Saturday 23 May 2015

Work continues at Broadway, and with the original blog 'frozen' I thought I would post a few pictures of work that went on today. I hope the Cheltenham guys don't mind me 'borrowing' their blog.

This is a photograph taken a few days ago and shows Peter Q starting on the T&G boarding inside the SB. At the end of the day he had done the area above all 6 windows, except for 4 boards that he didn't have. Below him is the floor, as yet open. This will be boarded over later, when there is less risk of damage from activities above. Scaffolding planks suffice for the moment.

Today, and up above, Tony and the two Johns cut and placed the ridge tiles, seen here on the northern end.
A small, interesting fact: They do not go down on a bed of mortar, but are attached to each other with mortar. This is to allow for expansion of the roof to take place.
Just visible on the centre ridge are the tops of the two cast iron ventilator tubes. The ventilator cowls are shoehorned over the top, and have wide skirts that go over, and grip under, the edge of the ridge tiles. These are of a special pattern, rounded over the top, not pointed. Typical for a GWR box.

Because our roof is fitted with insulation sheets to meet today's building regulations, the tops of the cast iron tubes do not stick out far enough, and we plan to extend them to the correct height. This will then give the cowls enough to hang on with.

One or two minor jobs remain after the ridge tiles. After that, the plan is to wash down the exterior brickwork with a special cleaner, to remove remaining traces of mortar. The joiner can then come and fit the remaining windows, after the scaffolding has been taken down a level. As the scaffolding is rented, it is in our interest to take it down as soon as possible.

Here is a glimpse of our new bric-a-brac shed. It's only a temporary building, so don't worry about the architecture. We will move the bric-a-brac from the old shed out into the new on a date yet to be decided. The old shed can then be taken down and the station building footprint fully revealed. Today's activity centred round the placing of the patio slabs and further sand around it.

There were only 11 volunteers today. That's a bit on the low side, but there was strong competition at Toddington! If you listened carefully, you could hear foreign whistles...

In this picture above you can see Phil painting some marker posts that were placed this morning. It's not much of a development, but represents a big step. These 4 posts designate the area for the footbridge tower foundations, and on the far left you can in fact see the first riser of the original footbridge. It's still there! This area needs to be marked so that a test excavation can be done on behalf of our consultant engineer, who will be designing the new foundations. We are also talking to potential fabricators for the new towers, but nothing has been decided yet. As extension money is limited, we need to prioritise and the BAG committee is currently considering this tricky issue.

Earlier in the week, the BAG committee met to elect a new chairman. We are very lucky that a committee member has indeed agreed to take on this challenging role, and we therefore welcome Roger Brindley as our new BAG chairman.
The position of project manager for the station rebuild, a separate job, is currently vacant, and the search for candidates is on.

Elsewhere on site brick cleaning continued using the remains of  the station foundations, and the new catch pit covers were given more coats of paint.

On Friday the annual BAG open evening was held, and there was a good number of guests, many brought in by London double decker bus from Broadway centre. The beer ran out within a quick 45 minutes, resulting in an urgent trip to the supermarket for some ad hoc bottles. There was an ample supply of beefburgers, but almost all of these went too. People were clearly hungry for refreshments, as well as information about the project. There was a steady stream of visitors to the footbridge centre span where explanations were being given, and at the end of the evening the platform 1a lights came on, and someone had even rigged a light in the shell of the SB. Very atmospheric, that was. All this was accompanied by live music from Mike S and his friends.


At the end of the day today the SB looked like this - the ridge tiles are all up, except for a short stretch in the middle. The name board is off centre, but it's a dummy made of wood, hanging between two window posts. We'll use a tape measure for the real, cast iron one later.

A small gang of 2 will continue on Monday, while a further expedition to Wishaw is planned for Tuesday to recover the last of the wooden planks for the footbridge centre span. Busy busy busy! Wednesday is the next normal working day then, and the last for your blogger, who will take a long awaited holiday in Italy.

18 comments:

Eric O said...

Thanks Joe
The SB is looking good.
Enjoy your holiday.
Eric

Pat said...

Thanks Jo - I been having withdrawal symptoms...
Rhymney Pat

Toddington Ted said...

I called in on my way to the Gala today and Tony very kindly showed me round the site this morning; my first visit for 12 months. Very many thanks for your hospitality and it was great to see the work progressing so well as usual.

richard said...

Thoroughly enjoyed Friday evening at Broadway, the Signal Box is impressive a credit to the BAG, also saw CRC plat 2 today a very smart bit of work.

Anonymous said...

Enjoy your holiday Jo. Look forward to your return.

Anonymous said...

Having read the blogs for 18 months it was very interesting to see the site for the first time on the open evening.
Many thanks to John, Two Petes, JC, Keith and others for a friendly visit. I learnt a lot.
Jo, keep this brilliant blog going it means such a lot to we "outsiders".
Spero che abbia una bella vacanza in Italia!
Mike Rose South Wales.

Anonymous said...

Is that a blackbird on the top of the SB (centre) or part of the building?

Jo said...

Well spotted, it's indeed a blackbird!

Anonymous said...

Last chance to take up this offer.
Anonymous said...

Mag Drill. If you can ensure that a donation sent to HQ is earmarked for you, they will have the benefit of 25% Gift Aid and you will have £100. Have we got a deal?

12 May 2015 at 10:00

Jo said...

Hi Anon,

It's very kind of you to offer to help with the mag drill, much appreciated.
It's just that things are a bit complicated at the moment. The mag drill actually belonged to a member, not to BAG.
We have had a change of chairman, and the new one (Roger Brindley) as you can imagine had to jump in at the deep end so has loads of stuff on his plate. Claiming gift aid back at the moment is difficult for the BAG. (as far as I know, happy to be corrected)
If you still want to help, the easiest thing for us would be if you sent a simple cheque.

What I can say is that the genny fried three tools including the mag drill, and we have now worked out that the 115v outlet was giving out 240v. Who knew?

Anonymous said...

£25 is a lot to forgo but as it's been promised I will send a cheque. Please advise payee and address.

Anonymous said...

Sorry that my message was not very clear.

£25 Gift Aid is a lot to forgo but as £100 has been promised I will send a cheque .....

Jo said...

Hi Anon,

Here are the payment details:
The cheque should be made out to GWR Broadway Area Group and sent to John Simms, Broadway Area Group, c/o The Railway Station, Toddington, GL54 5DT

This will see the cheque safely in the hands of our treasurer.

Thank you for your support !

Anonymous said...

I came to Broadway the day the chimney was put on the SB and talked to a tall man who mentioned the need for a pattern to be paid for to enable lamp posts to be made. I offered to pay for this pattern. You have my details as I sponsored to SB windows. Gordon

Unknown said...

Please more of the same. I'm so missing the regular blogs.

Anonymous said...

when are we going to see regular update on the progress at Broadway???? we feel totally cut-off.

Unknown said...

Please give some CRC2 and Broadway updates, we've been cut adrift for weeks now!!!!
yours in great anticipation, Graham H.

Jo said...

I have been asked (by BAG) not to post updates on CRC, pending a new Broadway blog.

I will therefore continue with CRC2 updates, one of which will be posted within the next 24 hrs, followed by another. Just got to get my mail sorted, only flew back last night.