Catching the early morning 'milk trains'

[Puddy_Tat]

A little bit more digging has suggested that some overnight trains were mix of travelling post office and passenger carriages (although presume you couldn't get through from one bit to the other)

and also that newspaper trains had travelling workers to sort papers on the move (less well known than the travelling post offices, but suppose it makes sense - one van would deliver a pile of mirror group papers, another a pile of express group and so on, so it was either sort them on the move or have to sort it all out at london terminus stations) so there was usually a standard passenger carriage or two in the train so they had access to a bog.



is an afternoon working of a newspaper train going back empty to paddington, and the second carriage has passenger compartments

 

[BusLanes]

Not quite the same thing but I remember taking a non timetables train on a suburban line to Victoria early one Saturday. Missed my planned train and the platform guard said to wait for it as it took staff in and there was no harm in me getting it

 

[Bus Honeygun]

I never did them myself, but mates of mine used to do the overnight trains out of Victoria and London Bridge in the 80s that were essentially newspaper and parcel trains with a coach for passengers - the delights of the 03.00 to Ramsgate and the like - and told some stories. The stock was apparently rarely cleaned, so you'd get in a compartment and find the same remnants of a Kentucky Fried Chicken that were there the previous week. That's on top of having to share the compartment with pissed-up sailors heading back to Chatham.

 

[planetgeli]

They had to stop them when rush hour became too much at Heifer Hever, Kent.

 

[Puddy_Tat]

not to be confused with

 

[Bahnhof Strasse]

They had to stop them when rush hour became too much at Heifer Hever, Kent.

View attachment 451558

Mooove along down the platform please, mooove along.

 

[davesgcr]

Not quite the same thing but I remember taking a non timetables train on a suburban line to Victoria early one Saturday. Missed my planned train and the platform guard said to wait for it as it took staff in and there was no harm in me getting it

Never a problem with passengers getting a staff train , subject to obvious caveats ........