Well it is true that there were no trains on the Christmas Day and no domestic services on the 26th - that meant all the long distance coaches were full on the 26th [called Boxing Day in the UK] so I took my daughter 250km by car - and returned empty. But when the airport was fog bound there were plenty of trains, as this was on the Wednesday-Friday before the Christmas weekend.
However, there was little information available on the alternative train journeys at the airports. It would have been easy for someone attempting to get to Scotland or NE England to have got a train from Heathrow to London, the Tube across town, and then the GNER. There were a number of spaces on the many trains that ran. It looked as though not many people were encouraged to take this option. It was a bit more expensive than the usual air fare, but not beyond most pockets. In the end, there were domestic flights on Saturday, so all the queues got away before the holiday.
I think that many people who book by air do not look at alternatives, so did not think of using the fast [sometiomes dor to door faster] and available long distance trains. They were not helped to look for these by the airlines either.
Thank you for your interesting answer, Peter Harris. IMHO, the airlines should have at least payed hotel-rooms for their stranded passengers. Considering hotel-costs in London, it would most probably be cheaper to direct some passengers onto a train and inform them properly and accordingly.
My wife and I were stranded in Miami about a year ago when our connecting flight home was cancelled and later flights were badly delayed due to a severe snowstorm over Chicago. The airline rep advised us that the airline would pick up our hotel tab only if the delay was due to mechanical problems, not the weather. I would assume that most carriers worldwide have the same policy regarding weather delays.
I know what you mean. Despite Tony B’s promises. a joined up UK Govt policy on transport and the environment etc seems as far away as ever. On the one hand the Stern report said we need to act on GLobal Warming, so we should be encouraging rail and not building more airports. But the Eddington report on transport said precisely the opposite! (But then not really surprising since Sir Rod Eddington is a former director of British Airways!).
But the real problem is that the final control of government policy lies with the treasury, who are very short sighted! Like most accountants, those at the Treasury know the price of everything but don’t appreciate the value of anything. For example they are against improvements to public transport because they’d would get less tax revenue from petrol if more people ditched their cars. Talk about not seeing the big picture!
A neighbour of mine got stucvk at London Heathrow in the fog. Eventually he ended up travelling to Europe by Eurostar and was very impressed. So Eurostar gains another convert!
Holman F Stephens trained as an apprentice on the Metropolitan Railway, before WW1. During the WW1 he served with the Royal Engineers, rising to the rank of Colonel. After the war he came into some money which he used to buy up ailing light railways. These include the Kent & East Sussex, the East Kent and the Shropshire and Montgomeryshire. He managed to keep all these running thru the difficult economic climate of the 1930’s when a lot of similar lines closed down. His lines became magnets for railfans because of the all the old locos and rolling stock they acquired.
Athough most of Col. Stephens lines had been excluded from the 1923 Grouping which created the Big Four companies, those that survived in 1948, which included the first two mentioned above, were nationalised. The two Kent lines mentioned above have now been preserved, while the Shropshire and Montgomeryshire was taken over by the British Army on the outbreak of WW2 (the sparsely populated areas of those counties made it in an ideal place to site ammunition dumps etc) and carried on under Army ownership until 1960.
The Kent and East Sussex Was a Col. Stephens Job. In a former life I used to work on a farm which abutted Northiam Station.
Cogload
(masquerading as devils).
Please pardon me if this has come up beforehand in this very long post–
At least, pre-privatization, were British train systems, lines, or companies ever referred to as anything other than a “railway”?
Consensus here seems to be that in the US (probably not in Canada), both “railway” and “railroad” are used. There is a very limited usage, I’ve been told, in which railway is preferable to mean “this particular line”; otherwise they seem to be just a matter of tradition–
–and when tradition must fall, many a railROAD has gone into a merger or holding company as (or with) new railWAY, and probably the opposite. So I might as well ask, given all these years of privatization, if someone has tried that semantic shift in the UK. I guess it really isn’t unethical. But is “railroad” seen in the UK as such an Americanism that it really wouldn’t feel quite right to use it? [%-)] ?
As far as I know, we always use the term ‘railway’ or shortened to ‘rail’
In the very early days I believe one or two companies used the term ‘railroad’ here but it did not catch on here. (In Wales, the Welsh word for railway “Rheilffordd” literally translates as rail road!. In quite a few European languages including French, Italian and Spanish their words for rail road translate as “iron road”).
Some early railways were called tramways or tramroads (or in one case “The South Gloucestershire and River Avon Dramroad” - that last word was an alternative for ‘tram’ - sounds a bit Scottish).
In the UK the use of the word “Railroad” would unquestionably be described as an Americanism and is certainly not in common parlance.
“Road” by itself, however, is a commonly used term amongst rail employees - examples would be a train given authority to proceed by signallers (despatchers) which would be said to “have the road.” A driver (engineer) familiar with a particular route would be said to “know the road.”
Conversely, in North American parlance civil engineering works are known as “Maintenance of WAY.”
Railroad is an Americanism over here. Although, rather like “FALL” it is probabley the correct term.
As has been stated “the road is off” or “getting the road” is used very very frequently.
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On a more cynical note, sorry optimistic, £19m has been thrown at the Merthyr branch in Welsh Wales and £35m at the Glasgow and South Western. There couldn’t be any elections coming up could there?
Not sure that your cynicsm is entirely justified Devils - The G&SW has been long overdue for heavy investment to increase capacity for Hunterston etc. traffic, and also to make it a more viable diversionary alternative for WCML.
I would also have to question the political currency of a G&SW upgrade - it’s hardly a key corridor through heavily populated marginals.
There are all sorts of linguistical inconsistancies between our countries - for example if I drove on the pavement in the UK, which you stateside folk do all the time, I would be arrested. Our pavement is your sidewalk.
Another rail-specific one which springs to mind is the place at which passenger trains stop. I read in US books and magazines of this being called either a station or a depot. Is there some historical or geographical explanation for this dual usage?
In the UK a passenger facility is invariably called a station. We use the word depot (although we pronounce it DEP-oh) primarily to signify a maintenance facility for trains or buses. Historically it was also used to signify a frieght trans-shipment facility although this usage has fallen out of currency primarily because these facilities have been replaced by nodal hubs.
Unless you are a cyclist, and then all rules about pavements, footpaths, pedestrian only areas, traffic signals, signs, the highway code etc. do not apply.
From my viewing of cowboy films, I deduce that a depot handles frieght and passengers and a way station had relays of horses stabled for the stage coachs along with passenger comforts. Many early railroads paralelled or followed said stage routes.
Funny you should mention elections Devils. As a pensioner I can’t help but notice the odd carrot being cast in our direction. Unfortunately because I have modest savings and a small company pension, all I get are tax increases. I think there could be a lot of labour councillors made redundant come the May local elections.
Something interesting I found in a generic sort of book called The Illustrated History of British Railway by Geofrey Freeman Allen:caption under a photo. "As traffic increased steadily on Britain’s railways, locomotives capable of hauling the increased loads became in short supply. The Midland attempted to overcome this problem by purchasing ‘kits’ from the Baldwin Locomotive Works in the U.S.A. Assembly was at Derby works where this photograph was taken about 1900. The photo shows a locomotive under assembly. It does not not have wheels or cab yet, but has the British type buffers. Was this the great grand-father of the Class 66 program?
Al