Summer is over, it's official

Week Ending 29 August 

Another 'Bitty' week, still nothing to get our teeth into. 

Monday 26 Aug 

The early week team of Dave and Nigel were in action at Royal Oak again, this time it was clearing the vegetation along the crest drain. It's going to be excavated at some stage to replace the stone layer on top of the pipe to improve the interceptor qualities of the drain. The water coming off the fields needs to be diverted away from the cutting slope, the crest drain should be doing this but neglect has allowed the stone to become clogged with earth and the water just shoots over the top. 

They started with the new drain from the crest down to the cess on the down side.

First batch of photos from Dave. 

Nigel out finding chambers 

A bit of silt build up 

New plastic pipe runs into the cess chamber 

A bit more silt building up in here 

Crest Chamber on the site of the 2016 land slip 

Nothing running in from the land drains 

Nigel stops to sign autographs for the fans 

A couple of investigative holes were 
dug to check on the pipe 

SGW Pipe looks to be sound 

Monday was the best day to be out and about weather wise, the rest of the week wasn't as pleasant. 

Looking back along the crest 
Malvern Hills in the distance 

Rush to get the crop in before the forecast storms 

Thursday 27 August 

Team Thursday (Andrew and Martin) had another day at Royal Oak, this time they had a change from vegetation clearance by doing a bit of shovelling and block removal. It's about making a start on the temporary improvement of the down side cess by removing every 5th horizontal block. This opens the way way for the ground to drain into the the cess pipe. Plans are underway to find a suitable way of filling the voids created, otherwise things like people will fall into them. More importantly they will fill with silt and cause more problems. 

Report and photos from Andrew. 

Down side crest to cess chamber cleared 

Not much of sump in this one 

Cess chamber cleared, it didn't look that much from the top 

The end of the cess drain is suffering a bit from limescale build up, it may look like a lava flow, but it's solid. 

Chamber between the cess and Culvert 24A

The line of removed blocks in the down side cess 

Rain stopped play after lunch, it started to hammer down so sensibly the team abandoned work for the day. 

Friday 28 August 

The rain was still coming down, so it was another short day. It did bring a change of scene though. The mission today to was discovering how the Winchcombe Cutting crest drain gets to the stream at the down side edge of Winchcombe Yard. The highways authority are planning to replace the deck on the bridge at Winchcombe Station, hence we need to know where our pipes are. 

Our Structures Engineer arranged for access to the old Station House garden so that we could have look in a chamber in the corner. 

Roger and John looking for the chamber 

Bridge rail lid on the chamber 

Par for the course today, going good to soft 

Checking where the road gully drains to see where 
the water runs 

The gullies along Greet Road run into a chamber that has an opening broken into it from the field on the tunnel side of the road. from there the water runs over into the chamber in the Station House garden. 

Surface water form the road gushing in 

Dye test in the Station House garden 

On the cutting crest the last chamber before the bridge was opened to run some dye down to prove the flow route 

Water flowing in form the ditch in the field 

Air bag used to bung up the flow down to the cess 

Bio-degradable marker dye 

Dye from the crest running through to the house chamber 

Roger tried tracing the pipe with the divining rods, but a water main runs along the road over the bridge which tends to interfere with the process 

Looking for the drain run 

Cast marker plate in the footpath above the drain chamber 

Next step will be to run the sonde through from the garden in each direction to get a better bearing on the pipe. 

Is there more excitement in store for the week ahead, we'll have to wait and see. 

Is this the New Normal

Week Ending Saturday 22 August 

Another belated report, but time flies when you are having fun and we've been having fun, at least that's what management tell us 😀   

Monday 17 August 

Dave and Nigel tootled off to Royal Oak to continue the battle against nature. The weeds have taken hold in a serious way (as we may have mentioned before). They kicked off on Culvert 24C clearing the outlet ditch. 

Photos from Dave 

Culvert 24C Up Side outlet ditch before 

24C outlet after clearing 

Toe drain into 24C cleared 

Culvert 24C runs under the adjoining land and reappears as a stream in the next field. There's a makeshift grille on the end of the pipe that needs to be renewed at some stage. The cancelled work plan for this year included building a silt trap and proper headwall and wing walls here that would allow regular maintenance. Currently the silt is so soft you can sink to the knees if you step in the wrong place.  

Culvert 24C down side outlet 

Next sto was up to look at the down side cess, starting at the high mileage portal of Greet Tunnel, or Bridge 24 as it's better known 😆

Dave flagged up a potential job for the Heritage Group, the sign is getting a bit moth eaten, should it be replaced with a cast iron one? 

Greet Tunnel sign 

Down side corner cleared 

Down side cess cleared 

The cess is being cleared as the drain isn't working to maximum efficiency, regular readers may be aware that we were working on this back in March. The upgrade in 1949 had the effect of stopping water getting in to the drain. Some new ideas for fixing the issue are being investigated. 

Looking along the down side cess 

Thursday 20 August  

Andrew and Martin got to do something completely different today, a change is as good as day off so they say 😕 Responding to a request from our friends in the Steam Loco Department they shot off with the USS Enterprise and the tipper to collect pallets for the lighter uperers. They headed off to Royal Oak after unloading to do a bit more clearance along the down side cess. 

A few photos from Andrew. 

Raiding the building site to collect pallets 

Culvert 24A down side, dry 

Royal Oak down side cess 

Looking over the line to Dixton Hill 

Friday 21 August 

The Friday gang were a no show today, domestic commitments getting in the way again as well as the forecast Storm Ellen roaring through. That said it did give time to sort out the report from the work up at Peasebrook Farm. 

Over the last few weeks there's been several trips up to Peasebrook to clear big chunks of embankment and measure it for signs of movement. After all the hard work, the measures get plotted and a report is submitted to the Civil Engineer for assessment. 

The team did a marvellous job getting the embankment exposed in the hottest part of the year in full PPE doing the brushcutting. They deserve a well done. 

The output charts showing the slope profile look like this... 

These are combined with images taken and map data from the internet to provide the picture of the area that underpins the decision making 

Peasebrook Farm - Bridge 4 looking north 

1m LIDAR DTM Imagery* 

* Extracted from the Environment Agency LIDAR (Laser imaging, detection, and ranging) Digital Terrain Model (DTM) 

That's it for this week, the length of the report belies the amount of effort expended 😞 

Back to Culverts almost

Monday 10 August 

Dave and Nigel were on Examination Escort today, they were in charge of some consulting engineers who were doing detailed examinations of Culverts 15A and 16C at Didbrook. While they were at loose end when the engineers poked around the culverts, they nipped down to Hayles Abbey Halt and did some grass cutting to help out the Friends of HAH. After that they threw in the towel, it was far too hot for wielding a brushcutter. 

Photos from Dave... 

The engineer's Roadies unload the kit 

CCTV camera into Culvert 15A

A byproduct of our numbering system is that when we find a new culvert, the signs on the older ones becomes confusing. After Culvert 16A was numbered, we found 2 further culverts nearer to Bridge 16, one became 16X for a while then the system was rationalised and 16A became 16C. We haven't got round to moving the signs or getting new signs made yet. 

Do I really believe this 😕

Down at Hayles Abbey Halt the heat was building up. 

Access ramp after the edge was cut 

Edge of the platform neatly trimmed 

Trains are unlikely to stop at Hayles for a good while, but it's good to keep on top of the vegetation. 

Tuesday 11 August 

Quick trip in to drop the Engineers at Culvert 30A Middle Stanley to do the last of the Detailed Examinations for this round. After that a run up to Royal Oak to see what needs doing before we can start work up there. Some positive vibes emanating from up on high about funds being available for the higher priority works. 

Culvert 30A is fed from a small stream that runs down through Stanley Pontlarge. There's some building works going on there and it seems they have been stirring up the silt. 

Culvert 30A inlet stream 

Culvert 30A up side (outlet) headwall, needs rebuilding again 

Culvert 30 down side headwall, a bit of crack in it 

The vegetation has run wild this year, it's been a terrific growing season, not that we wanted it to be. 

Working Lane Access Road 

Culvert 24A, Royal Oak, all our materials hidden  

Culvert 24A down side, Martin trimmed it back last week 

We've got a new addition to Culvert 24B on the down side, it's not one we installed. Another issue to sort out 😒😒

Pipe entering under the fence, Culvert 24B down side  

Royal Oak, down side cess drain 

Thursday 13 August 

Andrew and Martin went back to Royal Oak to start clearing more of the vegetation so we can see where we are. The flail took a bit of a pasting today and one of the control cables gave up the ghost. That's going to slow things down until another can be sourced. 

Photos from Andrew... 

Culvert 24B up side headwall 

Culvert 24B up side, ditch 

Martin flailing the access route 

Culvert 24A up side stores exposed 

Friday 14 August 

The plan was to carry on at Royal Oak today, but there was another reallocation of resources, a late signal from Star Fleet Command on Thursday with a new tasking for the day. Following some extreme weather events, or thunder storms as used to call them, Spock and Bones were dispatched on an end to end check of all the earthworks. No helicopter, drone or teleportation to make it easier, only the more reliable Transit-portation. The phrase 'I don't like it Jim it's too quiet' was bandied about as we found no visible signs of flooding. 

Broadway north sidings 

Broadway Station 

Pry Lane to Peasebrook 

First treasure trove of the day 
A loco crew flat cap - it's in the skip now 

Peasebrook, cows lying down, a sign of rain 🌧️

Peasebrook Farm 

Laverton, Bridge 6, dry as a stick 

Bridge 6 low mileage abutment, first time it's been dry 

At Laverton we spotted some ears of wheat in ballast, they didn't blow up here from the field, so how did they get here? 

Wheat in the ballast? 

Wheat mystery solved, the crow infestation 

Looking south to Bridges 7 and 8 at Stanton 

The overgrown vegetation is causing the Transit to overheat a bit, the radiator is filling with seeds where we've driven down the access track 

Patent Transit seed catcher 

Bridge 7 towards Laverton 

Bridge 10 to Stanway Viaduct 

Even our hard standing at Stanton has been claimed by weeds...  

Stanton welfare cabin park 

Culvert 11A down side 

Culvert 11A up side 

Culvert 11B at Stanton, pipes waiting to be installed 

Stanway Viaduct 

Stanway Viaduct down side 

Toddington Station, carriage maintenance gang at work 

Toddington North Cutting slip area safe 

Toddington Yard new lamp post with Peak 45149 

Didbrook 

Chicken Curve 

River Isbourne - Culvert 21A up side 

Winchcombe Cutting slip site 

Royal Oak to Greet Tunnel 

Gretton Bridge 15 

Gretton - more seed harvesting 

Gretton to Stanley Pontlarge 

Bridge 19, Stanley Pontlarge, Roger's secret code on 
flail damaged end coping 

Prescott Road, Culvert 31B up side 

Dixton Cutting towards Bridge 33

Tirle Brook, Culvert 32A, Dixton 

On a close inspection of the upstream end of Culvert 32A, Tirle Brook, a bit of rail was spotted, it's sitting vertically under the tree root that extended over the stream (centre of the image below). It's possible that there may have been a bridge here at some time, the amount of timbers in the stream could be too much for just a fence. 

Tirle Brook, Culvert 32A 

Culvert 32A downstream, still no signs of flooding 

Gotherington Yard to Bridge 33 

Bridge 34, Gotherington Skew 

Manor Lane round to Bishops Cleeve 

Bridge 37 Slip Repair Gotherington 

Top of the 10m piles
Bridge 37 slip repair 

Pecked Lane, Bishops Cleeve 

Culvert 39A Pecked Lane 
Bishops Cleeve, no flooding 

Two Hedges Road Bridge 

Southam Lane, Bridge 42  

Southam Lane to Cheltenham Racecourse Station 
End of the line for Today 

That's it for another week, rather a long report, but we have rather a lot of line. Passenger trains started running again on Saturday 15th after a 5 month gap. Things look to be on the up again.