What connects us…
What connects us, not literally or figuratively (although the answer to both could be trains), no what connects us through our passion to the railway?
These days as I experience life alongside a living preserved relic of North Wales’s lost cross country route I see the trains yes, but I experience more, the light on the rails, the sounds in the valley of a distant horn or whistle, the overgrown track and wagons left in the siding, the contrast of working greasy rust with pristine paintwork. Because it is here I’m connected to it. Growing up the Chester to Hooton, now part of Merseyrail, line ran across the fields behind my house. I could see and glimpse the DMUs from the bottom of the garden, and head the clicety clack as they ran along the jointed rail, echoing over the canal on a metal bridge. Exploring the fields we could get up close and see the railway first hand… and in town I could catch the very same train and try and spot my house from the comfort of its aging dusty seats. Then as now I have a personal relationship with a railway.
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| The village station. Accessible. |
What this makes me wonder is the difference in railway enthusiasts (railroad fans) and modellers either side of the Atlantic. If, unlike me, you can’t go down and experience the railway first hand, get on a train and travel somewhere, or just travel for the pleasure of the journey, if you can’t experience how your train interacts with others through signals and stations how do you have the same passion for the subject, trains and railways, as I do?
In Britain the railway is still something incorporated into daily life. That network of rural railways has no comparison in Canada. As such, beyond Montréal or Toronto commuter trains, we don’t ride the train as a form of transport. The only time we ride trains is when we make a plan to so the experience is one of novelty and not something mundane. And it’s that sense of mundane that becomes the drum beat of connection—the train was just a part of life.
Chris’s reflection is interesting. I’d love to hear from more of you, what do you think? Perhaps leave me a comment here or get in touch via the contact form.
My own early railway interests were pretty much divorced from my experience of actual railways. I grew up within sight of the Hastings Branch but its DMUs did little for me and my early Hornby was exclusively steam powered. I suppose that was indirectly dictated by gifts from parents.
ReplyDeleteHowever, in 1972 and aged eleven, I read Tom Rolt's 'Railway Adventure' and from then on my interest was almost exclusively narrow-gauge and particularly, as I devoured photo albums from David & Charles, JDCA Prideaux, and Ivo Peters, and the works of Lewis Cozens and James Boyd, among others, the British narrow-gauge as it had existed many decades before I was born.
Later still, my interests expanded to include the narrow-gauge in the US, and then worldwide.
What draws me to a subject is the very opposite of familiarity: it must be unfamiliar and the more exotic the better. It follows that. albeit I no longer model, the models I like are of unfamiliar prototypes or done with a great deal of imagination.
Thank you for sharing Colin. I wonder what drew you to railways in the first place? I, like you love the narrow gauge, and I also enjoy the unfamiliar - but in both of these I see parallels to the railways I enjoyed first hand as a child.
DeleteHi James
ReplyDeleteIn this blog on Sunday you posed the question “What connects us” and in some way the photo you used answers that. It is the track, and the rolling stock, which is the essence of any railway whenever or wherever it is and this exists even without locomotives . As I have said I was never a train-spotter and most of the trains I rode were packed commuter or Underground ones. There was no interest there until I worked at The London Transport Museum in the late 1990’s. I still feel a train ride is just a ride and does not really connect to the purpose until you are trackside. So freight railways, and particularly industrial railways are my thing, and to some degree modelling takes me there looking at those operations, and they all start with that track.
Track says this is going somewhere, can be a link with the history of railways or to the needs of the community and to industry. So I can look at track and rolling stock and see the railway in a way just a locomotive will not, and I guess that goes back to my first railway visit to Penrhyn quarries in 1964. For although they were closed for the holidays, walking on Red Lion level with all its intricate trackwork and various items of stock started my interest. Since then I have always tried to take as many photos of the system and draw sketch plans of the track whenever I make a visit.
I have sent a few non-locomotive photos to your e-mail address
Look forward to reading more
Best regards
Alan
Thank you for the comment, reflection and photos Alan. You’re visits sound like the sort of intimacy we get walking around sleeping, out of use or just paused workings for a tour at an industrial location or dock. What’s interesting is the mundane nature of the railway hasn’t got under your skin as it has done for me.
DeleteJames
DeleteI think what gets under my skin is the normalcy of operations and where appropriate trying to model them. I try to avoid the "weird and wonderful" and focus on the usual. For that reason even a well preserved industrial railway cannot compete with a working operation- something authentic is missing in the former
Best regards
Alan