NEWS
2009 – page 3
News 2009 –
page 1 | News 2009 -
page 2 | News 2009 -
page 3 | News Archive (news from previous years)
The final figures (uploaded
We normally leave the year’s
passenger number figures till the first page of the new year, but our number
crunchers have worked overtime this year and we’ve had the overall numbers to hand
for several days
Here they are:
- Summer Season – 7253 – 11.7% up on last year’s 6496
- Santa Season – 2093 – 6.5% down on last year’s 2239
- Overall – 9346 - 7% up on last year’s 8735
The Summer season was good,
and buoyed up by the unexpectedly (and frighteningly) successful Halloween
Special services
The Santa Season was
disappointing being the first year for several years that we have not made
progress. Early signs were good, and it
was only the snow of the final weekend that upset matters. We have suffered – but not as badly as
Eurostar!
The overall outcome at 7% up
on last year, despite a difficult final Santa weekend, an appallingly wet
Summer, redirection of volunteers onto development work, and, most of all,
the difficult financial situation that
passengers are doubtless experiencing, all tell us that we are moving in
broadly the right direction
It really does look as if
breaking the 10,000 barrier will be possible when the extension opens next
year. Please come and travel on our
trains and help us break the magic 10,000!
Dreaming of a White Christmas (uploaded
Once again, our Santa Season
was run over three weekends, that is, normal two weekends and then a long four
day weekend Saturday till Tuesday, inclusive.
In terms of the weather it
would be quite easy to sum up the season – rain for the first weekend, ice for
the second weekend and heavy snow for the final four day fling – though we
hardly dreamt of such a thing! We cannot
tell the story of Santa 2009 better than by including a selection of images
from our resident photographer Alistair Grieve, who provided all of the images
below.
Our first weekend bucked the
normal Christmas pattern of a quiet first weekend, and passenger numbers,
including those who had booked ahead, were well up on last year. The second weekend was even better and were
quite confident that it was going to be a record breaking Santa. The third weekend arrived, and railways
across the country and, notably, into France via Eurotunnel were laid low. It was little better on the roads, and
although the local authority had kindly heeded our pleas to grit our winding
and steep approach road, other roads in the areas were treacherous. So, not only were many of our ‘turn-up-and-ride’
passengers absent, many of our pre-booked also stayed away. Although we made strenuous efforts to re-book
our absentees on Monday and Tuesday, conditions were scarcely better on those
days. We therefore had no choice but to
accept a fall in the expected number of passengers during the final
weekend. The final figures are posted
above.
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Weekend one – and in a brief, dry, interlude,
passengers begin to arrive in very encouraging numbers. The first weekend is usually quiet, but
this year we started well |
The second weekend was bitterly cold, but these
parents, snug and warm in the Whistle Inn seemed more pleased than the young
recipient of a Christmas present. |
The cold weather caused brake problems with some
carriages. This needed some rapid
swapping of carriages to allow frozen brakes to be thawed out. |
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The third weekend arrived with heavy frost and a
light sprinkling of snow. Photogenic it may have been, but resulting
difficulties getting traction early in the morning on slippery rails led to the
decision to double-bank our trains |
But on Saturday night there was heavy snow. This was just the environment Alistair
needed to produce these stunning images.
Here No19 pushes the two coach train through the wilderness. This view is from our approach road, over
trees surrounding Garn lakes to the flanks of the Coity mountain. |
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A real picture postcard view, across the level
crossing south of Furnace Sidings sees No19 just waiting for the ‘right
away’. |
In this supremely evocative picture, looking south
from the embankment just south of Ty Rheinallt Farm we see No19 accelerating
its two coaches increasingly rapidly out of Furnace Sidings. The coaches look arctic outside, but inside
steam heating ensures that they are quite snug |
Shluuurrrrp! (uploaded 29 December 2009)
What noise do landslides
make? We’re not sure. We didn’t hear ours. We didn’t need one either, or rather two, but
that was what we got. We first became
aware of it on Monday 30 November – with our first Santa Specials just five
days away. Mercifully the slip was not
on that part of the line which is currently used, so running of Santa Specials
was unaffected. All the same, the
station at Blaenavon (High Level) and the works further down the line were
effectively marooned so that clearing up the mess was considered rather
urgent. In fact clearance work was
undertaken during the weekdays when Santa Specials were not running, and the
floodwater has now been returned to its proper course. However, longer term action is needed. We think we understand the problem – weeks of
extended periods of very heavy rain, and a long neglected infrastructure. Sadly legal threats from ecologists serve
only to magnify our problems – and, ironically, further threaten the local
ecology. Whatever the legal situation,
in the longer term there is no doubt that we shall have to study and control
the local hydrology, dig new drainage channels, and instal stable retaining
structures.
|
Here is the line, viewed northwards from near
bridge 12 climbing steeply up through the cutting When the slip occurred the
nearby barrel culvert was running in spate and when the slip happened (which
was not related to the culvert flowing at full-bore), it blocked the open
channel into which the culvert emptied.
The open channel can be seen disappearing into the bottom left of the
image |
Water, which should have flowed into the open
channel, was diverted across the line, washing out ballast between the rails,
as well as the ballast shoulder. Much
of the water entered another barrel culvert on the other side a little
further down the line and was discharged further downstream, however much
water stayed between the sleepers and caused damage under bridge 12. |
South of bridge 12, the rails emerge onto an
embankment . Here the side of the
embankment has fallen away in two places.
This has long been a period of slight concern, but it looks as if
remedial action will now have to be undertaken sooner rather than later. The scale of the slip can be judged from
the size of the sleepers left lying on the side after recent replacement. |
A bit of a hiccup (uploaded 29 December 2009)
We had thought that, with the
bridges completed in June, including even the infamous rail over rail bridge,
that things would be plain sailing. We
had thought that the remainder of the work in extending the line down to
Blaenavon (High Level), although there was a lot of it, would be quite
simple. How wrong we were. We had reckoned without a major hiccup from
our partners, Torfaen County Borough Council (TCBC) . All Heads of the Valley (HoV) funding for the
extension work, and for the Big Pit branch work was routed through them, so it
all came as a bit of a shock to hear that there had been some sort of
administrative misunderstanding, and the pot from which they had been drawing
funds, and which we had been cheerfully spending didn’t actually exist. Mercifully we weren’t asked to repay the
money, but it was made quite clear that there was no more cash. What to do?
One thing we could not do was to halt the project. TCBC wanted it, HoV wanted it, and, most of
all, we wanted it. After several weeks
of frantic meetings with TCBC and with HoV trying to find out just exactly what
was going on, it was agreed that PBRCo would place a bid directly with HoV for
sufficient funding to top off the Blaenavon extension work and to pay the costs
of the Big Pit extension work. This
happened on the 15 September. Meanwhile
PBR volunteers have continued to work doggedly and increasingly desperately,
keeping costs to an absolute minimum.
Absolutely essential costs were borne, temporarily, by the PBRCo from
its meagre resources, and critically important work was deferred and deferred,
until, finally, in mid-November HoV finally granted the necessary funding,
backdated, and directly to PBRCo. By any
standards it was a tight run thing – another fortnight would have certainly
brought the project to a halt, but funding is beginning to flow again, and
whilst our volunteers are decidedly bloodied, they remain unbowed, and with
thirteen weeks to go, are frantically trying to make up lost time. In the final
flurries of the track laying, some of the work will undertaken by railway
engineering contractors. They can buy us
time – but only at significant cost.
With our opening date
rapidly approaching, Her Majesty’s Rail Inspector has been briefed, and is
likely to appear in early February 2010 for his pre-emptive inspection, before
his final visit, hopefully in late March.
With his blessing and relief from the current snow, we very much hope
we’ll open on time.
Development – track relaying programme completed
(uploaded 23 November 2009)
The long sleeper replacement
programme, which has involved relaying track to
- and the Blaenavon (High
Level) station building reaches a useful staging point – see new page HERE
Spooky goings-on at Furnace Sidings (uploaded 5
November 2009)
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This is not the sort of thing you want to see at
night – on any night, especially at Furnace Sidings. This awful apparition appears once a year
as a wraith from the smoke. With his
hideous hat he lures trains to disaster by giving them a green signal through
the mist. |
|
The awful apparaition above is seen again, and is joined
by a mysterious masked companion, whilst head bowed, the ghost of Porter Joe
swings his lamp and gloomily surveys the platform he frequented when he was
alive. At the end of the ticket
office, spiritual vibrations from trains passing in the dead of night cause
coffins to burst from the ground, and discharge their vile contents |
Passengers scurry home, away from the noisome
train, still quaking with fear. PBR
finds it difficult to comprehend why nearly 600 passengers would want to travel
on such an awful night. Messengers
from the spirit world have assured us that they plan to haunt us again next
year, around the same time. All these Images conveyed
mystically through the ether by ghostbuster Alistair Grieve |
Track extended down to Blaenavon (High Level) (uploaded 16 October 2009)
Despite delays cause by
bridges being down, rotten weather, and a frenetic summer season, a final
effort by our Permanent Way team sees track relaid to Blaenavon (High
Level). Another few weeks will see the
track completed in the station itself.
For the latest news in detail click HERE.
The shop gets trashed…. (uploaded 18 September 2009)
Our shop has been completely
trashed. We cannot blame vandals this
time - it was us. Ever since we opened
the shop twelve and half years ago, we have been concerned about the uneven
floor, and the damp walls hidden behind some distinctly dubious – and gloomy –
panelling. Nobody had actually
disappeared through the floor, but in an age when a trip over a matchstick
might land us in front of the beak, we decided that we were not going to wait
to find out. So, everything was moved
into the shop next door, and, in a one-day orgy of controlled destruction, the
shop was laid waste. Apart from the
discovery of a huge and hugely ornate mirror behind the cladding, a wonderful
cast iron fireplace and slate surround was uncovered, which we plan, if it will
fit, to instal at Blaenavon (High Level) station. Judging by the dark seventies-style cladding,
it must be forty years since a fire last burned there.
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This is what the journo hacks would describe
as a scene of absolute devastation’.
And this much damage was done by our small team in less than a day! Our poor shop lies in ruins, but it’s all
in a good cause. The re-furbished shop will be lighter, brighter, and without
the cladding, even a little bit bigger.
The giant mirror described above is seen to the left of centre. 0328 19 Sep 09 |
More devastation and damp walls, but here lies a
very attractive fireplace, even if it is not looking at its most appealing in
this shot. The cast iron fireplace is
decidedly rusty and the slate surround,
with some neat embellishments carved into it, is covered in layers and
layers of thick paint. 0329 19 Sep 09 |
Here we are in the shop next door, a nice corner
shop, with attractive curved windows, but nowhere near large enough to
accommodate our growing range of products. We have a window of two months to re-furbish the
old shop, and return to it. Judging by
the current rate of progress it will take nothing like that. 0334 19 Sep 09 |
The photocharter (uploaded 18 September 2009)
The 14 September saw the
third of the PBR’s series of photocharters.
We can do no more than offer a very small selection of photos by our ace
photographer Alistair Grieve.
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Is this the first passenger train at Blaenavon
(High Level). Well not quite – it’s
Empty Coaching Stock parading at BHL. Whether
it is or not, it’s heartwarming sight, and hopefully a harbinger of exciting
times ahead next April. All photos by Alistar Grieve |
As you might reasonably expect, this is a carefully
posed scene with 6435 hauling a demonstration freight up the bank and over
the newly rebuilt New Pit Road bridge (Bridge 14). The Western Welsh bus and vintage lorry add
to the scene. |
Bringing up the rear of the freight train, a
properly branded local Toad brake van |
You may like to spend a
minute (57 seconds actually!) viewing the demonstration freight train as a
Youtube clip.
The link HERE takes you
directly to Youtube, use your browser ‘back’ button to return to this page.
140th Anniversary Gala (uploaded 18 September 2009)
Over the weekend 12/13
September, we really pushed the boat out – or was it engine out? Three steam engines, Ivor, Devonport No.19
and our special visitor pannier tank 6435, worked an intensive twenty-minute
service throughout each day. The gala
marked 140 years since the first train ran in 1869, on the newly built Brynmawr
and Blaenavon line, which travelled from Brynmawr Junction to the station at
Blaenavon (High Level) – or simply Blaenavon as it was then known. In those days Blaenavon was a terminus – the
Varteg Road bridge, (which is to be replaced next year), was not to be built
for about another five years. The
appearance of 6435 was probably the first appearance of a pannier tank since
the line was closed to passengers in 1941, apart from a Stevenson Locomotive
Society special visit back in the early sixties, by 6435 itself. We prayed for good weather – and we got it –
both days were fine, warm and sunny, and a steady trade was done from our resident
dairy ice-cream cart . Trains were
banked, double banked, single-headed, double-headed and every other combination
in between. Ivor, when not called for
train duties did a roaring trade trundling up and down the up loop and platform
2, Furnace Sidings on ‘driver for fiver’ and brake van rides. This was our first foray into this type of
thing, and it is unlikely to be our last.
All in all, a very enjoyable weekend.
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All three locos stand
ready for their turn of duty early in the morning. No.19 heads the line up, followed by
pannier tank 6435, and finally Ivor the Engine All photos by Alistair Grieve |
Dwarfed by the barren fastnesses of the Coity
mountain, 6434 heads a three-car train up the bank to Whistle Inn, banked by
Devonport’s No.19. In the foreground
is the lower of the two Garn Lakes |
A busy scene at Furnace Sidings as 6435 waits for
the ‘right away’ from Platform 1, banked by No.19. In Platform 2, Ivor, coupled to the Shark
ballast plough, waits to trundle back down the up loop |
Transport Rally 2009 (uploaded 7 September 2009)
Damp and thoroughly dismal
weather greeted the first morning of our Seventh Transport Rally, held on 30
and 31 August, and it would be reasonable to suppose that the event would have been
a washout, but our exhibitors appeared as they said they would, and all in all,
the rally was rather better than expected.
Passengers were slightly, very slightly, down on last year, but everyone
agreed that this was a good event. Nor
was this a very static rally – there was a regular ‘car-park shuttle’ up to the
main road, and a procession of buses did the circular Blaenavon tour, taking in
the heritage centre, ironworks, and Big Pit.
Since few buses did the same trip twice, there was plenty of variety for
passengers
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Commercials and heavies were well represented this
year, and this American-designed British-built Diamond-T transporter, wearing
the livery of the late Wynn’s of Newport livery is a regular and fine example. All photos by: Alistair Grieve |
Low cloud hangs over Coity mountain as No19 is seen
through a gap in the bus line up. The
gap was double decker Western Welsh ‘Megan’,
off doing a circular tour.
South Wales buses were well represented with these examples from
Western Welsh, Red and White, and hiding on the right Borough of Merthyr
Tydfil. |
Your webmaster got a nasty shock on his arrival to
be met by a burly bearded policeman and accompanied by a WPC (do they still
have those?). It was fortunate that
they were exhibitors and this small municipal cameo, was a delight to behold. |
Ivor does it again (uploaded 24 August 2009)
We had our third annual
visit from Ivor the Engine over the weekend 15/16 August. The weekend was no scorcher, but in
reasonably fine and warm weather, passengers came in large numbers. Thanks to the kindness of nearby Community
Farm at Cwmbran, animals made a real impact over the weekend, with cuddly
bunnies at Whistle Inn halt, and, together with Bluebell the Donkey and her
friends in the pub-garden at the Whistle Inn there was plenty to see. Alice the Elephant, not from the Community
Farm, but, we are told, from darkest India, trumpeted regularly from her box
van, which was both an irritation to the stuff and a source of unexpected
surprise to our visitors. Don’t tell
the children, but Alice was actually about 100 watts! In the Furnace Sidings compound, our
repositioned refreshment room, now replete with outside benches was very well
patronised, and overlooked by aerial youngsters hurling themselves from the
nearby bouncy castle. All in all a super
weekend.
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Almost ready for the ‘right away’, smoke drifts
down the platform. Idris the Dragon, sitting
on the front bufferbeam looks a little travel sick as front guard and driver
wait for the flag and whistle through the haze. 0078rr 13 Aug 09 |
Reasonably sunny weather certainly brought out the
passengers – just what we like to see.
Furnace Sidings almost looks like a suburban platform as passengers
alight, and the class 117 car looks as if its doing what it was designed to
do – carry commuters. The little girl
on the right appears to have caught sight of some gnomes, who are keeping an
eye on the proceedings. Now you don’t
often see that at your average suburban station! Photo: Alistair Grieve |
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Storms threaten in the hills, but they failed to
materialise beyond a few drops of rain.
No.19 pushes hard at the back as the three coach train, led by Ivor
accelerates noisily out of Furnace Sidings station. Photo: Alistair Grieve |
Bluebell the Donkey grazes contentedly as Ivor the
Engine brings up another train of passengers to see her. Photo:Alistair Grieve |
A liitle bird tells us that Ivor
enjoyed himself so much he is staying and will be putting in another
appearance.
Don’t miss him at our 140th Anniversary
celebrations on 12th and 13th September.
Ta raa-raa-raaah! (uploaded 1 August 2009)
We ought not to blow our own
trumpet - it’s unseemly. However we
could not resist telling you that the number of visitors to the website in July
was an astonishing 4259. This compares
with our previous best during September last year, around the 125th
Anniversary goings-on, when we logged 3390.
We stress this is the number of visitors, not hits, which many websites
use, and which, for this website, is about twice the number of visitors logged.
Diesel Gala 2009 (uploaded 29 July 2009)
We can do no better than
paraphrase our ace photographer,
Alistair Grieve’s comments on the gala, which was held over the weekend 25/26
July ‘Four
main line diesels, sunshine, showers, failures,
resurrections, two namings, two rakes of stock, a birthday party and a hell of
a lot of fun. Not your average diesel gala…’ It really WAS a lot of fun, but there were a
few moments when several heart failures seemed likely. As it was, a few days before the gala Class
31 D5627 suffered a major air leak, and, like the many-headed hydra seemed to
produce two more leaks for every one that was cured, despite the best efforts
of all-concerned. There was worse to
come when early on Saturday, 73 216 took it upon itself to blow some of its
wiring, and get its controls into a bit of a pickle – which, on the face of it,
meant that the air-braked 3-Cep EMU 1198 would also be out of the picture. However with some very rapid, how shall we
say, ‘tactical’ changes to the timetable, the show did, indeed, go on. There’s no question that four locos (even
with two dead) and two rakes of coaches make for more combinations of working
than the PBR could even have dreamed about a few years ago. And that was not all – exhausted fitters
finally cured D5627 of its leaks during Saturday, and, pretty as a picture, it
joined the party. Despite the showers on
Saturday and wall to wall downpour on Sunday, there certainly seemed to be more
passengers than last year by quite a margin, and we await the official figures
with interest. There were obviously a
higher percentage of spotters and photters than usual, but judging by the
comments we heard, they enjoyed themselves, despite the damp weather. We were very pleased to see Steve Organ,
former General Manager at the Chasewater Railway, Staffordshire, who saw the
rare treat of seeing a loco, namely Class 31 D5627, named Steve Organ GM during his lifetime.
Perhaps more poignant was
the re-naming and rededication of OVS
Bulleid CBE by the chairman of the Bulleid Society, Peter Fry. Bulleid was never honoured by having a loco
named after him before preservation, but one of his preserved steam
locomotives, West Country class 34023 Blackmore
Vale (later Blackmoor Vale),
carries the slightly shorter nameplate (but still with the family coat of arms)
OVS Bulleid for two months in every
year. Oliver Vaughan Snell Bulleid was
arguably the most innovative steam locomotive engineer of all time. It is, perhaps doubly poignant, that his son
HAV Bulleid (who wrote a very fine biography on his father), passed away only
two months before our event at the age of 96.
By one of those extraordinary quirks, HAV, who, like his father was a
fully trained locomotive engineer, spent most of his professional life in
polymer chemistry as Chief Engineer in the emerging British Nylon Spinners,
Pontypool!
Some photos of the event, by
our Alistair Grieve, are on a photo review page HERE
Class 37X2 (uploaded 2 July 2009)
It’s July and we start page 3
with news that our second Class 37, No.37 421 arrived at 8.40pm on the first
day of July. Privately owned 37 421 is
PBR’s second class 37 and joins 37 216 which is buried in the top shed, soon to
emerge in glorious green, after a substantial overhaul! Meanwhile 37 421 will be pressed into service
in the next week or so – entirely appropriately – since the Class 37s provided
the haulage mainstay from the end of steam in the early sixties till the end of
operations on the line in 1980. Although
clearly a stablemate of 37 216, it has a livery mate in 73 128, both being
finished in EWS livery, though we understand that 37 421 will be wearing an
earlier livery in due course. If we
include Brush Type 2 D5627 ‘Steve
Organ GM’, then the total of operational main line diesels stands at four –
an impressive total for a small line such as ours. Now a little bird tells us that
there’s going to be a diesel gala on 25/26 July (see ‘Events Diary’) – just
guess which loco is going to be the star!
By any standards it’s going to be quite a show!
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Our page 3 girl!
The sun sets on a blisteringly hot and very humid day and catches the
nose of 37 421 as, courtesy of Allely’s Heavy Haulage of Studley, the loco
arrives in the ‘arena’ on its 88-wheel ‘pod’.
Unloading took place the following morning Photo: Tom Edwards |
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Bathed in the morning sun, the loco wakes up to
another glorious day. Here is the
driver telling one of our volunteers that it is the first day that he had ever
been to Blaenavon ‘when it wasn’t bl**dy raining!’. 2963rr 2 Jul 09 |
What a locomotive needs after a long trek from the
midlands – a few amps into the batteries and best part of 140 gallons of oil
in the sump! The loco is finally on
terra firma, and a quick shunt sees her outside the top shed for a quick wash
and brush-up 2964rr 2 Jul 09 |
The crane now arriving…. (uploaded 2 July 2009)
All sorts of things go on at
the railway during the time when we are not running trains for the public, and here’s
an example. An agreement with a local
engineering firm sees the area near the platform at Blaenavon (High Level) used
for brake and performance testing of road rail plant. This area is particularly useful as it is the
only place on the railway where the track is level. As things stand, the station is still
isolated from the rest of the railway, but the capacity of the vehicle to run
on its tracks when needed makes this a very versatile piece of kit
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Here’s the crane – or rather, digger, in platform
1. The vehicle is not sitting on its
tracks, but on rail wheels which can be let down front and back to carry the
weight of the vehicle on the rails.
When work on the rails is completed the wheels are lifted into the
retracted position so that the machine can move off on its own tracks. 2967rr 2 Jul 09 |
Here the vehicle rushes out of the platform and
screeches to a halt a few yards further down the line in a cloud of
dust. Despite being tested at an altitude
of over 1000ft, the vehicles destination is London Underground. We just hope
they remember to lower the jib before it enters the tunnels. 2968rr 2 Jul 09 |
