Reminiscipackage

I stumbled across someone else's photostream which contained some Heavenly nostalgia -- this is a British Rail Class 31 waiting at the platform at King's Lynn station in late 1982:


The delightfully amateurish sign says "Passengers for DOWNHAM and LITTLEPORT please use the rear four coaches", then, scribbled underneath in chalk, "& for Magdalen Road".

Class 31s were notoriously underpowered, and it was much more common for a beefy Class 37 to operate King's Lynn--London InterCity services:


That was a down service leaving Ely in 1982; here's a 31 at Liverpool Street the following year:


You can see BR's lovely seats through the coach window, large wings enabling you to curl up in your seat and fall asleep without your head lolling.


I love the 1983-style people in that photo, taken at March, which I mainly included to show the guard's flag in action. The next one is pure Liverpool Street (pre-redevelopment) nostalgia:


This was an absolutely typical sight in the 1970s and 80s -- an InterCity London-King's Lynn service of nine Mk2 coaches (well, one of them would be a Mk1 buffet or restaurant car) belting through the countryside behind a Class 37:


Here a Class 31 waits in 1983 to depart with a Sunday service; this part of Liverpool Street is now a claustrophobic Hell-hole after "air rights" were sold to property developers on this side of the station:


But I just can't resist those 37+Mk2 rakes at speed...


This 31 is at Liverpool Street on one of the long, central platforms -- number 8, which was double-sided:


Here a 37 heaves into Cambridge on its way to London in 1980:


And to finish back where we started, a 31 at King's Lynn, at the end of the line in 1980.


That period -- that livery -- is so evocative for me.

Extraordinary stuff from someone who was obviously a dedicated photographer of trains.