Diesel Driving Experience courses (posted 28th January 2004)

The GWR’s programme of “Diesel Driving Experience” courses for 2004 commences in March. These courses are regarded as among the best of their type in the UK, with two different length courses and seven locomotives to choose from. There are still places available, but these courses are very popular, and we expect them to fill up fast. Click here to read the official press release. To view details of our Diesel Driving Experience courses, click here.

Festival race trains filling up fast (posted 24th January 2004)

Bookings for the special trains from Toddington to the Cheltenham Festival, 16th to 18th March 2004, are coming in thick and fast. Organised by specialist racing event management company Racing Tours, over two-thirds of the packages are now sold out.

Tickets are now only available for the Champion Hurdle on Tuesday and the Champion Chase on Wednesday. Bookings for the remaining tickets can only be made through Racing Tours (not through the GWR). For more information about Racing Tours click here or make your booking direct via the Racing Tours website.

Apart from train travel to and from Toddington, the Racing Tours package includes entry badge, full on-course entertainment and tote in a private facility on the Champions Drive, as well as talks by top jockeys Richard Johnson and Warren Marston.

Racing Tours has provided invaluable support for the GWR. It helped complete the new platform-level station building at Cheltenham Racecourse station while it is also assisting with construction of a new signal-box there. New signalling will allow more trains to use the station - particularly on race days.

GWR Photographic Competition 2003 (posted 21st January 2004)

The judging of the entries for the Gloucestershire Warwickshire Railway Photographic Competition 2003 has recently been completed. The winning entries, which were of a high standard, are as follows:

Print
Winner: Chris Cole from Eldersfield, “Elbow Grease & Brasso”
Runner-up: David Lewis from Thornbury, “Raveningham Hall in Greet Cutting”

Slide
Winner: David Locke from Stratford-upon-Avon, “1450 at night, Toddington”
Runner-up: John Burrows from Worcester, “6412 on Santa Special duty at Hailes”

Chris also wins the COLAB trophy for the best overall photograph. His winning picture was featured on the cover of ’The Cornishman’ issue No.87. The Cornishman is the quarterly magazine for members of the GWR - you can find out more by clicking here. Copies are on sale in the GWR's shop at Toddington Station. The other winning photos will feature, in colour, in issue No.88.

Diesels: attracting a growing following (posted 20th January 2004)

When was the last time you saw a passenger train on the main line being hauled by a diesel locomotive? Stop to think about it and you’ll realise that nowadays, almost all are diesel or electric ‘multiple units’ and high-speed trains. The concept of a set of carriages with a locomotive at the front, which has served the railways well for nearly two centuries, is almost a thing of the past.

But the days of diesel traction typical of the post-steam era can be savoured once again on the GWR - and the railway’s diesel days seem to be attracting a growing following.

The last ‘diesel day’ of 2003 took place on 29th December when over 500 people (20 per cent more than the same event in 2002) visited the line to enjoy a wide variety of motive power drawn from the GWR’s large resident fleet of ex-main-line diesels.

Plans are now well under way for the GWR’s first event of 2004: the Spring diesel gala from 12th to 14th March. Once again, variety is the name of the game with seven diesel locomotives expected to be operating. To find out more, click here. For train times on these days see our timetable.

GWR engineering blockade begins (posted 8th January 2004)

Hardly had the last train of the season returned to Toddington during the evening of 1st January 2004 when work started on replacing the ‘Defford Straight’ - a section of track between Toddington and Winchcombe laid over 20 years ago.

This section of track is named after RAF Defford in Worcestershire from where it came during the Gloucestershire Warwickshire Railway’s pioneering days. In all, 52 track ‘panels’ each 60ft long, are being replaced and, as at today’s date (8th January) much of it had already been removed. The trackbed is now reminiscent of the scene after British Railways lifted the line in 1979 (photograph copyright Andy Manley).

The track being replaced has ‘75lb rail’ – this is its weight per yard – and is typical of the track used in military railway networks. Replacing it will be modern 113lb flat-bottom rail on low -maintenance concrete sleepers, similar to that used on the national network and now on most of the GWR. This work will continue over the next two months. After ballasting and tamping, the current 10mph speed restriction which has been in place for safety reasons for some months will be removed, much to the relief of the GWR’s footplate crews!

The old 75lb rail will see further use, however. It has been sold to the 2ft-gauge Vale of Rheidol railway which runs from Aberystwyth to Devils Bridge in Wales.

This vital engineering work will be completed by early March in time for the first services of the 2004 season, starting with the heritage diesel gala on 12th, 13th and 14th of March. The Cheltenham Festival race trains run during the following week and normal steam services begin on the 20th of March. Click here for our 2004 timetable.

Find out what are panels, ballast and tamping are in our ‘jargon buster’ of railway terms.

Want to help in this and other vital work on the GWR? Click here for details of membership and how to volunteer.

Records tumble on the GWR (posted 5th January 2004)

The Gloucestershire Warwickshire Railway is celebrating its most successful year ever with nearly 65,000 passengers carried during 2003. The railway had more to offer visitors, too, with a three mile extension from Gotherington to Cheltenham Racecourse station, which was opened by HRH The Princess Royal in April. And as the season drew to a close, GWR volunteers learned they had won the Ian Allan Independent Railway of the Year Award (see below).

The last day of the season was 1st January 2004, when the 64,145th passenger bought their ticket for the 20-mile return journey over the line. This is a massive 25 per cent increase over the previous year, and just over 50 per cent increase since 2000. Click here to read more.

Christmas on the GWR (posted 2nd January 2004)

The GWR’s ‘Santa Specials’ have once again been a resounding success and were fully booked by the end of November. Thousands of children travelled by steam train from Toddington to Winchcombe to meet Father Christmas himself - and all received a high quality gift. All visitors could enjoy a hot drink and a hot mince pie, too. If you missed out this time, make sure you book well in advance for 2004! The GWR ran trains immediately after Christmas and on New Year’s day, including a diesel day on 29th December. These also proved very popular.

Essential engineering work (posted 2nd January 2004)

A term Network Rail travellers may be all too familiar with - but track maintenance is vital for the safety of passengers. This is true for the GWR too and, from 2nd of January through to early March, the line will be closed for essential work. This includes replacement of about one mile of track between Toddington and Winchcombe, a section known to GWR staff as the ‘Defford Straight’ - so called because the track laid here 20 years ago came from RAF Defford in Worcestershire. Regular visitors will have noticed that there is new rail already lying beside the line waiting to be installed. The track, complete with replacement concrete sleepers, will be finished to main line standards - and it will mean the 10mph speed restriction that has affected this stretch of line will be lifted. See our timetable for operating dates during 2004.

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