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Contact NIRT NOW nirt@btinternet.com |
Your local neighbourhood Management Board. People living or working in the area, listening to your priorities and getting the resources and funds to make a difference. |
Railway Projects throughout 2009
Before the clearance started by BTCV - there are rails there! |
Wednesday 17th June, 2009 - READYPOWER at nirt. Major rail industry plant hire provider, Readypower used Nirt infrastructure for an on site demonstration of plant to their clients. The day proved to be very successful and NIRT was very pleased to welcome them to site. We are hoping that more of these events can be arranged in the future. Should you have any requirements for their services, see the Readypower web site www.readypower.co.uk |
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Clearance in progress by the BTVC: Picture by Simon Tasker |
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Digger getting on to track: picture Ian Cave |
placing trolley on the track: picture Ian Cave |
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BTVC - Have joined forces with Nirt to help us in the battle to remove the weed growth. BTVC have provided up to 30 people for 4 days a week to tackle this job. This has proven to be a great success and the group have cleared the long straight on the loop line. Sincere thanks must go to Mick and his team for their sterling work. We understand that this might be on going as it provides work for unemployed people of all age ranges and skill sets.
Friends of Hunsbury Hill Country Park - Continue their work on park improvements. They have successfully obtained grant monies for an area of new fencing for the railway which will be installed as soon as an appropriate contractor has been appointed. Sincere thanks must go to Alan & his team for this help & support. |
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Loading water into the mixer to simulate a load: picture Ian Cave |
Full size Concrete mixer on a trolley! picture Ian Cave |
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| The newly completed platform. This has been raised to comply with the current regulations & aid passenger comfort. | The summit of the line looking towards Top Station | |||
Track Work to Tunnel Halt. We need to bring in more sleepers and more ballast too. There is a knock on effect to this, and that's the delay this brings getting the line up & running for passenger use. Money is particularly tight. Given the current climate and certainly in the short term; this area will in all probability have to be moth balled yet again. The Trust will look into ways of trying to source some urgently needed funding to enable us to progress this work. The site continues to be cleared of all major growth. Work has continued on a daily basis throughout the summer between foot crossing & Tunnel Halt. The hedgerow was over 25 feet high and had been choking its self for years. The major 'trees' in the hedge have been removed ready for hedge laying which has brought light into the park and helps dry out the track bed after rain showers. The difference is breath taking. The public continue to break through hedge's for access but once laid this will sort out this problem. The remaining previously cut hedging has gone berserk and is flourishing. There has seen a significant increase in the wild bird population; with over 60 nests in one stretch alone, prior to this work there was been little evidence of nesting. This managed approach seems now to be paying off, leaving only trimming twice a year. That's enough for us.
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| The reinstatement of Foot Crossing | ||||||
At 0800 we all congregated at the railway - Camp Freddie, Simon, Ian, Cyril, Dave, Nick & Myself were due to get this all done today It was the 24th January 2009 - 10 years ago to the day I took membership at the railway, today on my anniversary and exactly a month since Christmas. The lads & I were about to fill in the missing link that would rejoin the new section to the Old line and take us back to the underpass this side of the Mereway shopping center. By about 1000 we had picked up sleepers and placed them on Mabel - Our mobile buffer stop and general purpose vehicle, the train was the taken to the compound station and the main tools were placed on board on Mabel.
The arrival of the 1015 works train at Foot Xing. Laden with materials, tools equipment, the staff mess room (and cook) & Tailed by The Planet Loco. The old line to be connected, now clear of vegetation.
The renewal schedule was to install a new bed of stone, install sleepers, attach rails and make good a pedestrian crossing to allow safe passage across the newly installed section of line. The planned time was about 4-6 hours in which we would have to partially close this park entrance, or stop work whilst park users crossed carefully.
1015 we got to the work site and we started right away, laying the first ballast, placing sleepers and moving rail around the work site, it was a beautiful winter day, the sun out, the frost was thawing and this helped make the job even more enjoyable to do
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None of us like to doing track work, its hard back breaking work, its something we are used to, but not many people would consider shoveling stone, moving steel rails that weigh over a ton by hand something fun to do.
Slowly the jigsaw got completed, at about 1300 we stopped for dinner and congregated in the brake van, that today had been converted in to a mess room, with Chef de partie Ian doing a wonderful spread - a fry up we filled our rolls, drunk a much needed drink and just stopped for 20 minutes.
But like a jigsaw you don't see the full picture until its nearly all done, various users of the crossing stopped and watched us working - it could even have been you reader who helped us move a bag of stone - thanks for that small bit of help friend.
After this short break we walked back to the renewal, with much work done we had to just screw done rails to sleepers fishplate the new rails together, whilst this was being done Nick was fitting up the new pedestrian crossing
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With the majority of the work done some of the team had to leave, but without their help & drive to get this done we would not have finished
It was fast approaching dusk and we were near the end of today's task and ahead of time. once Nick had finished screwing down the crossing we brought the train forward to drop the final sleepers down to make the steps. With half the train across driver Simon took Mabel & the Fowler slowly over foot crossing and for the first time since christmas 2002 we were on the old line up to Mereway. We looked on and smiled, I started to laugh and the four of us felt very good about what we had completed today. With only some remedial work to be carried the following week, a new gate to be installed and the remain of the fencing to finished off this renewal work was almost done
Today's Work party - PIC ES Bill "Camp Freddie" Nile, Simon "Driver" Tasker, Cyril "chief Ganger" Crouch", Ian "chef" Cave, Nick, Kev "Ops " Smith, Ant Piner, "Wild" Bill Adlam and of course Dave Windhaber We are ready now to tackle the sleeper changing up to the end of the line, the year had started with a good start, with the fences being tackled as well we felt at that moment unstoppable, nothing would stop us now. Project top station is now GO ! Text Kev Smith. Pictures Cyril Crouch & Kev Smith |
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