Another Fine Mess

The final part of the Bishop Auckland line.  Part one is here, part two is here and part three is here.

I get it Shildon: the railways are your claim to fame.  They're your moment in the sun.  But you can kind of over-egg the pudding, you know?

As I walked round the outskirts of the town, looking for a bus stop, I found repeated reminders of its heritage.  Some, like the "Railway Institute", were genuine relics of its past.  Others, like these gates, had been shipped in with the museum.

The nearby plaque explained that these were taken from the old Euston station, but were donated to the town.  A nice gesture, though all they lead to was a rather dull Brookside estate.

I finally reached railway overload at a roundabout, where a wagon and a signal were sited next to The Crossings pub.  Enough already! I thought as I took up position in the bus shelter.  It was overshadowing Shildon's other attributes - for example, I also passed Good Buddy's CB Radio & Communication Centre.  I was fascinated.  Was CB radio still a thing in this corner of County Durham?  Were people ignoring the delights of FaceTime and Skype in favour of hunching over a handset?  I imagined a scene like the one in The Brady Bunch Movie, where the radio bursts into life for the first time in twenty years.  It's sort of like ChatRoulette, but without the penises.

I was sad I didn't have more time to explore the town as I passed through on the bus.  It seemed like a pretty, busy little town centre, well laid out and thriving.  I was particularly taken with the Millennium Arches (sadly unrelated to Jimmy Corkhill's Millennium Arch), erected to show the entrance to the town centre in 2000, and a charming little artefact of the new century.

Our bus rolled up and down steep hillsides, and I was glad I'd not walked.  That had been the original plan, particularly since I'd spotted somewhere called Busty Terrace on the road to Bishop Auckland, but the sun was setting earlier than I thought it would.  I didn't fancy marching down the country lanes in the pitch black. Instead I paid a couple of quid to the friendly driver and let him do all the work.

I'm not sure if they're celebrating or complaining.

The bus exchange was behind the Newgate Shopping Centre, and I cut through to enjoy a welcome blast of heat.  On the other side I exited onto the central pedestrian way, lined with all the usual chain stores and banks.  It was ordinary, generic; not without charm, but nothing special.  Better than Newton Aycliffe, worse than Darlington.

The side streets were more pleasing, with Victorian railwayman cottages and plenty of trees.

I headed into Beales, attracted by the Lego American Footballer outside and the promise of a cup of tea in the cafe.  It was a classic provincial department store, made up of different buildings knocked together, full of nooks and odd little passageways.  I had a sniff at the Yankee Candle section; there was a gorgeous "Christmas Cupcake" scent, but I would have to be a lottery winner before I spend £20 on something I am literally going to set on fire.

After my cuppa I headed back into the street to search for the railway station.  There was an unexpected pleasure on a corner: a statue of Stan Laurel.  I hadn't realised that the great man was from the town; his parents ran the (now demolished) theatre.

It does look a bit like the artist only knew Stan from the old Hanna-Barbera cartoon, but it's nice enough.

I knew that the railway station would be behind the Morrison's supermarket.  Years of tracking round town centres looking for stations has taught me that giant 1980s retail developments are almost always constructed on top of old goods yards and railway facilities.  So it was at Bishop Auckland, with the little building an afterthought to all the free parking and trolley bays.

The good news is that the station is growing.  It was adopted by Bishop Trains, an enthusiastic band of locals, who have pumped a great deal of energy (and cash) into revitalising the station.  The new cafe and waiting area were sadly closed when I arrived, but they were good to see.  Even better is the news that Bishop Trains will be reintroducing a staffed ticket office to the station, its first since 1969.  This pioneer of the railways will very soon have a facility we've all taken for granted.

There's also a pleasing mural covering the wall of the station building.

Once there were onward services from here, down a number of branches, but they all closed decades ago.  Now it's the end of the line.

I took a seat on the cold metal bench to wait for my train.  Time to go home.  I had crossed off an entire branch of the Northern Rail map, my first - I should have felt jubilant.  Instead I felt deflated, a sense of "is that it?".  Perhaps the terminus had affected me, the feeling of history closing off.  I had travelled right across the country and collected just half-a-dozen stations.  I'd spend longer travelling to and from Darlington than I doing the actual day's jaunts.

I began to think, is it worth it?  Am I wasting my time?  I thought of the hundreds of stations I still had to get, and how long it would take me, and how much it would all cost.  I sank down in my seat.  I had to focus on that end point, the day when I cross off that last station, because right there on that platform I felt like I was wasting my life.  I couldn't justify the effort for so little result.

I'm sure I'll go a few days and I'll be itching to get out there again.  At the moment, it all feels a bit... pointless.

Too Much Of A Good Thing

Part three of the Bishop Auckland branch: part one is here and part two is here.

Shildon is where it all started; Shildon is responsible for everything.  The very first passenger train service in history was launched onto the Stockton and Darlington Railway on the 27th September 1825, and Shildon is where it hit the tracks running.

And on the surface, it looks like just another railway station.  Two platforms, two shelters, a couple of tracks.  Nothing out of the ordinary.

Then you spot the big glowing column behind the station and think "that's a bit different".

This is interactive art, people; none of that sit back and watch nonsense - take part!  Apparently if you text a name of one of the original engines to a number on the base the lights change.  I wasn't going to do that, because there was no info on how much it cost, and I'm cheap.  I like the idea that a device was invented here two hundred years ago, and is still being used today, and they're commemorating it with a technology that's already going out of style.  In another twenty years kids will be looking at this with far more befuddlement than the third class carriages in the museum.

Yes, there's a museum.  The National Railway Museum has an annexe here to properly acknowledge Shildon's place in history.  Called Locomotion because, again, "museum" is such an off-putting phrase, it threads itself along the railway track, taking in the old works and climaxing in a large new shed full of engines.

Inside, there was a reverential hush, as though I'd entered a cathedral or a mosque.  It was a temple of trains, a locomotive Lourdes, and talking too much would be deemed tasteless.  Even the staff in the gift shop were whispering.

The shed is laid out with rows of tracks, each stocked full of engines, carriages and other railway stock.  Working your way from one end to the next is exposing yourself to a mass of industrial history.  I picked one end at random and was soon grinning with pleasure at the sight of an InterCity carriage, wedged up against a green Southern railway carriage, behind a steam engine with a Christmas wreath hanging from the front.

This is the point where I lose half my readers.

After a while, a parade of trains just becomes... a parade of trains.  One steam engine looks much like the next.  It might be a bit taller or a bit wider but it's still a load of iron on top of some wheels.  I lost a bit of interest.

The delights for me were round the edge, the detritus and sweepings from closed stations.  I've long said I'm more interested in stations than trains and Locomotion just underlined this.  I was probably the first visitor to walk straight past an engine so I could coo at a platform ticket machine:

Platform tickets are such a romantic idea.  Paying a little bit of money so you can kiss your wife or husband goodbye.  I know theoretically you can still buy them, but I'd die of embarrassment just asking for one.  I have problems enough buying Day Ranger tickets from people with a computer in front of them, without trying to buy a ticket that's not valid on any train.  Also, of course, in these days of unstaffed stations, anyone can wander around trackside without paying a bean.

I was equally excited by a sign from the Tyne & Wear Metro:

One of the best aspects of this whole Northern Rail expedition is the fact that one day I'll be in Newcastle, and one day I'll be able to ride on the Metro.  That is stupidly exciting to me - in fact it's one of those parts that I'm putting off doing, because I don't want it to go by too fast.  Just look at that font!  Margaret Calvert, you are a genius.

OK, there were some exciting trains.  The APT-E, for example, a British Rail High-Speed prototype that was powered by gas turbines.  That square front, the buff colour scheme, the Buck Rogers-future styling; adorable.

More beautiful still was the Duchess of Hamilton, a throbbing powerhouse of a steam engine.  Built for the route between London and Glasgow, this muscular train called to me: a rare example of an old school coal train matching the elegance of an electric one.

Though I admit part of the appeal is that gorgeous colour scheme.

After a while I just felt overwhelmed.  There was so much, engine after engine, histories piling on top of one another, until I had to get an overpriced cup of tea and have a sit down.

It was all very good, and well-presented, if a little bit worthy in places (thanks, NRM, but I really didn't need an exhibition space devoted to your waste water harvesting and your wind turbines).  If you like locomotives you'll be orgasmic.  I was just mildly thrilled.