Connington-Holme s/boxes (including the Ramsey branch).

[Mickey]

Here's one, some of you will remember this nodoubt but up to about 1973/4? at Holme (south of Peterborough) on the main line there use to be a single line branch leave/join the main line nearly outside Holme s/box/level crossing that went to Ramsey North. Well the home signal that brought a train off the branch onto the main line was right up to about 1973/4 a 'somersault signal' also i think that Holmes distant signal (for the somersault home signal) and could be seen from a speeding train when looking at the branch when passing Holme was also a somersault. Holme s/box was a 'good looking' box one of the sort that had arched windows in the tops of the window frames just like Arlesey, Biggleswade south, Sandy & Huntingdon north No2 s/boxes had so what did BR go and do?. Closed the 'historically and nice looking' Holme s/box and replace it with some 'cube' like small building placed on top of a 'portacabin' that they ended up closing just a few short years later?. Just like what they were to do with Hornsey up goods, Everton & Tallington s/boxes why BR?. As for the Ramsey branch apart from where it left the main line at Holme s/box/level crossing i don't really know that much else about it save for along time after it lost it's passenger service (early 50s?) it was a freight only branch for along time i believe?. Micky

[hq1hitchin]

Travelled over it on the trip from New England one morning once, that would be about 1970. Motive power was a 350, which would have been awkward to find a margin for over Stilton Fen even then, almost impossible nowadays. We had a load of vanfits for Ramsey, came back engine and brake. Can't remember too much more about it, to be honest, except that the branch seemed to run dead straight, the blackness of the soil in the surrounding fields and that some buildings had survived at Ramsey.
On a slightly different topic, was marooned at Connington one afternoon after doing a wagons check when the afternoon trip, which should have been my ride back to the outside world, was cancelled. What a prospect - stuck in the wilderness and a choice of walking to either Huntingdon or P'boro! Set off fatalistically towards Huntingdon, wondering if I would ever see my loved ones again, when I chanced across the patrolman and explained my predicament to him. They say that p.way men are generally kind hearted, and so it proved, as he told me that the District Engineer was inspecting a section of track about a half mile further south. That man had a car and happily gave me a lift to Peterborough. Saved again....

[R. pike]

Here are a couple of shots from Alan Moore's most excellent site..

http://alanmoore353.blokes.org.uk/p55612567.html
http://alanmoore353.blokes.org.uk/p49330285.html

The line was a real late survivor only just not making it onto Peterborough panel..

http://richard2890.fotopic.net/p54340789.html

[manna]

G'Day Gents
Always remember Holme, and the branch curving off to the right (if you were on a down train) a lot harder to see on a up train, tried to make a model of it a couple of years ago, would have been a good one IF I had had a bit more room
manna

[Mickey]

Deleted

[Andy W]

The "Network Change" advice for the removal of the connections into Connington flew onto my desk last week. Another piece of the GN goes.

Don't know when it was last used - it's been that many years since I've seen any wagons in there.

O the subject of the Ramsey branch, Google Earth shows that the formation is remarkably intact - where it has been included into nearby fields, the alignment is clearly visible from the air.