Southern England in the Early 1990’s

For our May meeting member Mark Greening took us back to the early 1990s in the South of England. He began by looking at passenger services where slam door emus dominated the scene, the Solent electrification scheme had been completed in 1990, and Class 442s had recently been introduced on the Waterloo - Weymouth line. Oddities illustrated included a booked Class 73 + 4 TC set on a Poole - Waterloo and return stopping service. Boat trains still operated to Southampton Docks, and even sleeper trains could be seen on the Southern Region. Class 456s and Networker Class 465s were noted on their mileage accumulation runs.

Mark reminded us that Cross Country services were loco hauled until HSTs started to be introduced in 1991, and summer Saturdays saw Portsmouth served by a service from Wolverhampton. First generation dmus were seen on the Henley branch and Reading. Steam specials that operated in 1992 - 1994 were shown, including those commemorating the 50th anniversary of D-Day.

The freight scene in the 1990s was very different to that of today as we were reminded by the illustration of the last years of Speedlink, oil trains, Ford Transit van trains from Eastleigh, steel traffic at Hamworthy, chalk slurry from Quidhampton, and coal trains at Didcot.

Our thanks to Mark for taking us back in time and recording everyday scenes that are now interesting history, and for showing us how much things have changed over the past 30 years.