I. Am. On. The. Wrong. Side. Of. The. F..king. Pond!

[crfriend]

And I have three links to ruddy prove it:

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-york ... e-38979100

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-38963632

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-york ... e-39581712

I do admit some concern about the unconstrained combustion following a bit of a jar at the crossing. The local fire-brigades will likely be unhappy with that.

However, a steamer in the 21st Century cracking a buck -- especially if it ever does it in revenue service -- is a thing of sublime beauty.

[Kirbstone]

Carl,

It's a bit like the resurgence of vinyl records and the equipment to play them, there's a big lobby now for the re-introduction of ever more frequent mainline steam train services. The same thing is going on over here in Ireland, but for the moment the scheduled steam services carry a premium price tag.

The ordnance is just as expensive here, but we have only a small fraction of the population/customer base to sustain them. It's a small miracle that apart from short quirky narrow-gauge lines there are at the moment six fully operational steam locos available to pull mainline trains here. I don't know how to post links, but a google search with the wording Merlin steam loco ought to bring up some steam footage from here.

Tom

[Sinned]

Carl, I don't want to boast or anything but ....

.... we have a private railway called the North Yorkshire Moors Railway that runs steam trains as part of a normal timetable, not just for special occasions. That's a comparatively short drive away. We also have the National Railway Museum adjacent to York Railway Station and if you have a decent interest in rail thingies then it's easy to spend ALL DAY in there. And do you know what the even bestest thing about the NRM ....









.... keep going ....











.... IT'S FREE,FREE, FREE TO GET IN. As in you don't pay. Probably one of the few attractions that is free. I go often enough that every time I go it's interesting but not too much where it gets boring. Next time I go there I'll take a pic or two, Moon fashion just to give you a taster.

York is on the mainline to anywhere - Aberdeen, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Manchester, Birmingham, Bristol, London.

The Tornado has been on the news a lot lately as has the Flying Scotsman.

[Uncle Al]

As Carl said in another post....

WHERE'S THE LIKE BUTTON WHEN YOU NEED IT

Uncle Al

[r.m.anderson]

The beauty of Steam in England is the inexpensive fuel (COAL) as opposed to oil fired locos i.e. USA 4449 Southern Pacific and other
conversions. The abundance of water is present almost everywhere in the UK. Yes there are fire hazards and the fire departments
along the mainline should have a concern especially with 100 mph beasts drafting their fire breath on the landscape.
Exciting to see the return to steam powered passenger trains and their shrill whistle.


And YES I keep pressing the LIKE LIKE LIKE Buttons and nothing happens ? WHAT ? THERE ARE NO LIKE BUTTONS !
I keep hitting the ESC (Escape) button but I am still here - what's wrong with these gol-darn computer things anyway ?

[Ray]

You must have seen the pictures of the Harry Potter train crossing the Glenfinnan viaduct. It's an amazing sight. Steam and scenery are an irresistible Scottish mix. Come on over!

[Kirbstone]

Just having a dig at Denis, who has the privilege of living in such a jaw-dropping historic city as York......With all those rail and motorway links, also that fine river estuary, York is a very easy place TO GET OUT OF !

Tom

[Sinned]

It gets even better as we have two theme parks nearby - Lightwater Valley and Flamingo Park with its zoo, a bird garden with a mini-zoo, the North York Moors, Dales, Pennines for walking, the coast with an hour's drive away, Museums, history and, possibly unique to York - snickelways. Leeds/Bradford close to us. Two Universities. So much more but like most locals, they mostly just pass me by. You have forced me to realise how lucky I am to live here.

[crfriend]

What, pray tell, is a "snickleway"?

I very honestly haven't the foggiest notion.

[Kirbstone]

All that, for sure and the weather is mostly cold & wet!

Meteorological info.: When there's anticyclonic fine weather over the YoUKay the onshore Nor-Easterlies keep the North Sea coastal towns several degrees colder than elsewhere, also much of Yorkshire & that includes York.

But Yorkies are a hardy bunch.

A couple of fine dry weekends ago I motored 200-odd miles N.E out of Kerry, where the air temp. was 16.5 deg, to Kildare, near the East coast where the same air was just 8 deg. Centipede. Very different.

Tom

[Taj]

In the glory days of American steam the Hiawatha regularly exceeded 100MPH. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milwaukee_Road_class_A Some crossings were signed with a warning of trains approaching at 125. A 300psi boiler fired on oil presents no coal ash or sparks for random fires. Boilers can use any renewable fuel that the burners are designed for. We have a large heating boiler at work that runs on recycled wood chips.

[Sinned]

Carl, it's spelt snickelways and they are a collection of narrow alleys, streets and footpaths, some short, connecting main thoroughways in York's centre. They have come about as a result of the unplanned and ancient developments of the buildings in the centre. There is a booklet that shows them and a lot of the entrances to the snickelways you could walk past and not know that they were there. Some open up into courtyards that you wouldn't think were possible. Worth going around if you ever visit as are the bar walls - the old defences of the city, much of which is still intact. Any building developments in and around York have to have time buildt intot he front end for archaeological surveys to be done and York Uni is a premier centre for archaeology.

Tom, I haven't noticed that the weather is any colder or wetter than anywhere else in the country. In fact, we get very little snow in winter, being in a vale. As for being a hardy bunch, well, I won't comment on that - it's all relative.

[Kirbstone]

There you are! Proof positive that you hardy bunch don't even notice the ghastly wind-driven 10 month chill around your gills.

I married a Home Counties lass of Lancastrian descent and her people are still smarting from that defeat yours inflicted on them at Barnet in 1471.......Not to be forgotten anytime soon!

I know Manchester relative to York is on another planet, but I have it on good authority that they 'enjoy' the same climate. A late countryman of mine researched this and gave out the definitive explanation (about Manchester) on the BBC. radio.
Terry Wogan explained that the then Pharoe of Egypt had had seven years' drought and the Nile had shriveled to a trickle and crops had failed yet again and animals were starving in the fields &c &c, so he called his Court Magician to his presence and explained to him that his very job depended on his being able to fix the problem. The magician knew that far to the North there was plenty of rain, so he got on the blower to his counterpart in Manchester, who was delighted to swap weather with him for a few weeks. It was Summer and they could do with a heatwave in Manchester.

In Cairo the heavens opened and it rained non-stop for three weeks and the Nile flooded, carrying dead livestock floating to the Sea, the Palace roof leaked everywhere so the Pharoe had nowhere dry to sit or sleep, so he once again called his magician into his presence and said: 'OK wise guy, you've made your point, but we need a compromise here!'....So the magician got on to his Mancunian colleague again and a deal was struck.

And so it has been ever since. Manchester has one fine day a year and Cairo one wet one.

Tom.

[Sinned]

Tom, I hadn't heard the tale you told but there's the old joke in which a UFO was seen in the sky above Manchester - it was later identified as the sun which fits in.

As I type there's a hazy sun out there - it's coldish outside - not quite T-shirt temperature but too warm for a jumper.

[Fred in Skirts]

My son-in-law visits GB on a fairly regular basis for work. He is no slouch at bad weather living in the Rocky mountains near Denver Colorado. He says that the weather in England and Scotland where he has to go is "NASTY". He says it is not so much the chill in the air but the dampness that drives the chill bone deep that bothers him. This is a guy that grills meat in the back garden with 6 inches of snow on the ground and a temperature of 10 degrees F in a light shirt and shorts.

My take on weather is will the heater keep me warm or the air conditioner keep me cool, and the roof keep me dry!