Volunteer Liaison Update | 28th June

Another great week at the railway with lots going on as usual. 

Chris and Allan loaded the lorry with the sleepers to go off for recycling. It is good to have them finally gone.
Trevor painted the flowerbed sleepers and put together the GWR bench, donated in memory of Fred Eakin. Both look very impressive on the platform of Spring Village station. Sean, Martin and Kevin continued to work on the Mk ll Brake Standard Open (BSO) coach No. 9406. John and AJ were repairing the dumper truck in the yard. This will be useful piece of kit when it is operational.
We had a flying visit from a Mallard duck this week, she enjoyed a rest on the platform and a bite to eat, before we carefully took her back to Horsehay pool. A couple of hours later she was back with her friends - all nine of them! 

On Saturday John was putting more vinyl up, and Ben continued to put the seating together in the Mkll Tourist Standard Open (TSO) No. 5220. Ian was in the shed working on North British diesel hydraulic No.27414 'TOM'. AJ, Paul and John were also in the shed working on Ruston Hornsby 0-4-0 diesel mechanical No. 382824 'Hector'. Hopefully it will not be too long before we have these useful locos back in service. Pete and Alex were busy mowing and strimming the 'forest' of grass that has spring up between the platform and shed roads. It looks much tidier now.
The permanent way department were also busy at Lawley. Martin, Kevin, Shaun and Ryan took the road rail digger and a works train to start preparing the platform and site for improvement works. The fencing was taken down and posts lifted. Concrete sleepers were placed in the rails to get the digger off and on the track. The two rails for the run round loop were also brought closer to the point for putting in at a later date. All this whilst dodging the heavy rain showers that kept appearing at inappropriate times throughout the day 😁

On Sunday Peckett steam engine W6 0-4-0 No. 1722 'Rocket' was hauling our service trains. Josh, Andy and I were kept busy clearing all the fence posts brought down from Lawley and stacking them neatly in the yard. The top of the dock at Spring Village was strimmed and fence posts in the car park were painted white. This will help us to mark out bays to make parking easier. After lunch and an ice cream, Andy and I went up the line clearing back lineside vegetation that was beginning to block the view of drivers and shunters. It was a busy day with lots of passengers enjoying the railway and the good weather  The final tasks of the weekend was to shunt the stock to allow Rocket back into the shed and to put everything away. We finished tired but happy😁

Thanks to Shaun, Ben and Paul for the additional information used in this update.

Our next public running day is Sunday 3 July with Rocket. The first train departs Spring Village at 11am. No need to book, just turn up and pay once to ride all day

​Our next event is the open day for prospective members and volunteers, on Saturday 30 July. Full details and to book a space can be found on our website www.telfordsteamrailway.co.uk/events