Letters

In your report on the extension of the Gwili Railway to Abergwili Junction in issue 230, you mentioned that the nearby Swansea Vale Railway was one of the few heritage railways to close. Another to suffer this same fate is the Tralee & Dingle Railway in County Kerry in south-west Ireland. Although this 32-mile line…

Continue reading »

In your report on the extension of the Gwili Railway to Abergwili Junction in issue 230, you mentioned that the nearby Swansea Vale Railway was one of the few heritage railways to close. Another to suffer this same fate is the Tralee & Dingle Railway in County Kerry in south-west Ireland. Although this 32-mile line…

Continue reading »

I am an overseas subscriber to Heritage Railway and have just received my copy of issue 228. I was amused to read the claim made in the report of the East Coast sunrise spectacular that this event was ‘a unique world-first event.’ I would like to point out that at the annual Maitland Steamfest, which…

Continue reading »

None of the varieties of Brunswick green was used on BR locomotives. The Railway Executive published details in 1949 of the new BR standard liveries – Locomotives, Carriages and Wagons – in a supplement to the Railway Pictorial and Locomotive Review, a periodical published alternate months. In July 1949, the well known model railway supplier…

Continue reading »

I was interested in the letter and photo of the carriage in the car park from Roger Davenport (Platform issue 228), as at one time I owned this vehicle. Firstly, it is not a Pullman Car but the sole remaining Semi-Royal saloon from the LNWR Royal Train of 1903, of which the main carriages of…

Continue reading »

I read with interest the article Steam Miracle Ecuador by Maurice Burns in issue 225. My wife and I travelled over the Guayaquil to Quito railway between August 20-28, 2005 and what an incredible journey it was. We had three engines in steam: 2-6-0 No. 11 from Duran to Yaguachi and return, 2-8-0 No. 17…

Continue reading »

An interesting carriage has recently appeared in the car park of an Indian restaurant at Polhill near Sevenoaks in Kent. There is a plate on the underframe showing ‘LNWR Wolverton 1908.’ It carries BR-type electric charging points. On each bogie are chalked ‘PE/DO 01/11,’ which make it appear that it may have run within the…

Continue reading »

Ben Collier’s photograph of ‘Black Five’ No. 45212 in issue 227, on its first main line run, brought back memories of its last BR main line run and of the 1P58. The 1P58 was the 20.50 Saturdays only Preston to Blackpool South and was the last officially booked steam passenger working on BR. On the…

Continue reading »

The article by John Forman in issue 226 takes an unfortunate and dismissive tone, and contains a number of factual inaccuracies that could leave your readers with an incorrect impression of how main line steam operates. The following will, I hope, provide some clarification on some of those points. The first area where the author…

Continue reading »

The P2 Steam Locomotive Company, currently building the new P2 locomotive Prince of Wales, claims that “the Gresley class P2 2-8-2 Mikados were the most powerful express passenger locomotives to operate in the UK.” This claim is repeated (twice) in the progress report on the project on page 26 of issue 224. However I’ve never…

Continue reading »