hopefully in the panel
room at Didcot.
Above: (l-r) Ray Woodward, Owen Gibbs, Colin Baldwin, George Dicker and Sybil Baldwin enjoy
catching up and viewing the model of the new Didcot building. Below: A group photo of those who
attended the event. Thank you very much to everyone who attended, we hope you enjoyed it!
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Swindon Panel Stand at Railcar Day
THANK YOU to everyone who came along and
visited and supported the display stand at Didcot
Railway Centre this weekend!
We were especially impressed by our young
visitors who were particularly interested in
Newbury Emergency Panel and loved operating
the route-setting switches!
It’s a sign of things to come
when young visitors will be
operating
switches
on
Swindon Panel and seeing
the results in the indications
which will be even more
engaging.
If you weren’t able to visit us this weekend, don’t
forget we’ll be back during the bank holiday
galas in May.
More photos of the weekend available in the
usual place, on our website!
Have you got more photos? If so, we’d love to
see them!
Well done to everyone who
helped run the stand,
including the Sunday, which
we
weren’t
originally
expecting to open!
Above: Young visitors are
engaged
by
Newbury
Emergency Panel. If a
lifeless panel can attract so
much attention, how much
more will a working one?
Left: Display boards and
mugs and the Wootton
Bassett electronics test
panel.
[Both: Ian Lynagh]
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SPS Stand at May Galas
We will be at Didcot Railway Centre with our
stand in May. This was a very busy period last
year when we covered the same galas, but
extremely worthwhile for the Society in
attracting new members and supporters.
Please help us out on the stands if you can for a
day or half a day!
No special skills are required. The important
thing is a willingness to talk to passers-by about
Swindon Panel and whatever they want to talk
about. We frequently find that visitors are far
more likely to support an organisation that is
friendly and gives them a sticker, than one that is
cold-hearted, regardless of the worthiness of the
project objectives.
We have leaflets, stickers, photos, display
boards, toys, mugs, something for everyone on
the stand, and we have been helped in the past
by supporters ages from 5 to 85!
This is a really important way in which you can
support the development and growth of
Swindon Panel Society that will be necessary for
its success.
We give out a great number of leaflets at events
such as these and in very many cases that is the
prompt that a passer-by needs to ask ‘so what is
a panel then?’, or ‘what is your project all about
then?’ that gives us the opportunity to engage
them in conversation. Very few people leave
saying ‘well now I know I wish I’d never asked’,
and it is hugely satisfying when someone leaves
saying ‘I never knew anything like this existed’!
Below: The stand team at Railcar Weekend in
April. Great job!
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Quizzery Questions!
Thank you to Tom O’Quizzery for the ten challenging questions in
the last newsletter. Here are the answers…..
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
In which stage of the Swindon MAS Scheme did Swindon
Panel open? — Stage 5
Which company is the UK supplier of Integra Domino
panels? — Henry Williams, Darlington
One which days of the week to the Operations Group meet?
— Mondays and Tuesdays
How many signals have there been on the Swindon Panel
area with the number ‘62’ in their identity? — I believe
there have been nine — 62, 62A, 62B, 662, 262, 624RR,
624R, 624, 628 — if you found more please let me know!
When was SN.20’s top yellow aspect brought into use? —
18 February 2002, as part of the South Marston
commissioning
When was Hullavington Ground Frame recovered? — 25
July 1993
What method of protection for road vehicles was in use at
Purton Collins Lane before Automatic Half Barriers? —
Miniature Red and Green Lights
How many interlockings does Swindon Panel control today?
— Ten: Uffington, Bourton, South Marston, Highworth,
Swindon, Wootton Bassett East, Chippenham, Thingley,
Wootton Bassett West, Hullavington.
How many different signal boxes has Swindon Panel fringed
to in its lifetime? — Twelve: Reading PSB, Swindon B, TVSC,
Swindon Loco, Sapperton Siding, Gloucester PSB, Hay Lane,
Bathampton Jn, Bristol PSB, Badminton SB, Bradford Jn,
Westbury PSB. If you disagree, please write in!
Where does Swindon Panel have hot axle box detectors? —
Bourton (Down Main) and Studley (Up Main). “Studley”
used to be “Wootton Bassett”, in a slightly different
position.
Well done to everyone who had a go!
It’s Tom O’Quizzery!
Well done to everyone who
had a go at Tom O’Quizzery’s
10 questions from last month.
Are you a budding Bob Holness
or a potential Peter Snow?
If so, why not pose a puzzle for
the Swindon Panel newsletter
and you could be wearing the
hat of wonder!
It could be a puzzle or a
crossword, a quiz or a teaser,
whatever you can create.
Send your contributions on a
post
card
to
[email protected]
today!
Purton Common
Some photos of Purton
Common sent in by SPS
member Duncan Thom.
This crossing used to be
manned
and
have
vehicle gates. When
Swindon Panel first
opened, Purton had
semaphore distants in
each direction!
The crossing box was
on the down side of
the line on the Kemble
side of the crossing.
The crossing was later
downgraded
and
vehicles were no longer
allowed to cross.
The crossing had a
public telephone fitted
and removed several
times over the years,
and in 2014 was
upgraded to a R/G
crossing with miniature
lights for users.
Thank you very much
Duncan for allowing us
to use these photos.
Follow us at
/SwindonPanel
/SwindonPanel

- Swindon Panel Society

Transcription

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