Jessie's Seat, aka The Chilworth Chicken, has been accidentally destroyed: www.bbc.co.uk/news/article... A topiary chicken beside the Down line of the Redhill to Guildford Line, approaching Chilworth. A memorial to Guard Henry Wicks who was killed there in 1892. youtu.be/bxVu99xCP5Q?...

#OnThisDay 13 years ago, the A60 Stock farewell railtour covered the entire Metropolitan line, including Watford, Amersham, Aldgate, Uxbridge, Chesham and the Watford curve. The final revenue service was three days before on the 26th. Image: bowroaduk buff.ly/no6J7O6

A London grumble: the A312 Parkway is a hideous yet sometimes-useful piece of road I use rather a lot. There are signs about it being closed, but located just where you can't afford to take your eyes off the 3-into-2 forced merge. one.network has nothing about a closure. Nor does TfL website. 1/3

iOS 26 review: unsure about the new glassy display, annoyed my clock has changed to something retro-80s (not in the good way) but already using the 'screen unknown callers' option to great effect! If you're neurodivergent and have a lot going on right now, don't update to '26 yet

I recently spoke in Parliament about the impact of pavement parking—a concern I hear often from constituents with disabilities, sight loss or mobility aids. It makes everyday journeys harder and more dangerous. Councils need proper powers to act. Everyone deserves safe, accessible streets

In October 2018 the People's Vote march attracted *several times* the number of protesters to the thugs' march which happened yesterday. Particularly noticeable the total, utter absence of violence or any vestige of unsafety. The only police we saw all day were these 4 seeking to reopen Park Lane.

Appalled by the violent scenes of police being attacked at the Tommy Robinson rally today. Those responsible should face the full force of the law. These far right thugs do not speak for Britain.

Word of the day is ‘tamalou’: a French name for an older person who no longer greets their friends with ‘how was your holiday?, but with ‘t’as mal où ?’, ‘where does it hurt?’. There follows an enthusiastic account of aches and pains and doctor’s appointments.

I was listening in on internal radio to the Jubilee Line incident channel. Faulty train in tunnel near Westminster. Seems to have been there for about 5 hours. Gapped. Load-shed. But steadfastly nobody wanted to risk even coupling-up another train to push it onto juice, far less perform a pushout.

Reminiscing to myself about bus-driver training, in December 2000, at Oxford Bus. And in particular my wonderful instructor, Peter Kilduff (RIP), who knew to throw this promising but over-eager kid in at the deep end...

While my train was at Chesham this morning, I took a little walk along the public footpath that runs beside (and then crosses over) the branch line. I walked far enough to see signal A1000, which usually displays Yellow to trains — but as my train was occupying the single line there, it shows Red.

So, what do we have for this week's #MapMonday? Well, the next batch of 15 maps from the #OrdnanceSurvey One Inch Popular Edition, adding sheets revised in 1936 to our already large collection. buff.ly/3TyUjFi

Mmm, Glenfield Tunnel! I drove all the way to Leicester in 2017 on purpose to visit it. :) I love the facility of having old maps at our disposal.

I post something along these lines each year, and unapologetically so. It goes to prove that, whatever your A-level grades, two things should be a given: 1) Life will always throw up challenges and, 2) You'll always find your path in the end. Never lose hope. Have a train.

More Helsinki wanderings: www.merseytart.com/2025/08/rush...

We just watched the Prost documentary (BBC, June 2025). It's in 6 parts of around 25 minutes each, and it tells Alain Prost's story of his family, his life, his career (he won the F1 World Championship 4 times), and his intense rivalry with Ayrton Senna. www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/epis...

#OnThisDay 145 years ago the Metropolitan Railway opened from Willesden Green to Harrow (=Harrow-on-the-Hill) with an intermediate station at Kingsbury & Neasden (=Neasden). Circa 1890 a train for Harrow is seen at the latter looking very rural. LT Museum collection buff.ly/1KVo2BY

I'm helping someone who has a remote facility with a mobile-wifi router and a freezer. Their router is plugged into a budget UPS device, so that internet connection is retained when the power gets tripped (which is frequently). How can I arrange to get a text-message alert when the power goes off?

Nice thing today: Passenger alights my train upon arrival at Uxbridge, waits at my cab door, shakes my hand and is keen to let me know he thinks my braking technique (in which I do admittedly take pride) is "bloody brilliant".

Phew! That was an awful lot of work, but I have finally dug through ALL outstanding email, to become INBOX ZERO for the first time this year.

One of the parts of SABRE Maps that we like the most is our Map Fader functionality, where you can fade in a modern OpenStreetMap map onto any of our historic #map layers so you can easily compare then and now, like the now-abandoned section of M4 here. buff.ly/wiHXf0c

I see the RAIB is investigating a recent derailment at Denbigh Hall South Junction, between Bletchley and Milton Keynes. It occurred at a Switch Diamond Crossing. The selfsame set of points may be seen in the attached framegrab from my cab video footage (from April’s HDL East West DEMU).

OK this is getting peculiar now, the number of #LHR missed approaches has got much greater in the last few days. That's the second #GoAround in the last few minutes (they sound distinctive as they go off-throttle over Staines, & then FlightRadar24 corroborates it). Must be half a dozen in 30 hrs.

HEADS UP. BSky added a feature that allows people to be notified every time you post. A fine feature! By default, it's set to allow anyone to do this. If you are prone to stalkers though: *Under Privacy and Security settings, you can change this to only allow people you follow back to use this.*

Every time I now hear “we’re experiencing a high volume of calls”, I’m now going to hear this as “we decided that customer service isn’t a priority, and so we’re going to make you wait”.

This is signal TVC 682 at Latchmere Junction. Route "G" is shown on the indicator, which seems to be a route which takes you to Longhedge via the 'wrong road'. Is there a list of routes and indications for this and similar signals?

Hmm, 3x missed approaches in succession at LHR just now (heard by me at my desk) — KL1013, BA491, CSN673 — wonder what's happening at LHR 27-L?

Farage and the far right in general come from a grievance culture. If you do what they want, even maximally – Brexit – they’ll move the goalposts and keep moaning. If you engage seriously with their concerns, they’ll find new ones. You will never satisfy them, because they don’t want to be satisfied

While stood at my kitchen sink earlier, saw aircraft proceeding over Heathrow but neither climbing nor going around. Then another one. Oh! It’s the flypast vehicles from Trooping The Colour.

There’s a Dutch phrase about feeling anxious that translates to “shitting seven colours of sludge.” A Bulgarian version is “deep in thought like a fat pig before Christmas.” But my favourite variant is the Puerto Rican como cocodrilo en fábrica de carteras, or “like a crocodile in a wallet factory.”

Got home in the small hours after another evening offering assistance to the Metropolitan Line with the bedding-in of its Wembley/Neasden re-signalling, which went live on Saturday. Slept poorly, repeatedly having stress-dreams about how I should have written my instruction-booklet more clearly.

In 2019 we carried out computer modelling and then dynamic train testing, which showed that forces would be manageable at 110mph, but marginally non compliant at 125mph. Ever since, electric trains have been limited to 110. The new testing is to see whether that restriction can be lifted.

Hi, Steventon Bridge expert here 👋 when permission for demolition of the bridge was refused, it left NR with a dilemma. Stocks Lane level crossing is only 400m away, and the contact wire grading between the two features would be too steep for line speed of 125mph, limiting electric trains to 60mph.

Should cycling be central to health policy? The benefits are clear—physical health, mental well-being, and stronger communities. Yet cycling remains undervalued in public health strategies, despite strong scientific backing. Read more: buff.ly/giyp5YM

Doozy of a thunderstorm just starting, as seen from Neasden railway depot

Egham is now an axle counter detection area.

View of track by Egham substation. Bus-bars connecting the traction current return path to the substation (just out of shot to top). Ordinarily these would be impedance bonds, but here they just seem to be direct connections. How does this not shunt the track circuit too (or maybe it does)?

A newspaper cutting from the Staines & Ashford News, 13 August 1992. But what I want to know is, was the rumoured interaction (not mentioned in the article) true, or (sadly) was it apocryphal? Police: "Who do you think you are, Nigel Mansell?!" Senna: "No. Ayrton Senna." @joesaward.bsky.social

Oops. I will never forget, but I did manage to get almost to 3pm before remembering what happened 31 years ago today. #MayDay #Senna www.squarewheels.org.uk/f1/imola/

In spite of its massive size, the Boeing 747 cargo plane feeds almost exclusively on small helicopters and other light prop aircraft that swarm the summer months.

"Shark's Teeth" road markings are the unsung heroes of Dutch street design, indicating which users must 'give way'. They can be painted across a wide or narrow space, indicating a complex set of priorities in a clear manner, without the need for signage.

This is Maggie. She saw this tree blossoming into its true colors and thought of you. 13/10

The #F1 #SaudiArabianGP 🇸🇦 Issue 3⃣9⃣9⃣ Your e-mag is available Subscribers --> bit.ly/subarea Not a subscriber? --> bit.ly/4hdUaFN

Biggest commitment to a 3 second joke I've ever seen

Our #EastWestDEMU railtour is under way and is approaching Crowhurst.

On this day in 1889 the Eiffel Tower was completed, opening later that year. In honour of this I just watched a documentary about how they put the Eiffel Tower together. It was riveting

I’m amused at how many private aircraft are taking advantage of the current closure of Heathrow airport to come fly over it in daylight hours — like this person I heard overflying a few mins ago, making a long afternoon’s flight from the Isle of Man just for the novelty value.

I saw, being driven in a residential area today, a T*sla Model Y with a “25 plate”. [UK licence plate denoting first purchase since 1 March 2025.] It’s one thing to have bought one a while ago and be lumbered with it, but buying one now is pretty much unforgivable…

Et bardaf, il n'y a officiellement plus aucune des sociétés de transport public belge sur X 🙃