Trains...why?

[Cyril Haearn]

Today my train left on time and arrived two minutes early, where may I complain?
..
I agree with 100% about the trainspotters, most of them drive to spot, makes me sick, TDTS, tragedy of drive-trainspotting
As if there were not enough photos on the interweb already

[Cugel]

Today my train left on time and arrived two minutes early, where may I complain?
..
I agree with 100% about the trainspotters, most of them drive to spot, makes me sick, TDTS, tragedy of drive-trainspotting
As if there were not enough photos on the interweb already

There can never be enough photos of trains! Well, steam trains. Well, British steam trains.......

I have a friend who has spent a lifetime driving about to photograph steam trains of the revived or preserved ilk. The photos are wonderful. His car is not. Also, he still employs the film. All this indicates that it's true that you have to be a bit mad to be a proper train spotter.

Cugel, curling the lip at Pendolinos and such.

[100%JR]

I saw earlier in the week that "Train Spotters" were "dangerously close to the tracks" to get photos of the Flying Scotsman
According to the report this caused over 1000hrs of knock on effect delays A THOUSAND HOURS?????Surely a mistake?

I don't like trains.I don't get "Train spotters"...especially turning up to see a relic

Can I change the title to Train spotters...why?

I saw the Flying Scotsman.....or parts of it when it was being rebuilt at the National Railway Museum in York(sons school trip) a few years ago.It's just an old train!

Do you understand old car enthusiasts? Or those men who coo over flashy modern ones?

Old cars/motorcycles/bikes....no.Chances are if they were crap in the 50s/60s/70s/80s time won’t have improved them.A 2019 Ferrari will always look better and be better than a 1960s Ferrari(I’ve argued about this many,many times with my mate) likewise motorcycles and bikes.
New cars/motorcycles/bikes....yes.
My road bike is a 2015 model....it’s getting on abit now and looks dated.I generally replace bikes every two years for this reason.

[661-Pete]

Don't know about ferraris, old or new, but there used to be a bright yellow lamborgini - a recent model I think - cruising inappropriately around our local country lanes, I was often passed by it. Noisy and ugly (to my mind at least). I think it was hired out now and again to the odd Hooray Henry with too much dosh and too little social conscience.

Then one day, as reported in the local rag, it burst into flames on the road. So that was the end of that. Good riddance, thought I.

I think we have to live with "100%" being an unreformed petrolhead, after all this forum is open to all, provided they observe the rules! Certainly I won't find myself agreeing with anything he utters.

Change bike every two years? My road bike dating from 1999 is still going. OK a bit shabby now, but it gets me around. What do you do with the old ones?

[Cyril Haearn]

Don't know about ferraris, old or new, but there used to be a bright yellow lamborgini - a recent model I think - cruising inappropriately around our local country lanes, I was often passed by it. Noisy and ugly (to my mind at least). I think it was hired out now and again to the odd Hooray Henry with too much dosh and too little social conscience.

Then one day, as reported in the local rag, it burst into flames on the road. So that was the end of that. Good riddance, thought I.

I think we have to live with "100%" being an unreformed petrolhead, after all this forum is open to all, provided they observe the rules! Certainly I won't find myself agreeing with anything he utters.

Change bike every two years? My road bike dating from 1999 is still going. OK a bit shabby now, but it gets me around. What do you do with the old ones?

The cops in Hamburg siezed a "supercar" (new price 377 000 €) because it was such a bright shade of gold that it dazzled everyone They could have used a law that forbids driving around just-for-fun instead

[Vorpal]

Why is that. Road expenditure is far less than motoring taxes/

https://www.racfoundation.org/data/road ... data-chart

It depends on what is included.

Here are a couple of previous threads about how motoring is subsidised...

viewtopic.php?f=6&t=120805
viewtopic.php?f=6&t=115700
viewtopic.php?f=1&t=89938

Not that old chestnut. Counting things like reduce d physical activity as a subsidy for cars while not doing so for public transport. By that logic cycling is subsidised because someone doing a 5 mile commute by bike expends less effort than a pedestrian.
Likewise noise pollution counted as car subsidy but not bus or train subsidy.

Er, I did say it depends upon what is included. I didn't want to rehash it, so linked to previous threads.

Motoring *is* subsidised. It's just a matter of degree. Road expenditure is not the only cost of motoring. Pollution and environmental damage, for example are significant costs. So are RTCs. Even if you ignore the costs of physical activity, noise pollution, and damage to the environment, but include the costs of congestion, pollution, and RTCs, motoring is substantially subsided. Even the RAC and AA accept that. They only argue about the degree to which it is subsidised. I think one study commissioned by RAC left out the cost of road building on the basis that it 'contributed to the public good' and that roads are also used by pedestrians and cyclists. They still found that motoring is subsidised.

[Cugel]

Don't know about ferraris, old or new, but there used to be a bright yellow lamborgini - a recent model I think - cruising inappropriately around our local country lanes, I was often passed by it. Noisy and ugly (to my mind at least). I think it was hired out now and again to the odd Hooray Henry with too much dosh and too little social conscience.

Then one day, as reported in the local rag, it burst into flames on the road. So that was the end of that. Good riddance, thought I.

I think we have to live with "100%" being an unreformed petrolhead, after all this forum is open to all, provided they observe the rules! Certainly I won't find myself agreeing with anything he utters.

Change bike every two years? My road bike dating from 1999 is still going. OK a bit shabby now, but it gets me around. What do you do with the old ones?

I have had similar experiences in seeing, for example, a very new Aston Martin being winched on to the back of a large AA low-loader rescure thingy. Such cars are notorious for being unreliable, basically because they are so few and so complex that no one has been able to thoroughly test and refine their design.

Also, they are often driven by fellows with too much money and too little sense. The "little sense" manifests in all their doings, including driving about very badly.

100% perhaps doesn't do anything with his cast orf bikes. Someone else manages them to the landfill. Or am I being terribly awfully unfair on the bloke? He has a certain reputation, mind! I am hoping he gives me a good telling off as he explains how he recycles them via a charitable donation to bike-deprived children everywhere.

Cugel

[661-Pete]

Today my train left on time and arrived two minutes early, where may I complain?
..
I agree with 100% about the trainspotters, most of them drive to spot, makes me sick, TDTS, tragedy of drive-trainspotting
As if there were not enough photos on the interweb already

Some activities about trainspotters I really don't 'get'. Some stations (Doncaster for example) seem to attract a cluster of them every day, standing at the extreme end of the platform with anorak, camera and notebook at the ready. What are they expecting to see? It's decades since steam trains regularly passed through there, even diesel locomotives are a rare sight except on freight trains: it's all DMUs and EMUs now.

I have to admit, as a kid yes I liked watching trains, but steam trains (commonplace back then!) were no more 'special' than any other sort. And they were certainly slow*, dirty and polluting. I remember, on a certain journey, my mother warning me to shut the window (yes! back then you could open windows on trains!) because we were about to enter a tunnel and the previous train had been a steam train...

But nowadays, if I'm cycling past the Bluebell Railway, and I hear a steam train in the distance, I do pause to watch it pass. Sometimes seeing something 'in the flesh' awakens more nostalgia than watching a video on the 'tube'...

*I know there were exceptions to that! Seen the 'Mallard' at York museum.

[Cyril Haearn]

The Bluebell is or was the only all-steam railway with no diesels
Mallard reached 126 mph for a few moments, then had to limp home for extensive repairs
Positive thread alert: the heritage railways organise events for kiddies, Thomas, Santa, enchanting even for me as an old curmudgeon

[mjr]

Some activities about trainspotters I really don't 'get'. Some stations (Doncaster for example) seem to attract a cluster of them every day, standing at the extreme end of the platform with anorak, camera and notebook at the ready. What are they expecting to see?

Probably the just-launched Azumas (a slightly updated IET) or the still-being-tested Mark 5s at Doncaster now. Maybe the Civities. There's always new stuff to see, even if I think it's not worth the time to go stand on a station.

I did go stand on National 1 where it crosses the fen line to watch a steam train a few weeks ago but I was nearby anyway.

[Mike Sales]

Old cars/motorcycles/bikes....no.Chances are if they were crap in the 50s/60s/70s/80s time won’t have improved them.A 2019 Ferrari will always look better and be better than a 1960s Ferrari(I’ve argued about this many,many times with my mate) likewise motorcycles and bikes.
New cars/motorcycles/bikes....yes.
My road bike is a 2015 model....it’s getting on abit now and looks dated.I generally replace bikes every two years for this reason.

At least train drivers don't put me in fear of my life, or shout and hoot at me, and of course train spotters are very no trouble to anyone, there at the end of the platform.
I think drivers of flashy (in their view) cars are more likely to drive aggressively and take pride in the unpleasant noise they make.

[Mike Sales]

Some activities about trainspotters I really don't 'get'. Some stations (Doncaster for example) seem to attract a cluster of them every day, standing at the extreme end of the platform with anorak, camera and notebook at the ready. What are they expecting to see? It's decades since steam trains regularly passed through there, even diesel locomotives are a rare sight except on freight trains: it's all DMUs and EMUs now.

Out on a ride I came across groups of people on the rural railway bridges, watching the line. I asked why. Apparently there were tunnel repairs on the ECML and trains were being diverted via the Lincoln, Sleaford, Spalding line. This was worth seeing for the enthusiasts!

[Oldjohnw]

I love train travel. Have been all over Europe by train. In retirement I love visiting heritage railways. I am not a trainspotter and don't get them but what is wrong with 'each to their own'?

As for my bike, which takes me camping all over the place (have just completed 170 miles of Hadrian's Cycleway) it is a modest Raleigh, 17 years old.

[Mick F]

There's a possibility I'll be letting the train take the strain from Gunnislake to London and back next week. 30th May.
Toyota want people like me to take part in a discussion about Hybrids. They'll "reimburse" us with £100 of Amazon voucher for attending, and it just so happens that the train fare is £109.

Just waiting to find if I'm accepted. They'd better hurry up letting me know as the fare will increase as the date gets nearer.

[Cyril Haearn]

The EU offers thousands of interrail tickets free to young persons so they can travel and learn that people in other European countries are very like themselves but a bit different in a positive way, Plus One! English is the lingua France of course for Greeks speaking to Finns etc etc

Hope I can get one as an old curmudgeon in a few years, did have a France Vacances ticket once, 6 days out of 14 or the like, that is better, one does not 'have to' travel every day
Travelled from the Heart of England to Metz on the first day