What did they do before 'Bustituton'

I think we are all familiar with replacement bus services at weekends due to engineering works.

In Colin Maggs book on the Bristol - Radstock line he refers to a replacement bus service in the 1950's due to engineering work, but clearly in those days the buses and roads available made a poor substitute for rail in most cases.

So, how did the railways deal with major works? Clearly there was single line working and they worked on lines in a way we would not tolerate today, but can anyone give more details as to how major line closures were dealt with?

 

Another option was single line working.

 

Were there fewer closures? I'm just wondering - if you need to relay a line with CWR, you don;t have much option but to close for an extended period. Whereas with jointed rails, you can replace individual rails and sleepers between trains but basically keep the line open, albeit working at a lower speed.

Just a theory ...

Tom

 

More crossovers and more sidings to let a train pass.
I think operators in the US do this today.

 

Just got on with running a railway.

 

Small typo niggle, I think that the spelling should be - "Bustitution".

Cheers,

Alan

 

I do recall reading of accidents involving removed rails. IIRC Charles Dickens was a passenger on a boat train where the ganger mis-read the timetable of this train which varied with the high tide time and ran through repair works.

No doubt such procedures became safer with absolute block working but as suggested I suspect prolonged closures only came in with welded joints. The closure for the re-gauging of the west of England lines seemed to have been regarded as something exceptional.

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There were also far more ticket route options. I read in an article by a retired BR Ticket Inspector that a Kings Cross - Leeds return would require you to travel North on the ECML, but if necessary, (and only if necessary),you were allowed to divert.
Leeds - Manchester - Wrexham - Paddington was permitted!

 

The footplate reminiscences books seem to talk about a lot of single line working.

 

Apart from more alternative routes on which to divert services, bear in mind that back in the 1950's at least, many trunk routes had minimal services on Sunday, People by and large did not travel on Sunday, unlike today's "seven day" railway. So closing a line on Sunday for essential engineering work was not going to inconvenience all that many travellers.

 

But that's similar to today, surely - if there are major issues tickets will be accepted by unusual routes.

Even on a normal day, a London-Leeds open ticket is valid back to Kings Cross via the ECML, or via Lincoln and/or Cambridge, or to St Pancras.

 

I travelled regularly on Sundays in the 70s and diversions were common as was single line working. In fact half the fun of some journeys was the weird and wonderful diversions. Checked off many a freight only route while travelling on service trains.

 

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Just to show how much flexibility existed ; in 1964 I wanted to travel from Leicester to Edinburgh and I calculated at least 64 different routes which were valid with my return ticket. Not only does that indicate the routeing flexibility but also the ticketing flexibility which no longer exists on the modern network !

 

Not to mention risk assessments, environmental impacts and all of the other 'helpful' hangers on that are associated with any project thesedays.

 

buses were used but usually limited to a couple or three stations. Virtually every station had a crossover road so trains could be turned back either side of works, which made sence. Even in the 80s at Staplehurst in Kent the stopper ran Charring Cross - Staplehurst. Bus to Headcorn. Shuttle train Headcorn - Ashford. Now they close the whole route Tonbridge - Ashford.

There were some modern outfits which got it right, the much missed Wrexham and Shropshire. The direct route via Teford was blocked and buses used. However W&S had other ideas and advertised direct servis to Shrewsbury. How did they do it? We went Wolverhampton - Stafford (pass) Crew (pass) - Wrexham and all stations to Shrewsbury in reverse order.

 

Are you sure this wasn't a all lines rail rover.I think 30 miles down the line at Kettering there was about 4.

 

They even used horse drawn coaches. Did a talk on the former London & Southampton route recently and horse drawn bustitution was used during construction of IIRC the Winchester - Basingstoke section as the bits either side were already running trains,


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