please empty your brain below
Mentally listing the stations along the Northern and Victoria lines - or trying to - has long been a strategy I've used when trying to fall asleep.

Alan | 23.01.22 - 7:45 a.m. | #

I think for intercity trains there were instructions for trains drivers if an animal was on the track and it depended on the size of the animal. No emergency braking for say a starling, but emergency braking for a goose. Naturally cats and dogs were cases for emergency braking.

Andrew | Homepage | 23.01.22 - 8:28 a.m. | #

I assume the Crossrail Rule Book has been published on the public TfL website rather than a company intranet to save the bother of having to deal with the inevitable FOI requests.

Andrew S | 23.01.22 - 10:04 a.m. | #

Tops of the rails under 7" of snow
allows 'normal running'?!!!??!!?

Joho | Homepage | 23.01.22 - 10:07 a.m. | #

A local undertaker has black and white striped traffic cones for reserving parking space for a cortege.

Martin'O'Holcombe | 23.01.22 - 10:14 a.m. | #

A vintage example of Diamond Geezeresque randomness today.

cau1khead | 23.01.22 - 10:19 a.m. | #

Fascinating collection of things I didn't know I needed to know until today!

Cornish Cockney | 23.01.22 - 10:45 a.m. | #

I don't understand how traffic cones did not warrant a full article in your estimation - your 100 words has only left me wanting more. I've not seen yellow, green or blue traffic cones, how recent is this?

Caroline | 23.01.22 - 12:17 p.m. | #

Eclectic and altogether fascinating. DG at his best. Nicely done Sir!

Stuart R | 23.01.22 - 12:31 p.m. | #

Black and white undertaker cones also spotted in Braintree recently. Maybe they are a thing.

Rob | 23.01.22 - 2:31 p.m. | #

A major preserve of traffic cones exists at the Epping interchange of M11/M25. Here many, many hundreds of them are permanently installed (less than 9m apart) to prevent the junction being used as a roundabout. Without the cones, excessive merging and weaving could occur, being only of benefit to traffic wanting to make U turns, but the resulting junction is extremely complex with sharp bends and very many bridges.

kev | 23.01.22 - 3:31 p.m. | #

Re the Surrey Waterfall. You can park just by Westcott church and then walk on the path to Friday Street. The wife and I did it one year and had a nice bevy at the pub there, which I think was called the Stephen Langton, don't know if that is still open. Oh dear. Just read it's permanently closed :-(

Marmaduke Jinks | 23.01.22 - 6:03 p.m. | #

Great stuff, particularly the cones.

Kevin | 23.01.22 - 6:24 p.m. | #

The London And The South East map is almost impossible to find in central termini now, either on a wall or in handout form. It's like it's been deprecated, but I don't know why. You can still get the old green folder in Victoria, and there is one poster hidden away in the taxi rank at Paddington.

Tangential Moan | 23.01.22 - 7:10 p.m. | #

Never seen those alternative traffic cones either!

The chances of seeing a cow on the Crossrail tracks are pretty remote you'd imagine, I'm trying to recollect whether the Reading and Shenfield branches pass any farms with cattle, and on the flat so that they could theoretically wander onto the tracks.

Mikey C | 23.01.22 - 11:09 p.m. | #

So “The UK Highways Agency along with others within the industry devised a coloured traffic cone system” that is illegal to use on UK highways?

dg writes: obviously not.

Rich G | Homepage | 23.01.22 - 11:21 p.m. | #

Comment count...

Crossrail drivers' rules: 4
Waterfalls: 1
Prime Ministers: 0
Audio maps: 1
National Trust houses: 0
Traffic cones: 6

"I see you've written about maps": 1

Effusive appreciation: 4

diamond geezer | Homepage | 24.01.22 - 12:46 p.m. | #

Well now I feel obliged to speculate on whether our dearly beloved PM has been commandeering Carlyle's or Eastbury Manor Houses for any important work meetings lately, hence rendering their opening dates uncertain.

Also, yay maps!

Will | 28.01.22 - 10:34 a.m. | #

I'm fairly sure that Tillingbourne waterfall is artificial and built in the 18th century by a landscape gardener. Indeed when I last walked past in May 2021 no water was coming out. I have since read that this was to discourage visitors during Covid. I don't see the point of that because people will still turn up and only then discover that it is not working.

David | 29.01.22 - 9:32 a.m. | #











TridentScan v2.10.0 | Privacy Policy