24th February 2019

Special Announcement of the start of a new section
Public Notices and Posters Collection.

We have started a new section entitled Public Notices and Posters Collection.
This can be found by scrolling down the left hand side of the screen to the bottom.
This section will cover scanned copies of paper notices of the 1960s; this will include all manner of railway advertising literature published at the time such as,  
Cheap Day Tickets, Excursions and Holiday Runabout Tickets.
We start this section with the notice of The Blue Pullman that was released by British Railways Western Region in October 1962, also a British Transport Commission notice for the withdrawal of passenger train service notice for Swansea (Victoria), Craven Arms and Shrewsbury.

Sand Train at Plymouth
Leslie Curnow

Good Evening Roger
The best available facilities for a photo on Saturday morning was my mobile so zooming is not at its best.
Number 66126 and 66044 head the Saturday 683L Burngullow to Exeter Riverside Sand train onto the through line at Plymouth awaiting the green light to follow the 12:18  1Z51 Cross Country Plymouth to Exeter being  two units together.

Thanks Leslie

HST Pioneer Sunset
Guy Vincent

Pioneer class 43 power car 43002 returned to traffic today following a short period out of use at Laira where it has been smartened up for the last few weeks it has left in normal service.  Today it called in at Westbury at the head of 1C86 1503 Paddington-Plymouth. For the record the full train formation was coaching stock set LA64 consisting of  44076 42108 42092 42166 42582 42094 40734 41166 and second power car 43025.  Well worth keeping a look out for this one now as it has been mentioned elsewhere that most HST diagrams are due to finish by the end of March.

                           Guy Vincent   Many thanks Guy

Westbury 43002 1C86 HST Pioneer Sunset 23rd February 2019 Copyright Guy Vincent

Portishead branch News
Re-opening a step nearer

From a letter received on the 20th February 2019

​Dear Member,
Last night North Somerset Council approved a number of very significant steps for the project to reopen the Portishead line.
 
The most significant is committing an extra £15 million from NSC’s own Tier 3 business rate funding  to reduce the funding gap. This means that the funding is now in place for roughly three-quarters of the total cost and hopefully makes it easier for WECA, central government, Network Rail or other sources to come up with the remainder over the next few months.
 
Other commitments approved include:

1. Signing the Initial Promotion Agreement which underpins WECA and NSC working together through to delivery of the railway
2. Spending a further £4.5 million in 2019/20 and £7.2 million in 2020/21 to progress the project, taken from the existing Local Growth Fund source
3. Spending £300k on land purchases
4. Jointly promoting Phase 1 with WECA  (para 3.2)
5. Tram Trains review by NSC and Network Rail will report by end February that tram trains are more expensive than heavy rail and that it will be easy to convert Portishead to trams later if needed
6. The Bristol Feasibility Study (referred to in Chris Grayling’s letter last year) will report later in 2019 and it assumes that MetroWest Phase 1 and 2 are implemented

 
The DCO Submission is now scheduled for June 2019 (para 3.08), presumably to allow some of the above and other work required to be completed first.
You can find the whole document here under 19 February MetroWest Phase 1: http://apps.n-somerset.gov.uk/cairo/committees/comidx163-2018.asp
 
This all sounds very encouraging. In particular, if NSC are committing a further £15 million, then possibly WECA and Central Government could each do something similar, to close the funding gap completely.
 
Regards, Peter.
 
Peter Maliphant
Membership Secretary
Portishead Railway Group