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I genuinely think British trains are the best; other countries had their incredibly impressive, enormous brute machines, but almost every locomotive that ran in the golden age of steam here was just great to look at. LMS Stanier Class 5, or Black 5 as they're better known these days. A proper workhorse, but look at it. Muscular and perfectly formed:   LMS 2-6-4  The GWR had a range of really interesting little tank engines:   The LNER had all the beauties, though. Even the mid level locomotives were very beautiful:  The A4 Pacifics have been mentioned here but all the photos showed them with their fairings on (I think) and these trains look best with them off, and working hard:   And there's the infrastructure. We used to have some of the most amazing stations   St Pancras is still a sight to behold, but many of the great ones are gone.
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May 4, 2011 10:54
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Transport For London run a heritage day where they do rides in one of their restored 1938 stock trains. I went on it a few weeks ago as it was passing near me, and man is it gorgeous on the inside.      The ride was surprisingly good for a train of it's age, and the seats were about 9,000 times more comfortable than any current London Underground stock, including the new S-stock, which is either wonderful or terrible, going by popular opinion.
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Oct 3, 2011 12:47
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reddeathdrinker posted:And some of the best scenery in the world for steam... A Black 5 loco rounding Ben Dorain on the West Highland line I love Black 5s. Perfect mix of function and form. They're just really gorgeous locos.
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Jan 20, 2012 16:20
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That's my beloved Met line stock, which is being retired as we speak. Super comfy and spacious, and being replaced with the uglier and harder S-stock trains. The Met line is much more suburban than the others, and to a degree, it represented the slightly plusher aspect of the LU. The Met line trains and architecture is some of the nicest aspects of the LU, and it's a bit of a shame to see it all getting replaced.    Had hoped to go on the met line on those trains one last time, but I'm working in Bristol now and suspect I've missed my opportunity. echoplex fucked around with this message at 12:30 on May 27, 2012 |
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May 27, 2012 12:19
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BrokenKnucklez posted:Makes you almost wish for the golden age of train travel. It never really left us, although sadly a huge amount of our grand old stations were refurbed in our era of architectural malaise - Birmingham New Street is just one of the stations that was ruined. But the met line - where that train from the lorry was on - still has all it's glorious art deco (and nouveau on occasion) stations and fittings. When it was built it was all about social mobility (not even really a pun there) and it was very aspirational, and I love it. My local station is being decomissioned in a few years and I'd love to buy it... can't see that happening though. Most of the buildings are different, in varying levels of grandness:  Other lines on the London Underground are much more get the gently caress in/get the gently caress out, which makes their stations less interesting. One of those railway rarities where the infrastructure is more interesting than the trains themselves I guess.
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May 28, 2012 00:00
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Mahmoud Ahmadinejad posted:I went out today and I saw one of Freightliner's new(ish) Class 70s while I was waiting for my train, and oh boy do GE make a gently caress ugly locomotive. My god, that's horrible. What was the noise like when they 'dropped' it?
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Aug 18, 2012 16:04
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Mahmoud Ahmadinejad posted:Lots of old footage of these beasties on a BBC Four documentary this evening. Didn't know about that, thanks - will check the iPlayer. I studied in Derby and the St Pancras - Derby line was run by a mix of those Class 43s and whatever the new Pendolino trains that London Midland ran were, and the 43s were always much nicer to travel in because there was double the interior space per passenger. I don't know if they were slower but they were definitely a lot smoother. I lived about 1000yards from Derby station so I got to hear them pulling out the station a lot, and it is the most glorious, Thunderbirds-esque sound that I missed from my childhood - at home I've never been even so much as out of eyeshot of the West Coast mainline despite moving house 3 times, but they pulled the 43s off about 20 years ago? The Design Museum had a good retrospective on Ken Grange last year and of course, the 43 was a huge part of it:    Prototype chair for the HST:  Got a poster print of the 43 artwork framed, as well. They had planned to get in a 43 and repaint it in it's original Intercity livery, but it wouldn't quite clear the gallery doors. Real shame. In short: love the 43s. echoplex fucked around with this message at 09:29 on Sep 14, 2012 |
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Sep 14, 2012 09:23
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Itzena posted:Hey, I remember that one closing! It was a one-stop branch line run with a very limited service and I don't think I ever saw anyone actually use it. Speaking of now-closed peak time only Tube lines from back when I was a student: The Central line used to run this odd little mostly rural branch line from Epping to Ongar, way out in Essex They're likely closing Watford Met in a couple of years which is both logical and a shame, the station house is lovely and it's one of the nicer, leafy parts of the Met. A pipe dream revolves around having the money to buy the station house once it's decommissioned but it's a larger terminus station on a plot of very expensive suburban land; the value would either be astronomical beyond belief, or most likely they'll just knock it down.
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Jan 3, 2013 11:02
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I've started a little tumblr for the London Underground. It'll focus less on the trains (because you can only really say so much about them) but details of stuff like station architecture, all the exposed hardware, period fittings, etc, basically the beauty of the infrastructure. http://tfldetails.tumblr.com/
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Jan 22, 2013 22:04
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This is round the corner from work. I like to think of it as a warning to others.
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Sep 9, 2013 16:11
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Mahmoud Ahmadinejad posted:I've just noticed the most amazing service update on the Southern Railway website; The S-stock? Hate them. The Met ones have been in service a year and a half and they still smell chemically. Bring back the bouncy, roomy, dirty A stock
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Jan 16, 2014 03:54
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The Overground was closed for works this weekend so TFL were doing on-foot tours under the Thames through Brunel's old tunnel, which was awesome. As fun as the tunnel was, getting to walk through stations I used to commute through on foot was pretty awesome.    I've also got a bunch of photos from things like tours of Aldwych, various steam railway days, steam trains on the underground, the TFL museum depot etc - need to organise/upload them all.
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May 24, 2014 23:11
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