Saturday 12 October 2013

Saturday 12th October 2013

The heavens opened and the rain came down first thing - I suspect it deterred some of the lads from venturing out. In  the end there were six of us plus Steve Warren and the JCB on ground clearance.  To be honest it didn't matter whether it was 6 or 16 - the level of effort was tremendous and we achieved all of our objectives (and the sun then shone all day - the Broadway micro climate again!)

The main task was clear the landing strip north of 1B. There was a great deal of accumulated materials which had to be moved northwards, which could only be shifted with a JCB.











Here the old horse dock buffer stop is moved northwards - what  a chunk of metal that is! In the background you can see that the area is getting clearer.









 By the end of the session the  whole area was clear and the embankment was graded to  a near  vegetation free slope. Brilliant!

This was all the more remarkable as in between time the  first section of trees and saplings cut down by Brian from the track-side gang on Wednesday were being chopped and transported up to the Northern end bonfire. What a glorious bonfire it was!


 Here we see the size of the task. Jim H and Roger H were on the embankment and Dave B and yours truly shifted the branches over the wall for the JCB to gather up. The bonfire is in the distance.









When this was finally clear we were able to run some ballast in the gully in front of the wall and level it out.

I think its fair to say that everyone was pleased with achievements of the day.

As an extra task I took delivery of  the first two lamppost lanterns of a batch of six sponsored by a generous benefactor. We ordered 2 sizes to see which were the most appropriate in situ.

Here is Jim on assembly work in the store/ workshop. The tidiness and organisation of the  workshop area is largely down to Jim and his well organised mind. I have to say its quite nice going in and knowing where to put your hand on the right tool (I think that's what I mean!)







The end result is that the larger of the 2 lanterns look just fine and we will store them off site for future use.


The missing pictures are that of Jo painting the running in board post and Vic sorting out the borders in front of the shed. An opportunity for another day.


It was a great day - I enjoyed it and I think the rest of the Gang did as well. It will be back to construction on Wednesday - brick laying on platform 2B and slab laying  behind platform 2.







7 comments:

mack said...

Wow, things are really coming on! Those lamps look the business, are they not going up till the end?? How long before we can see them in situ !?

Bill said...

We wil put them up on special occasions!

Alex said...

sounds like a good idea, I agree with you storing them offsite, there's been all sorts of railwayania robberies recently, it was only last year a couple of benches at CRC were stolen I think.

another question; when track gets to broadway, will Leverton loop still be used as a passing place, like gotherington, or will it be taken out?

if it's staying, how will it be operated, as there was never a signal box there?
Alex

Bill said...

Alex,
I don't know the answer to the track question, sorry!

Dave Danger said...

I'm given to understand that the Laverton loop will be taken out once Broadway is opened. Services will run from Toddington in one go with no passing on the way.

Nigel Black GW Pway said...

Indeed Dave, I believe the Laverton turnouts will be installed at Broadway.

Alex said...

thanks for the answers, pity though, it would add so much more operational flexibility (having said that, doubling the line would do that too...!)
Alex