Re: Complexity

Unfortunately I’m unable to comment directly on Andrew Cowie’s post. But it’s nice to see the railway station from my home town. The station shown was designed by John Dobson (a famous northern architect) and constructed by Robert Stephenson (that’s the bloke who invented the train).
Now for all this set of tracks may look overly complex it actually isn’t, the reason it hits such a weirdly dense set of tracks at the station is quite simple, there are two railway bridges going south, originally only one, these bridges were pretty much the only way to connect the north and south for a long time (well until IKB got his act together and finished the great western). From Newcastle the railways would carry coal from Spital Tongues and the Rising Sun coal mines, and from further north in places such as Ellington, to the south of England.
Essentially Newcastle central station became a major crossing point between the north and south. You can see that on the left of the picture Andrew posted there are 4 sets of tracks which don’t even stop at the station. I’ve heard that some trains did stop, on the bridge that they are visible on, toward the back of the station. From there a crane would load up the trains with goods, including coal. When it was built it was one of the most heavily used stations in Britain, and incredibly important to the industrial revolution. These tracks have now been replaced with another platform and it doesn’t quite look the same anymore;
Newcastle central station, C.1990s
Obviously this happened as a result of the closing of both the Spital Tongues mine and the Rising Sun which is now a nature reserve and country park. Now if you go down to the Rising Sun, you can see the original train tracks (there are earlier tracks of course, but these were the first to run locomotives) from the first test railways and you can walk down Middle Engine Lane where the Rocket was tested at 30mph! All just a little bit of awesome in my backyard…
The Rocket, the first one made, with a hack to allow the piston to move from the original 45 degree position.
Yes, I am a bit of a geek about this stuff… Point me at the Clifton Suspension bridge and I’ll probably sing a song from the animation “The Great IKB”