please empty your brain below
What an unexpectedly interesting and seemingly well kept place. Have been meaning to go Braintree way for a while and this looks to be a good excuse.

Alfie | 26.07.16 - 7:04 a.m. | #

Another very interesting post,DG. How neat and tidy it all seems to be. Little wonder that someone dug up the road by the station,so that it could be renamed- Slowmo. 😉

Jo W | 26.07.16 - 7:37 a.m. | #

Did you not take a picture of the Pertis machine? :(

Kirk | 26.07.16 - 7:44 a.m. | #

I do love a Modernist house. Thanks for this. Very interesting. You do find some odd places! (By odd I mean unexpected)

AliE17 | 26.07.16 - 8:31 a.m. | #

How nice, after yesterday, to read yet another fresh, interesting, informative and novel travelogue. great photos. Back on form!

David | 26.07.16 - 9:06 a.m. | #

My apologies for this blog's wretched irregularity.

diamond geezer | Homepage | 26.07.16 - 9:09 a.m. | #

I'm not normally one to leave a tenuous comment, but being as there's only a few comments so far . . . I did my motorcycle training in Braintree many years ago, including several passes of Silver End, a fascinating place indeed. Thanks. Your words tempt an afternoon's stroll. The barns certainly sound worthy of a special visit on their own. Off to browse maps.

This all gets me wondering if one day there'll be a dg visit to Adlestrop, I do hope so.

In case there's anybody that doesn't know . . .

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/history/10821831/Adlestrop-a-lost-station-but-words-that-still-beguile.html

Interestingly enough the piece mentions Thomas 'dutifully jotting details of this fleeting non-event into his notebook'

Lorenzo | 26.07.16 - 9:34 a.m. | #

I know it doesn't strictly (well, not even close) border London, but are you going to include Sussex in this series? Chichester's not any farther than the eastern tip of Essex, after all. I can understand not wanting mission creep to include Oxon and Hamps, but the entirety of Sussex isn't any farther than some of the counties that *do* border on London.

Chz | 26.07.16 - 9:39 a.m. | #

Back now.

On browsing OS maps it appears there is a 'Diamond Way' footpath passing Adlestrop. Oh.

http://www.gps-routes.co.uk/routes/home.nsf/osmapdisp?openform&route=north-cotswold-diamond-way-walking-route

Lorenzo | 26.07.16 - 9:53 a.m. | #

I did consider Sussex, as it's sometimes deemed part of the Home Counties. But...

The least used station in West Sussex is Faygate, between Horsham and Crawley, whose surrounding area doesn't look especially interesting, and which has no trains at weekends.

And the least used station in East Sussex is Doleham, in fine walking country north of Hastings, but which has no trains between 8am and 9pm.

So I'm skipping Sussex, sorry.
For now at least.

diamond geezer | Homepage | 26.07.16 - 10:09 a.m. | #

I guess I'll sound stupid, but I can't work out what "slowmo..." originally said.

John Maltby | 26.07.16 - 10:09 a.m. | #

White Notley does sound like a character in a b+w crime caper, it'll have Terry Thomas and Sid James in it.

As befits the era, the rozzers will foil their plan, no doubt because having loaded the car with loot, it then runs out of petrol in front of a Police station.

| 26.07.16 - 10:18 a.m. | #

John Maltby ... obviously SLOWMO is actually two SLOW's, one "upside down" for traffic coming the other way ... then some kind contractor has dug a trench obliterating the SL which hasn't been repainted when they resurfaced

Caz | 26.07.16 - 10:58 a.m. | #

Doleham does look pretty. Pity about the purely parliamentary service. :(

Chz | 26.07.16 - 11:31 a.m. | #

Caz:. Of course! Durh. Thanks.

John Maltby | 26.07.16 - 11:31 a.m. | #

Also on the subject of slightly unusual signs, there's one in the station photos that says: Wait for white light and whistle before proceeding.

GA Annie | 26.07.16 - 11:33 a.m. | #

The least used station in Oxfordshire is almost certainly one of the three on the North Cotswold line (Combe, Finstock, Ascott-under-Wychwood) that gets precisely one train a day (Mon-Fri) in each direction (towards Oxford from Worcester/Malvern in the morning, away from in the evening). Nice countryside around all three places, but hardly practical from London...

Dominic H | 26.07.16 - 11:46 a.m. | #

I passed through Silver End on a trip to see the remains of the WW2 airfield at Rivenhall, not far away. An interesting place, Silver End, worth a visit on its own.
As well as Witham, Crittall's had a factory (long gone) at Sidcup, and there's a roundabout on the A20 which is still referred to as Crittall's Corner. This thought led me to see if there's anywhere in Essex that carries the name. There is: Witham has its own Crittall Road.

RogerW | 26.07.16 - 12:22 p.m. | #

I thought Fishbourne would be a good candidate for least used station in West Sussex.

dg writes: Fishbourne has more than five times as many passengers as Faygate.

Adrian | 26.07.16 - 1:19 p.m. | #

Chz,

Doleham does look pretty. Pity about the purely parliamentary service. :(

It might have been true in the past but it is more a case of being unable to run have more trains call there without messing up the hourly timetable frequency or having appalling stock utilisation. Hence calls tend to be restricted to first and last trains of the day - so more than purely parliamentary.

I strongly suspect the desire is to have all trains call there but it is impractical. The idea of a parliamentary service is there is the desire to have no trains call but one is forced to have at least one train a week call.

Pedantic of Purley | 26.07.16 - 2:05 p.m. | #

Surely there is a station in East Sussex with even fewer passengers than Doleham?
http://lucymelford.blogspot.co.uk/2014/01/the-ghost-train-of-newhaven-marine.html

Odd that the next station up the line from White Notley, which is midway between the villages of Black Notley (pop 2478) and Cressing (pop 1610) is named after the latter. (And Cressing Barns are, as you have noted, closer to White Notley)

@GA Annie
"Wait for white light and whistle before proceeding" is not that uncommon - it is used at automatic crossings and is an instruction to the train driver. The white light is linked to the lights facing the road traffic, and indicates to the train driver that they are flashing and thus that traffic should have stopped. There should really be a comma after "light", as it is the driver who is supposed to whistle (term still used although modern trains have horns instead of steam whistles)

timbo | 26.07.16 - 2:25 p.m. | #

There is no strict definition of a "parliamentary" service in the modern sense - the Victorian equivalent was a train complying with an actual Act of Parliament requiring all railways to run at least one all-stations train a day charging no more than 1d a mile.

A particular sparsely served station or line may be kept open simply because it's too much bother to close it (usually referred to as a parliamentary service, although it is the government, rather than parliament, which would have to authorise any closure).

Or it may be a useful diversionary route and running the odd train keeps the drivers' route knowledge up to date (see Battersea Park Overground).

Or there may be odd workings at the beginning and end of the traffic day to get trains into position, and they may as well run in service (Watford North Curve)

Or the operator would dearly love to run a more frequent service but cannot because of operational constraints (Doleham, possibly).

timbo | 26.07.16 - 2:59 p.m. | #

"Wait for white light and whistle before proceeding"

You could argue it the other way, so even if if the light has changed, the driver should wait until they have heard the whistle, then proceed.

Luckily the likelihood of the sign and a train driver who is Autistic or has Asperger's encountering each other are low.

| 26.07.16 - 3:03 p.m. | #

There are many ambiguous English phrases based on uncertainty as to whether one of the words is to be taken as a verb or a noun. A famous one (not strictly ambiguous, but requiring backtracking to interpret) is "fruit flies like a banana".

But a train driver (whatever their syndrome) would not misunderstand this one simply because of familiarity, and the frequent observations when learning of how experienced drivers read it.

Great article, by the way, and very nice pictures. Whenever I see the signs on the A12 for Rivenhall and Silver End it makes me think of Tolkein.

Malcolm | 26.07.16 - 3:52 p.m. | #

Good thing you;re drawing the line at the counties bordering London; Cambridgeshire's Shippea Hill would be a particular struggle.

Al__S | 26.07.16 - 7:02 p.m. | #

Thanks for this post and also for yesterday's. I enjoyed these both immensely. Keep us all on the hop.

Herbof | 26.07.16 - 8:37 p.m. | #

@timbo: The third interpretation of the sign (the one that occurred to me) is that the driver should whistle a merry tune whilst waiting for the white light! (I should have described the sign as ‘ambiguous’ rather than ‘slightly unusual’.) I was glad of your info as to how automatic crossings work, as I was a bit hazy on the details.

GA Annie | 27.07.16 - 7:04 a.m. | #

I'm wondering what station DG is going to cover for Surrey. I think Dorking West crops up as the least used in the figures but it isn't really. It's because Dorking, Dorking Deepdene and Dorking West are all grouped as "Dorking Stations". Counting tickets issued to individual stations can be worked out from the route but since Dorking Deepdene and Dorking West are on the same line they can't work out how many tickets should be assigned to either so they go for Dorking Deepdene because it is nearer the town centre and main station. So I think the only users counted to Dorking West are those travelling there from another Dorking station (so not issued with a ticket to "Dorking Stations" because you can't buy a ticket from and to the same station). Hence the count is small, but the usage isn't that small. I suspect the least used station in practice is Longcross (an interesting place to explore, it has no public road to it) or perhaps one of the stops between Dorking and Horsham.

Jon Combe | 27.07.16 - 1:40 p.m. | #

The official statistics are available online.

Kent - not saying, as I expect DG will cover it, but I think DG must have been through it in 2011, and was in the general area as recently as April this year.
Surrey: Dorking West is actually busier than three other stations on the Guildford/Redhill line, as well as the two between Dorking and Horsham. None of them is the wooden spoon holder.

@Dominic H
Those three stations are indeed the quietest in Oxfordshire - fourth place goes to another station on the same line.

timbo | 27.07.16 - 4:29 p.m. | #











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