East Anglia in transition – 1980s to date

Our October meeting featured an old friend in John Day who presented The Railways of East Anglia in transition from the 1980’s.  John’s employment enabled him to travel widely over the region accompanied by his cameras. The photos were of high quality and great interest accompanied by knowledgeable commentary and excellent anecdotes.

Starting from Spring Road viaduct and Derby Road the photos ranged all over East Anglia covering the full period of change and all the branches from Lowestoft and Yarmouth in the east. Nuclear flask trains from Sizewll were illustrated on the Leiston Branch.  The final class37’s to Kings Lynn and Yarmouth were illustrated as were the Middleton Towers sand trains hauled by 56’s among others active on what is now a busway.

Steam specials were depicted with the Pocket Rocket 76079, Oliver Cromell, Bittern, Tornado and 73096.  The Ipswich Docks  traffic was shown with Branch Line Society specials including class 03 haulage.  Saturday specials were shown with double headed class 25 on Yarmouth- Derby trains, and double headed class 31 too.  Class 40 were represented on Whitemoor- Mossend.  If it moved in East Anglia John recorded it so we saw diversions, specials and weekend service trains featuring classes 45, 56, 50, 55, 60 on spoil trains plus of course the regular class 66s, 57s on RHTT, 58s, a 69 on a weedkiller train and 67 on the Royal Train.  We wound up with a Stratford white roofed 47, 73, 90 and 86 on service trains, 87 and 92 on freight class 379 battery experiments on the Harwich branch, and a class 68 at Reedham. A breathless tour concluded with an 88 testing OHL, a Thumper on a railtour and HST’s to Ely for store. The talk was well received in the room and on line by an appreciative audience.

John Fitzgerald