Enjoy a nostalgic steam journey on the Llanfyllin to Oswestry branch in 1965

[editor]

This amateur film positively oozes wonderful period detail. Beautiful stations, well kept track, semaphores a-plenty and a lovely steam train puffing away.

The engines, stations, route, passengers and helpful guards on the Llanfyllin to Oswestry line are recorded on one of the last journeys undertaken before the Beeching axe fell and the line was closed. The stations (not seen on screen in line order) are Llanfyllin, Bryngwyn Halt, Llanfechain, Llansantffraid, Carrechofa Halt, Llanymynech, Llynclys and Oswestry (with an engine on a turntable).

Watch Jan 14 1965 Llanfyllin to Oswestry Branch Line - BFI Player

 

[8ball]

I do wonder whether the nostalgia for this dirty technology is something that will peter out as some generations shuffle away.

 

[existentialist]

This amateur film positively oozes wonderful period detail. Beautiful stations, well kept track, semaphores a-plenty and a lovely steam train puffing away.

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Watch Jan 14 1965 Llanfyllin to Oswestry Branch Line - BFI Player

I bloody love this old stuff.

 

[editor]

I do wonder whether the nostalgia for this dirty technology is something that will peter out as some generations shuffle away.

Oh well done.

The sum contribution of pollution created by all the preserved railway lines in the UK put together is barely a blot compared to all the other shit created by modern lifestyles.
And happily, the preservation movement shows no signs of 'petering out.'

 

[8ball]

I bloody love this old stuff.

Yeah, me too.

Though it's a bloody good thing we've moved on to be fair.

 

[existentialist]

Yeah, me too.

Though it's a bloody good thing we've moved on to be fair.

Well, yes and no. I agree that there needs to be better ways of moving stuff around than burning coal...on the other hand, was scrapping most of the railway network and moving to shifting stuff around by burning oil really such an enormous leap forward?

 

[Mumbles274]

What lovely footage

 

[editor]

Well, yes and no. I agree that there needs to be better ways of moving stuff around than burning coal...on the other hand, was scrapping most of the railway network and moving to shifting stuff around by burning oil really such an enormous leap forward?

There were loads of lines that never, ever should have closed, and the environmental impact of shifting so much freight and passengers on to hugely congested roads has been horrific. Far worse than the occasional tourist steam train puffing about, for example.

 

[8ball]

Well, yes and no. I agree that there needs to be better ways of moving stuff around than burning coal...on the other hand, was scrapping most of the railway network and moving to shifting stuff around by burning oil really such an enormous leap forward?

That's a fair point. I don't know that much about Beeching and all the numerical implications, but shifting everything around in trucks on the road hardly seems like the rational way forward.

 

[kebabking]

It's not just the logistics and pollution, the closing of huge numbers of branch lines and reduction of passenger services had a horrific social and economic impact on small towns and rural society.

For great swathes of the areas i know best - Worcestershire, Herefordshire, Shropshire and Powys - unless you could and can afford a reliable car, and the petrol to do a 40/50/60 mile round trip commute every day then you're stuck. Even the 'big' towns like Builth, Newtown, Llandridnodd Wells, Brecon, and further north to Oswestry, Bala, and east to Tenbury, Ludlow, Leominster and 50 others have had their economies and civil societies eviscerated, but if you're in Craven Arms, or Erwood, or Rhayader, or Llandridnodd, you may as well be on the far side of the moon.

You can either be well enough off to afford a decent car and to fund the Saudi royal family single-handed my, or scrape by on benefits and the occasional low wage service job. There's nothing in between.

Beeching shouldn't just be reversed, but the man should be dug up, tried for treason and his remains hung up in a cage at Tyburn!