News from the East Anglian Branch of Railfuture, Edited by Martin Thorne and Jerry Alderson.
Railfuture News Snippets 265 - 31/05/2015
At the Railfuture AGM in Blackpool on 16th May two new vice presidents were appointed. They are Lorna Slade, the editor of Rail Professional magazine, and Paul Abell, the editor of Today's Railway. The full list of Railfuture vice presidents can be found HERE. Ms Slade wrote the following biography for Railfuture: "I have been a writer and editor for thirty years. During that time I have won a national award for my work in internal communications for a global blue-chip, written speeches for the Group chairman of a global bank, and worked as a reporter on The Observer. After a short stint at Network Rail in 2012 editing its employee magazine, Aspects, I moved on to edit Rail Professional, the business magazine for TOC managers. I have a particular interest in accessibility."
The start of the summer timetable on 17th May saw a minor improvement to services on the Abellio rural lines. Extra Sunday trains have been introduced on the London-Norwich line, whilst the Norwich-Lowestoft line has an hourly service (rather than two hourly) until 27th September, along with one extra train on the East Suffolk Line. There will also be an extra Ipswich-Felixstowe and Ipswich-Peterborough train until 6th September. The additional services have been introduced because of the growing demand for rail travel.
The platform at Needham Market station has been renewed. Normally this would not be worth reporting but the old concrete platform has been replaced with a composite fibreglass Dura Platform, and is apparently the first station in the world where it has been used. A unique feature with the Dura Platform is the ability to heat it in winter to melt snow and ice.
On Wednesday 13th May a Network Rail test train visited the short Griffin Wharf freight-only branch just south of Ipswich, which is rarely used.
Peter Fry, Public Affairs Manager of HS2 Ltd will be speaking to the Institute of Mechanical Engineers about HS2 in Cambridge on Wednesday 10th June between 19:00 and 21:00 with refreshments served from 18:30. It is free to attend and booking is not required. The venue is the Institute of Manufacturing, Alan Reece Building, 17 Charles Babbage Road, Cambridge, CB3 0FS.
Railfuture East Anglia Branch News Snippets 265 - 31/05/2015
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