Broadway signal box news.

Saturday, on call out.

There was an urgent shout to examine the JJ Farms bridge at Far Stanley, where footplate crews had reported a bad jolt, and a couple of broken springs. 

 

 

 

 

A quick dig at the end of a sleeper showed that it was voiding underneath, so that could explain the jolting. There was also a kink in the curve at that point.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The top of the sleeper had only the faintest hint of white abraded stone, so if something was happening here, it was recent.

We decided to lift and pack the southern end of the bridge, and at the same time, attempt to eliminate the kink with these four sluing jacks. They are the heaviest piece of kit that we have in our arsenal.

Also in our arsenal were these chocolate covered doughnuts. The chocolate, in the 31 degree heat, was just about clinging on, but it didn't affect the taste...

With the track successfully slued, and also lifted, it was time to fix it in place with Robels and plenty of ballast.

From time to time we had to let a train through. Saturday was rather dieselly, as we were short of steam footplate staff that day. On the other hand, you did get to hear the sound of a class 37 under load.

When we found no more spare ballast on site, Dave managed to find us some from a buffer stock half a mile away at Gotherington Skew bridge. We distributed one and a half bucket fulls here.

Afterwards the site looked like this. Both sides lifted and packed, and the southern side had a kink removed as well.

Problem solved!

As we had had an early start, without our usual tea and briefing, we decided to take our lunch break at the Coffeepot. From here we took a return trip to CRC, so see how the repair was working. The answer was - JJ Farms bridge is now smooth as silk. 

At CRC there was a layover of 40 minutes. They were actually able to switch off the diesel engine, to save on fuel and emissions.

Jim was fascinated by the works plate in, er.... Newton-Le-Willows. Where's that?

Google was able to help us there.  But what is the 'Le' in several place names that we have actually for?

 

 

Enjoying the beautiful Cotswolds countryside, and reflecting on the future...

 

 

Back at the base camp we noticed that the steel post holding the keypad for the gate had made another victim - see scratches with red near the top, and red shards of plastic on the ground.

A quick survey of our vehicles found no damage - phew! 

For once it wasn't our fault.

 

 

 

 

 

During the 40 minute layover at CRC we went topside to have a look at the roadworks along the A435 over our bridge, and the routing of the cycle path being built. Quite a number of people have mentioned to us that they didn't know what was going on up there, and how could a cycle path be routed over our bridge, with its narrow pavement? 

 

We therefore took a number of site photographs, which we give here and below.

This first one shows that the cycle path follows the road on the Cotswolds side.

The building is the original (wood built) ticket office for the race course, now sadly unused. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The second picture shows how narrow the footpath was along the Costwolds side - about 3ft, just as wide as the yellow pipes in the ground. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The next picture shows the footpath on the Malvern side, which was much wider.

So what they are doing is shifting the road westwards, reducing the space on the left, for more space for the cycle path on the right.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The next picture shows the other end of the bridge, a few steps towards Bishops Cleeve. Here it goes hard against the old foot acces to our P2, with three lanes for queuing passengers at the top (but today no longer in use)

 

 

 

 

 

 

A few more steps forwards, and you can see space being won on the right to continue the footpath down the road to Southam lane.

 

 

 

 

 

 

This picture shows the view back towards Cheltenham, from the north end of the bridge. The wider footpath/cycle lane is starting to appear on the left.

 

 

 

We then return back to the south end, standing outside the original road entrance to our ticket office (now out of use)

The new cycle lane continues up the hill, leading to the roundabout.

On the left was a public foothpath, running alongside the road. This is closed during the works. 

 

Arriving at our former ticket office, sadly now out of use, the footpath entered the race course car park via the gate in the foreground and, turning left, crossed the fence via a stile and then proceeded alongside our site all the way down to Southam lane.

There is no current official point of entry to our station at this point. Whether cyclists using the new footpath could do so - a gate exists - is not known to us. 

 

 

 

 

Broadway signal box news.

 

For a number of weeks now we have heard unconfirmed reports and snippets that Broadway signal box might, after all, be activated this year. We haven't dared comment on such reports, but now confirmation has come from the top: Our new chairman, in a presentation to plc shareholders, confirmed that Broadway box would be activated at last. This would be one of the projects during the 2025/2026 season.

To quote our new chairman: 'I'm an engineer. When I heard that we had built a signalbox, but not used it since, I said : Whaaat?'

Such welcome news, and what a great start. Numerous other projects were listed during the talk, but these will all depend on funding, and your support, during the next 2 - 3 years. More concrete proposals will no doubt be tabled later in the year. Broadway box is low hanging fruit - it's all ready to go.

 

 

 

One item we will miss is the handing over of the token between drivers and signalman. The token is replaced by an acceptance lever in the box. While we are not experts in GWR signalling set ups, we understand the acceptance lever is driven by the fact that the other box to the section, at Toddington, is quite some distance from the departing train.

 

 

 

 

Still a shame though, that we won't see the signalman interact with the drivers on the platform - that's part of the historic ritual. 

 

 

 

 

 

If things go well this year, by the end of the season we won't be seeing these crosses any more.

 

Thumbs Up ! 

 

 

 

 

 

  

Monday at Broadway.

Very windy, and still hot at times. Three of us on site, due to the expectation of another delivery of sand (we get through this quite quickly) and this, we were told, would arrive 'today'. That proved to be one o'clock, although we were there at 8.30, just in case. 

 

The brickworks have finally come back with a sample, so that we can judge the colour. It was.... almost the same. This was agonising... we compared the brick to two specials, and a plain stretcher, and discovered that all three originals were different. If you peer closely at the main building on P1, you can see that all the bullnoses for example, are darker. So which one do we ask the brickworks to copy? Do we improve the matching of the colour, or carry on with different shades as per P1? We are stuck with a legacy of different shades, imposed on us when the bricks were first ordered back in 2015 or so.

 

We decided that, rather than ping-pong examples back and forth, that the best way forward would be to visit the brickworks ourselves (in Measham) and see what options thay have for us.

 

 

We then carried on with the blocks on the interior.

 

Here you see John, working on the second half of the back.  

 

 

 

 

 

Neal spent a lot of the day cutting and measuring, and the result at the end of the day was the dividing wall, and part of the fireplace cut to size, ready for John to actually lay with mortar.

Neal also fixed more insulation strips, this time around the storeroom door. 

 

 

 

 

Then, finally, the sand delivery came, at lunch time.

 

 

 

We had two bags, and given that the RRV can't come until August, the plan was to half empty them into two other dumpy bags, and then pump trolley them down one platform, and back up the other.

 

 

 

 That worked quite well, thanks to Kevin from the Broadway Maintenance team, who came as a 'helper'.

 

 

At the end of the day John had also laid most of a course of hard concrete blocks around the store room.

This room needs hard walls, so that shelves, machines etc can be attached to them in due course. 

Tuesday at Broadway.

A big push this week, as John, our chief brick layer, is not available next week. And the weather is with us. 

As Neal had so kindly laid out all the necessary blocks to build up the south side fireplace, John decided on Tuesday to actually bed them down with mortar. 

Here you see him standing in the fireplace. He also worked on the Thermalite blocks on the dividing wall, the other side being built of the hard concrete blocks. 

 

At the end of the day the fireplace was chest high, with an arch resting on a left over piece of angle to hold it up. Thermalite blocks are in on each end of the dividing wall, ready for the next course. 

Locos for the day were P&O, and Foremarke Hall. At the end of the day a Growler came in with the second to last train at Broadway.

The platforms were pleasantly busy. Unfortunately 'Auntie Wainwright's' was not open, due to lack of Broadway gang volunteers. Every penny we earn there is pure profit (all items being donated) so the volunteer in there has an important job. Not only taking the money, but also answering all the questions about the station's history.

If this is something you could do, why not give it a try? Come and have a chat with them (esp Mondays and Wednesdays), and if you think you'd like to help, sign up via the Trust website:

 https://www.gwrt.org.uk/volunteering/volunteer

 

At the end of the day John had moved on from the fireplace, and started on another row of blocks at the rear.

Wednesday with the Usketeers.

Two of us, on another hot day. But interesting, as it was time to unwrap the new cast iron downpipes and accessories, paid for by the FoWS. We decided to go for a trial fitting, to see how the layout would work, together with the ACO drain planned across the door.

 

First we had some follow up work to be done from last week. The left hand corner of the door still had three bricks to be replaced - last week we ran out of time.

Paul and Yours Truly ambled down to the yard, and found us some more original bricks from Measham. Many of those on offer were cracked or spalled, so it was a difficult choice, but in the end we got three acceptable items. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And this was the result afterwards. That corner is now done too, so from the visitor's perspective, the bottom of the building now looks much more presentable.

There's also the higher floor now. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

During the morning this enormous double decker bus drew up, and disgorged three groups of schoolchildren. How does 'farmer Brown' keep them all busy, and under control? We had a sneaky look - he's got them on the stirrup pump! One bucket filled with water, one empty. One kid on the pump, the second aiming the end into the empty bucket. After a little while he cries 'All change' and it's 'Awwww' from one group, and 'yay' from the next.... 

 

 

 

 

 

The double decker parked itself carefully outside the white stripe that says 'Keep Clear'.

Then another coach turned up, this one from Heathrow (!).

Coach drivers are very careful, but there is always 'Murphy's Law'... 

 

Sooner or later you will hit something, like this one did. Looks like more than once too. 

 

 

 

 

The first train south was headed by our Peak diesel.

Some of the diesel drivers are particularly friendly, like this one.

Good on ya, mate ! 

The first carriage had 5 occupied compartments. Three occupants were on their phones, and two were asleep! And it was only the start of their journey...

 

 

 

Down by the toilet block we found a collection of volunteers from Colas Rail, who had come to help us. 

You may recall that on a previous visit, Colas helped us with the surface of the road by the Usk hut. Here they were, back again. And, we heard, again next week. 

They must like us.

Today's job was painting the fence, which looked very grey, it must be admitted. 

By the end of the day it was a neat brown again.

Thank you, guys! 

 

 

 

Walking past the entrance to our admin HQ, Churchward House, we were joined by three old ladies who had tried to buy tickets there. We were only too glad to set them right.

 

 

 

 

Then it was back to the weighbridge. Having finished the brickwork repair, we decided to address the stormwater drainage. The downpipe at the back is original, but has a hole in it. Where it drains to is not clear.

We're going to lay this ACO drain across the front, and connect the rear downpipe to it. 

 

 

 

At the back we have the original downpipe. The new cast iron pipe will take the water diagonally like this, round to the front, where it will go to a soakaway via the ACO drain. That is the plan.

We're standing in the neighbour's garden here. That is how close the weighbridge is, after the adjoining land was sold, back in the day. 

 

 

 

We need to cut the original down pipe just above the hole that it has, and intercept the water and bring it round to the front.

The last thing we did was to remove the Ogee gutters here. They were the original reason we proposed to help with the dampness in the weighbridge, as they were clearly leaking, and a fern was growing where the water seeped out. 

On removal it turned out that the two gutters were not linked with the customary nut and bolt, thus allowing two different levels to occur, and the water seeping out. 

Here is one of the gutters, ready for grinding, to fit the new downpipe we have sourced. 

After grinding down the rusty drain fitting in it, we were annoyed to find that the new downpipe still did not fit. There was only 1 - 2 mm in it. How could that be? Cleaning the paint off the inside of the new downpipe did not help much either, it needs some metal skimming off it, inside. We will need to investigate what tools are available to do this. Some sort of Dremmel perhaps?

This is where we decided to call it a day, and repair to the Coffeeepot for a mug of tea. Yours Truly also had a mint Magnum, which was frowned upon by Paul.

What do you think - can you eat ice cream, with a mug of tea? Is that permissible? 

 

 

From the June 1981 GWRS newsletter.

- Thoughts turn to the establishment of a separate limited company. The charitable status of the GWRS does not permit the serious inward investment that will be needed to rebuild the line.

- Auto coach 169 has been purchased from BR at Gloucester, funded by an interest free loan of £2000 from a member, which is to be repaid by raising 100 shares of £20 each from other members. The mechanical condition is very good, and restoration costs were thought to be minimal. It was to be the railway's first coach.

 

Photograph by Steve Hill

(Auto coach 169 later left us, and is currently, restored, on the WSR).

- A PWay raiding party went to St. James yard to recover track materials. It was buried in the adjacent council yard. The rails were of a lighter grade, the sleepers rotten, and a turnout had no blades - fairly typical of such raids. It was proposed to use the rails in the yard at Toddington.

- GWR 2-8-0 2807 was purchased from Barry in March 1981, together with missing parts scavenged from 2873. It was expected to arrive at Toddington in June 1981 (this one is still here!)

- Work began on the P2 waiting room, which was in very poor condition and had to be partially dismantled.

- 24 lengths of bullhead rail arrived from Sheffield, and two lengths of track were immediately laid with them.

- Tim Bazeley bought a Hudswell Clarke 0-6-0 diesel shunter. It was in working order, but needed a new head gasket.

- Other loco arrivals expected by the end of June were: 5952 Cogan Hall, 7828 Odney Manor (both of which since moved on) and two industrial tank engines, a Peckett and a Hunslett. (The Peckett is also still here, albeit currently undergoing a full rebuild) 

Block laying accelerates.

Friday at Broadway.

A half day, but a good one, on Friday morning at Broadway. John laying Thermalite blocks - he's got the bit between his teeth now - and Yours Truly in support with mortar and block cutting.

 

 

 

John and Neal also had a go last Wednesday, and the wall under the tarpaulin shows that work.

We're working our way along the front at the moment. 

 

 

This is the look of the fireplace at the staircase end at the moment, just to show you. We have approached an architectural fireplace supplier for a quote for a replica slate one. Let's hope they come back to us with a price.

Friday was one of our Steam & Ale days, with three different locomotives in service. Both our class 47s were seen on trains during the morning, and...

 ... one steamer, in this case 2807, in black. It must have been hot on the footplate, even with the very limited cab these veteran 2-8-0s have. We suffered on site in the sun, without having a roaring coal fire right next to us as well.

Once the steamer had left we wandered over to the cafe, to watch the blue 47 come in, the second man having his arm hanging out of the window, very relaxed. No roaring coal fire here...

As we watched the goings on at the station it occurred to us how good the recently refurbished coaches look, with their Ferret & Dartboard, crimson red and yellow first class stripe. Excellent work there, at Winchcombe!

Guard Christine, a volunteer for 4 years now, looks very proud in her uniform. 

 

 

Late morning saw John on the last section of the front going south, with still the store room to do.

Instead, he turned right round and started on the back, and headed back the other way.

We shall see what he did on Monday, when we will be dealing with the logistics of having building materials for P2 arrive on P1 ! All hands on deck there then.

 

 

 

 

 

 

We were recently able to look at a couple of original GWR timetables.

This one is the earliest, from 1921. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We rummaged through the pages and here, on P53, we actually found our own line, Honeybourne, Broadway & Cheltenham. By then the line had been fully open for 15 years, and it is interesting to see that the steam rail motors, introduced soon after opening, are still in service.

 

 In 1939, with another edition of the GWR general timetable, the timings were altered once again.

 

Strangely, there was a quite a bit of difference to the 1921 arrangements. Was it changing traffic patterns, or was it the onset of the war that drove this?

This one, dated 1920, was quite unusual, as it refers to the 'Consequence of Labour Troubles'. After the end of WW1 there were several strikes in the UK, although we couldn't pinpoint the exact one which caused Paddington to change its timetable on 17th October 1920.

 

 

 

 A lighter note, issued on October 28th 1909 (or even 1869...?) shows the cost of getting caught sneaking a second class seat between Audlem and Nantwich, when you've only got a third class ticket - fourpence ha'penny!

 

Saturday, out with the gang.

Nine of us on Saturday, quite a good turnout. Evil tongues linked the good attendance to the nature of the weekend's services - Steam and Ale. It was very popular with our customers too, the stations were crowded.

 

 

 

We loaded up the truck from the GUV, the long standing stores vehicle that has been part of the PWay train when we were still building the line. Loading is still awkward, as you can see, but we have a better idea, shipping containers on the ground, and are clearing an area for them.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Saturday's destination was the south end of the yard at Toddington. Half the group began to jack & Robel the main line nearby, while the other half was given the job of clearing an adjacent strip of land, enough to lay down a panel of track to store diesel dept bogies. 

 

 

 

 

The strip of land had all sorts of detritus in it, woven into a tangle of brambles and nettles. 

At least some of it was leftovers from the installation of two turnouts here 5 year ago, we never cleared up the remains.

 But you have to eventually.

The first find was 7 or 8 rusty steel plates. We think these might have formed part of the walkway across the former Ashford turntable that we gave away a couple of years ago. 

As it was Steam & Ale weekend the main line was busy, with 3 trains on the loose. We kept stopping to let them by.

 

 

The next find was a big coil of fencing wire. Definitely not ours, but still ours to clear up.

There was so much stuff that we decided to engage the services of a second Telehandler. 

 

 

It was quite warm on Saturday, so enforced pauses to let trains through were kinda welcome really. We sat down in the shade and watched the green Growler.

 Just when we thought we could get on with the job, a steam engine emerged from the yard.

Well, that wasn't on the timetable. We stopped again, but in fact it didn't go by, but retreated again. A bluff !

After removing all the metal that we could find, we were finally able to address the real issue, a long line of semi rotten sleepers in the place where we wanted to put the new track panel. 

The bigger Telehandler started to scoop these up, and start a more orderly pile at the other end of the site.

 

The scooping depended on the sleepers lying in line, but then there was a section still chaired with throughbolters, and they were all over the place. They were also too heavy to carry and sort by hand, so STEVIE was  drafted in to lift them out.

This was a fascinating job for some, who, for reasons of safety of course, stood to one side (in the shade) to watch the goings on from a distance.

Steve lifting the throughbolters clear.

Another metallic find emerged from the undergrowth (together with more fencing wire).

We couldn't say for sure, but we think this may also be connected to the turntable that we used to have. 

Our lifting gear seemed to be attractive to a certain kind of very colourful moth.

Wonder what it's called...

BTW Dave from the Usketeers drew our attention to a brilliant app for your phone. 

Launch it and let it listen to a bird's call, and it will tell you what the bird is! Amazing, and it really works. 

The blue Growler was out as well, giving two diesels and one steamer in service that day. Many beer glasses were seen in windows as the trains passed, people seemed to enjoy themselves very much.

 

Again we stopped and stood to one side dutifully. Just beyond where we were working was the end of station limits, and what a great sound when that Growler finally opens up !

At the end of the afternoon this was the result:

The site was cleared of all detritus, with quite a bit making a useful contribution to the scrap skip. The site still needs strimming, and a little back filling to achieve a perfectly level foundation.

Below is the NG line, and more than once the blast of their diesel's horn made us think there was a train coming. Well, there was, but... 

Back at Winchcome the place was humming. Both platforms were full of visitors holding drinks and enjoying themselves. 

 

 

 

 

This was the inside of the 'beer tent', the ground floor of our Bradstone visitor centre.

We snapped a moment without a queue, it  didn't always look like this. Nearby there was a frantic hunt for more buns for the griddle. Things were going well.

 

 

 

 

 In some places the platform looked like the back garden of a pub, and in a way it was.

 

 

The PWay gang managed to squeeze on to a bench under the canopy, glad to be in the cool at last. We all had tea, sadly, being on duty still (the Transit still had to be unloaded)

 

 

 

 

 

 

Monday at Broadway.

An interesting day, as we were expecting a delivery of building materials, but to the wrong platform. While the RRV can easily deliver all sorts of stuff on its little trolley, getting it actually on a particular date is more difficult, mostly due to conflicting personal and operational issues. The earliest we can have the RRV bring stuff up is August, but we need sand, building blocks and insulation now.

 

 

 

Our interim solution is to bring up one lorry load to the P1 side, and manhandle it across ourselves. That will at least keep us going. We have accepted the August RRV offer, and will use it to release also the bricks currently stored on a wagon in the headshunt.

 

A temporary bridge to get our concrete blocks across.

 

So on Monday we had delivered a bag of sand, a pallet of concrete blocks (1.4 tonnes!), a pallet of Thermalite blocks, and 8 rolls of insulation. That should keep us going until the RRV and its wagon come along.

 

 

Ordinary work continued with John, as Neal, Yours truly and Kevin from the station maintenance gang wrestled with the supplies. John mainly worked on the blocks for the rear wall.

 

 A course was also put down along the front, using blocks cut by Neal and assembled dry.

 

 

The hardest part of ferrying the supplies was getting the sand across. This was done with shovels and wheelbarrows, and the sand from the new bag was run across the temporary bridge, and tipped into two empty bags

 

Sadly, it became apparent that we had not specified the colour of the extra sand that we wanted, and red sand was supplied where we had previously used yellow.

To get round this we decided to only use red sand for the mortar intended for the Thermalite blocks. These will in due course be hidden from view.

 

 

Tuesday at Broadway.

With this lovely warm weather, we are really putting in the hours. So, another day at the coal face. Another due Wednesday, Thursday a day off, then another at Broadway on Friday.

 

 

This is the building as it looked on Tuesday. We were getting compliments from the station staff; we don't usually see it from this side and, yes, it does seem to be getting on with it.

 

 

What we were doing on Tuesday is blockwork on the rear wall, which is getting quite high here. Where the blocks intersect, or where they fit into the uprights, they need cutting to size or shape, so that occupied quite a bit of our day.

Neal was at Toddington, on the final stretch with the canopy steelwork.

 

 

In view of the very dry weather we also gave the new pine trees some water, about a bucketful each. The trees in question are the ones grown from seeds about 10 years ago. We planted them to continue the original pattern along the extended platforms. Others were planted in between subsequently by someone else.

Those seedlings along the higher of the two rows are visibly smaller than those in the row half way up the cutting. This is because the upper reaches of the cutting are drier, so that is where we have directed our watering activities. Let's hope they survive; about 80% of them have so far. Some died because of drought, others because they were strimmed to death by (over) enthusiastic clearance.

 

We took this picture to give an update of the view from above. You can just about make out the grey blockwork along the back of the building. 

 

 

When the afternoon train came in, the platform was filled with people sitting on benches and licking ice creams. The railway looked very busy on Tuesday.

 

 

The last train that we saw was headed by Growler 37215. Here it is leaving, with a toot and a bellow:

 https://youtu.be/3xCDSpVAP4E

 

 

 

 

Wednesday with the Usketeers.

 

 Three Usketeers on this very warm day.

 

 

 

We came, bearing 4 large boxes containing the new heritage downpipes and accessories for the weighbridge. They filled the car to the top, we were lucky to get it all in. It's basically a complete new set of downpipes, front and back. The old front one was made of grey plastic, and the rear one was broken. The weighbridge will look better, and be drier, for them. 

 

Now park your car.....

 

 

Winchcombe was very busy on Wednesday, with no fewer than three coaches, all with school children for our wartime experience. That takes most of the day. During this time they are parked outside on the forecourt.

 

 

Getting three coaches to turn around is not easy, given that the car park is invariably full, and Halls may be busy outside their own yard. Some coaches do a three (or more...) point turn outside the station, others go down into the yard and hope there is room to turn there. 

Notice how the canopy projects beyond the edge of the pavement outside the building, and how high the coach is next to it. Sooner or later the parking there, or else the turning round, involving a reversal right up to the canopy, are going to result in the canopy being hit. What to do?

 

Our suggestion would be a wider pavement. It's just a thought.

 

Dave, fitting a replacement brick by the door.

 

 

Today's job on the weighbridge was to complete the replacement of bricks below ground level, around the door. There are spalled bricks on both sides. That will allow us to make a start on the ACO drain in a trench outside.

 

 

 

 

Having done the right hand side, Dave attacked the left one with his chunky SDS drill. We thought just one brick needed replacing, but it always gets worse once you get into the job. Several had to come out.

 

 

 

Growler 37 215 was out again today - Green timetable, meaning one steam and one diesel.

Here's a nice handover of the token to the signalman. 

 

 

After lunch, Dave fitted replacement bricks cut to size by Yours Truly. This one is just being 'buttered up', as they say in the trade. We also did the other side, with one brick left to place next week. Then that job is done, and we can look at drainage.

 

During the day we had a look around the site, and found... 

 

 

Andy, cleaning up freshly sawn rail ends, to make them ready for sale. These are still going strong, so if you want one, get in touch. It helps our tool fund no end. We just took delivery of a fabulous set of Milwaukee tools - result !

Over by the gate to the Usk hut we found the clearance gang busy with their chipper. This is good news, as our site clearance in that area, clearing the fence line of elder and brambles, had resulted in a large pile of brash. As of today, it's no more. Great ! This area is used by the PWay to turn round the Transit when we load up our tools.

 

Lastly, while passing through Toddington we noticed the fruits of Neal's labour on the last intermediate trusses for Broadway.

Here he has assembled two new ones, and laid them across an existing truss (that Neal also made)  In the background is a third, and in total we believe that there are 4 to be made.

 

 

 

 

 

Infrastructure blog.

Just a brief mention to say that this blog, dormant for a while, has been reactivated by our new Infrastructure Manager, Sarah.

So here is her first report:

https://bridgestobroadway.blogspot.com/2025/06/cheltenham-racecourse-bridge-43-works.html

Blogging is kinda a personal thing, some people can't do it, others don't want to, but Sarah is up for it, so we look forward to further news. Give her all the support you can.