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Latest News: Archive
February 2011
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Latest News: Archive
February 2011
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By Matt Goodrum, Toby Rawlings and Gary Hall.
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Felled trees near bridge 1701. 6th February 2011. Photo: Toby Rawlings |
Today the team were joined by various chainsaws to continue the tree removal work north of Hoe level crossing, especially targeting between Bridges 1700 and 1701 where we propose to build a platform. This reminded us (if we needed it) just how tall the trees have grown in the past 20-40 years as once felled each produces a pile of logs and enough smaller branches for an entire bonfire. You can now see Dereham Water Tower, looking like a flying saucer, from the deck of Bridge 1701.
Tom, Simon and Toby spent a couple of hours at Northall Green installing another three runs on the access steps besides Bridge 1695. One final push should see us reach the top of the bank. Returning to Dereham they were joined by Rob and managed to load 42 new wooden sleepers on to the Flatrol wagon by hand ready for tomorrow's trip northwards.
The combined efforts of the Northern Section team and skill of Southern Section's Trevor resulted in all 42 sleepers being installed with time to spare. We now know never to trust the weather forecast, which had predicted heavy rain: in the event we had none and could / should have brought up more sleepers to change. We did however take the opportunity to start backfilling ballast around the new sleepers to keep as busy before riding back on the Class 37 (another first for the section).
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Left: 37 219 with Flatrol. Right: Filling in after changing sleepers. 13th February 2011. Photos: Toby Rawlings |
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View of the clearance work. 20th February 2011. Photo: Toby Rawlings |
During the morning the team split into three: Tom B, Simon, Alan J and Toby managed to gauge, drill and screw the remaining sleepers between Bridges 1698 and 99 while Julian, Alan W and Rob cut up and transported another few loads of logs to Hoe LC. Graham kindly got a bonfire going at Bridge 1697 and after lunch Tom B, Simon, Julian, Alan J, Tom R and Toby joined him in clearing yet more scrub from around the bridge and burning what Rob had cut down that morning.
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Clearing scrub with the digger. 27th February 2011. Photo: Gary Hall |
It was a glorious morning, so we started at North Elmham and removed the dirt that accumulates on the level crossing and causes flooding. With three of us this was soon taken care of. We then went on to County School Station where we conducted some clearance work last month to burn off the cuttings. We continued with some additional clearance and got quite scratched by the brambles and blackthorn. One of the volunteers suggested that we give the road /rail a chance. Andy had started it up to conduct a check on it. After it was warmed up Gary derailed it and positioned it beside the foot path fence. This was the first time the machine has done some real work with the bucket from the time it had arrived. Everything went well as two days worth of clearance had been achieved in a very short time. When asked to stop to clear up, the bucket caught to top wire of the fence and the rotted posts fell down like dominos. The replacement of this fence has been on the cards now for several years as we have been shoring it up a bit every year. The replacement fence will now be installed this summer.
By Trevor Brackpool, Owen Stratford and Roy Malyon.
Working with National Grid over the last couple of days 150 metres of the upside embankment between Yaxham station and the road bridge have been cleared. The Wednesday gang have helped and with five fires we have managed to burn most of the cuttings. Thanks are due to the team from National Grid who were very efficient and helpful.
The work was in preparation for the replacement of the cables on the overhead power line later in the year. Scaffold will be built in the field either side of the line and a net suspended between them to protect the railway.
Today was the first day of operating trains again this year and they were running an intensive hourly timetable. As a result we set off to Whinburgh cutting to dig out sleepers for the next batch of replacements. Unfortunately the weather was rubbish and rained all day. We had 30 sleepers already out on site ready for changing and after digging out 35 we decided to finish early as there were enough ready for a day's changing.
With the weather still not playing ball, we carried on with digging out sleepers in Whinburgh Cutting. A further 41 were dug out taking us down towards the station at Yaxham.