Rother Valley Railway

Thats quite a bad slip developed on the NR headshunt. Does anyone know if the plan is for full reinstatement of the embankment and siding, or is it just stabilisation work?

 

The N rail embankment stabilisation works will include enabling the recommissioning of the long headshunt siding to its full length of over 200 metres. That siding was completely relayed some years ago with concrete sleepers & flat bottom rail as part of the electrification of the Tonbridge - Hastings line and is in otherwise generally excellent order. The side benefit from that work will be enabling full length ballast, spoil and other materials trains to gain access off NR metals onto RVR to assist in track laying over the missing link. Mike Hart

 

Thanks Mike. Good to hear, and much appreciated.

 

While full length trains could be stabled in the head shunt, surely they would still need to be shunted onto RVR in smaller portions, due to the length of the siding behind the platform?

 

I would imagine so that a full-length ballast train could be left in the siding away from the mainline, then split, and moved onto the RVR each movement will not affect the movement of trains through the NR station,

 

Spot on! In two halves. Mike

 

Is Robertsbridge Junction open to visitors next Sunday? I'd like to pop along and have a look around if possible. Is there a cafe/buffet?

 

I was intrigued by this news. I wonder if the bank reinforcements will permit the headshunt to be returned to its full length, thereby adding greater capacity for stock being moved onto the RVR?

 

Yes, the station s open on Sundays - but no refreshments currently on site - the Ostrich Hotel just over the road is good but you would need to book as its Sunday lunch day!

 

Yes - see my post number 2742 above

 

You're assuming that the former landowner was responsible for or somehow complicit in causing the damage. Unless that can be proved, your rather gleeful post supposing that this might cost them a lot of money seems in rather poor taste. (And even if it can be proved, I doubt we will hear about it here.)
And, presumably, they are still the railway's nextdoor neighbour.

 

Considering that it is private land, who else is it going to be? The tooth fairy?

 

Given that there were sections of metal taken, could be as simple as thievery. Not saying it was, it just could have been.

Anyway, none of this helps the cause of the RVR, so could we please stow the speculation? What's done is done. Let's move forward.

 

Can we please leave this unfortunate issue alone? May I respectfully suggest that it is not a matter for discussion outside the parties that are directly involved. We have everything in hand. Thank you. Mike Hart

 

The other day, someone left fliers (seeking a parking place to rent) on the windscreen of two of my vehicles, which were parked on my land behind my house at the bottom of my garden in a residential street, in a clearly fenced off private parking area only accessible by going down a private alleyway between houses and around the back. Unless you'd gone snooping around you wouldn't even know the cars were there. But it's fully visible from our back windows, if we'd been looking out, and the neighbours have CCTV over the alleyway. With people that brazen about, I absolutely don't believe you can reasonably expect the owner of an overgrown bit of trackbed in the countryside to be fully aware of who may be trespassing on it, no.

You or I may have theories about what may have happened, but nothing will ever be provable so these theories are no more than pub talk and should remain so. Wishing someone most of us (me included) don't know financial penalty, against that background, was what irked me. As a society we are very quick to judge others based on our perception of their actions, rather than the facts.

 

There is a post today on the Robertsbridge Facebook Page from one of the landowners accusing RVR of failure to meet RDC's planning conditions.

 

Of course !

 

Very much the same i dare say as previous complaints that in the end were found to have been baseless, So what RDC planning conditions have not been met?
I would be very surprised if the RVR had not complied fully with all conditions as set out, they are a very professional outfit, who would know exactly the planning requirements, and would have abided by them, it's of course possible that agreement might have been reached with RDC, and RVR, to modify timespans etc, to take into account ground conditions, and unexpected additional work.

 

They are environmental conditions - I am absolutely sure that the accusations are without foundation. I just wonder what has happened which has lead to the posting.

 

I have a very good idea, but mike has asked that we not add more fuel to the fire, but I would assume its to do with recent happenings,