This is the heart of the Rail Blue era, when heavy machines like that Brush Type 4 (a Class 47), above, or the English Electric Type 3 (a Class 37), below, dominated the system.
There were more than 800 examples of those two types alone.
And there were more than 600 of these -- Metro-Cammell Class 101s:
For me it was always faintly disappointing to be confronted with a diesel multiple unit rather than a "proper" locomotive-hauled train, but on some parts of the network you only ever saw things like this:
That was a Class 308 (I think -- they're difficult to tell apart) electric multiple unit. I have nothing else to add about that.
Whereas this was the scene at the station throat at Norwich Thorpe, a brutish Class 47 arriving on an InterCity service, about to roll past a waiting Class 31:
But let's finish with a fine portrait of my favourite, the Class 37:
A hugely successful mixed-traffic design, these English Electric machines were equally at home on heavy freight or secondary express passenger services. I love their purposeful looks.
3 comments:
I love the tiddly bits of "First Class" on those multiple units, not much for your money apart from that wonderful view ahead if the driver was in kindly mood and didn't lower the screen - but you never could be sure that First would be at the front!
The chairs were also vastly better -- proper, shaped railway chairs, rather than the cheap bus-like bench seats in 2nd class, mostly arranged in the dreaded "airline-style" (what did we call that back then?).
I was told only yesterday that in Poland some brand new trains even have proper compartments and a side corridor: lucky them not to have had our political harridans ever ready to scream "Rape!" During and after WW2 there were eight-a-side carriages reserved for "Ladies Only" in UK
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