It's all happening at Winchcombe

Lots of jobs going on today, the gang was active in several different locations, mostly indoor ones, as it was raining heavily.

Interesting is the recovery of 4 high spearhead fencing panels from Cheltenham. They were straightened by C&W (recovered spearhead fencing panels are almost never straight) and then cleaned up by the B&S gang. Some were cleaned indoors...

...while others were cleaned outdoors, but under shelter.

It's a slow job getting all the rust off. Austen and Jim attacked this one in the car port, and they even got a coat of primer on after lunch. In the workshop Bruce was making some new wooden gates for Winchcombe station.

Mike touched up the paintwork applied last week in the training room in the visitor centre. The floor covering goes down next week.

The downstairs room has received its floor covering, but will upstairs have the same?

Mike also varnished the door to the training room upstairs. You can see the round window at the back to give you an idea of where that is.

Out by the forecourt the anti dog fouling fence is nearing completion. The vertical posts still need to be trimmed, and a layer of concrete will be provided below the fence panels.

A similar run of fencing is needed up the steps by the new building, but the day was really too wet to do this. The gang got soaked just by simply removing the protective fence panels that were there. Enough already !

A major advance at Winchcombe is the start by a contractor of the new concrete roadway through the Cotswolds side of the site. This has been a potholed quagmire for years.

The station end of the Winchcombe site lies in a shallow cutting, and it therefore attracts rainwater  naturally, which then drains only slowly. This concrete roadway will stop the rutting and potholing, and the large puddles of water which always accumulate.

There's a fair bit of traffic down the site. S&T, the drainage dept., C&W and the PWay yard are all reached by this roadway, sometimes by large and heavy lorries.

Eventually the whole of the yard to the left of the picture will be redesigned, but first of all it has to be cleared. This process has started, but patience is needed.




In the afternoon 3 B&S gang members went to Broadway, where the group have undertaken to lay the original granite kerbs by the forecourt in front of the building

This one here is a large 6ft long example that was rescued from tipping at Broadway. It was collected last week and will now be reused in its original position. That's railway restoration! On the right BTW is one of the original stone blocks that supported the 1904 canopy at Broadway. Today the canopy sits on a hidden steel frame inside the walls of the building.

Seven more granite kerbs were dug up at Broadway recently, and these too will be re-used, together with a complement from a reclamation yard. The B&S gang spent a happy afternoon, in less rain, pressure washing the seven that were recently recovered. They ended up just as wet though. Laying of the kerbs will start in earnest next Saturday, weather permitting.

A roundup, and a trip to Broadway

News from Building Services has been a bit intermittent since Christmas, as a dose of the deadly 'Man Flu' has hit your correspondent.

Yesterday he was back in action, playing catch up, and here is what B&S have been up to.

Last Wednesday the wall by the Winchcombe weighbridge was being rebuilt, using pink mortar and bull nosed headers. It has been raised by 3 courses.

It's a shot from a passing Landie, but it counts.

Yesterday, a week later, the job was done. Doesn't it look neat, and authentic? Remember that previously the top of this wall was a rotten sleeper, which held up the neighbour's garden.

The door to the weighbridge was also refitted, after painting, and the job is now completed.




An amazing 11 volunteers turned up yesterday. It must be all the publicity they are getting via this blog, or perhaps it's because the days are finally getting longer again.

Three teams were about the railway.

 Team 1 was in the apex of the visitor centre, giving the walls in this roof space a final coat of paint.

The interior of this building will be quite modern and there is no attempt to make it look like an old railway building on the inside.

Upstairs will be a study centre.

The walls have been finished now.

This Saturday the gloss paint on the woodwork should be done, and then the floor will be covered.

The gang will then return and fit cupboards and shelves to the right hand side of the windows.

Team 2 was out in the Winchcombe car park, completing the anti dog fouling fence behind the toilet block. Back in B&S headuarters, Pat was beavering away making a final fence panel for this stretch.

At the top of the steps next to the new building the gang then excavated a hole to hold a fence post, which will support the modified gate that is going to be located here.

While at Toddington with the third gang there was an opportunity to photograph the frames of 76077 being shotblasted in a specially erected tent in the car park.

A quick look at the signal box, surrounded by scaffolding is also of interest.

We learned that the roof covering is being replaced by a contractor, and the windows will also be replaced, but later in spring when the weather is milder. This can be done without scaffolding.

The real reason for the trip to Toddington was to pick up a pile of granite kerbs that has been in storage in a corner there. These will be used in Broadway to construct an authentic forecourt pavement outside the new station building there.

The eagle eyes of the heritage group even spotted a single kerbstone by the goods shed, hidden under the green fascia board lying on the ground here. That was collected as well. We hope to have about 50m of granite kerbing at Broadway, which will give a softer, more period look than modern concrete.







The original Broadway kerbstones were in fact still in place, but buried by demolition rubble and a raised forecourt area.

Those that were found during the excavation of the building foundations were at first jettisoned, but later recovered and transported to Winchcombe, from which the Fairview lorry recovered them today.

 At Broadway the kerbstones were lifted off the Fairview lorry....

.... and stacked at the top of the drive, ready for laying. This is expected to start on Saturday, to create a footpath from the bottom of the drive up to the wall of the B&B. Concrete kerbs are being used along the drive.

Steve with his JCB passed by to dig a shallow trench for the granite ones along the side of the building.

The number of kerbstones recovered from Broadway and Toddington will not be enough to cover the full length of the building, and a complement has been sourced and ordered from a reclamation yard.

The footpath alongside the building by the forecourt will be paved in 3 x 2 foot slabs, as original, and as evidenced by a photograph we have found showing the situation before demolition.