So, what got you interested in railways?

[pavorossi]

John (Gandalf),

In my defence at the time I didn't know that it was a Battle of Britain, I just knew that it was big and looked good. Besides, using my German skills the brochure would have been totally illegible for a German!

Adam

[Kurdt Kobain]

Being deprived of slam door trains and having them replaced with awful Pacers at the age of (umn...now) roughly 7/8 yrs!!! (City Line - Merseyside)

There was just something about sticking your head out of the door window and feeling the wind in your hair at such a young age!!!

[Southern.]

Like Most everybody else, My Father loved the Railways and It sort of attached itself to me .The thrill of standing on a Station and watching a Steam loco with all It's associated smells coming in. As a child during the 40s and 50s I used to spend some time in Loughborough and used to stay not far from Loughborough Central. I spent hours there taking numbers and watching.Rgds Tony (southern.)

[Arthur Maunsell]

A pal took me to the Great western Soc open day at Taplow...loved the steam engines (still do) but what hooked me was the procession of Westerns and Warships hammering past....

[Trev]

My interest in railways began in quite a tangential way I suppose.

Up until the age of 12, I had no interest in trains at all; in fact, I can vividly recall being terrified at the age of 3 or 4 by a steam locomotive on the Hull-Withernsea line. And then, one morning during assembly at my school, I noticed that a group of lads sat behind me who were from another form were looking at those strange ABC books that boys in my form had also been passing around. I mentioned this fact to one of the lads from my form, and decided to find out what all of the fuss was about. Not only did this encourage a bit of inter-form friendliness, but within a week I had purchased a copy of the DMU ABC ( I was reliably informed that it would be more use, as DMU's were endemic in Hull), and I was hooked for life. Thenceforth, every Sunday was spent bunking Botanic Gardens, every Friday evening after school involved a race to Paragon Station in order to see the arrival of the Scarborough train (always a Class 37), and every breaktime meant a trip across the playing fields to cop the Type 1 on its daily trip to the small yard at the closed Marfleet station.

In time, the Newton Hall Grammar School trainspotting club spread its wings further and further afield. Trips to York and Doncaster were followed as we got more adventurous by spending weekends away, 'doing' all of the depots in London and the south east, Scotland, South Wales...you name it, and we probably went there. And if nothing else, the geographical knowledge acquired certainly impressed our Geography masters ( "Where is the Eden Valley?" , " Settle and Carlisle line Sir!!")

But the thing that really got me was something that I thought about whilst stood at the stops at Paragon station one Friday evening many, many years ago. I looked at the rails where they came up against the buffers, and realised that, give or take a change of gauge, and the English Channel (conveniently crossed by a train ferry ), I was looking at one end of a continuous ribbon of steel which stretched all the way across the Eurasian continent. All the way....across France, Poland, the Urals and then past Lake Baikal until it ended on the shores of the Eastern Pacific Ocean. Maybe it sounds a bit trite in this world of intercontinental air transport, but if you just sit and think about it, it's an incredible thing.

Trains and railways...I just love 'em

[Andrew R Bull]

I was a very lucky kid.As my two previous posts have indicated, I went from about 14, everywhere with my P-Way Senior Engineer Dad.He had one ambition, to be the Engineer responsible for the section of the WCML over Shap. This he achieved,+ the Settle- Carlisle.

We both shared a wonder that two strips of steel, could be kept correctly apart, and no noticable lateral or horizontal distortion, to go for hundreds, or thousands of miles at then 90 to 100 mph, with trains of 00's or 000's tonnes,
held only by a wheel flange of just over an inch deep ( typically 1 and 1/8th inch )

The only time I remeber being a little anxious was when staying in Prague about 1996, I took the Warsaw express for an afternoon trip.Modern almost new Air Con stock, but at about 80/90mph curves were taken with massive sieways kicks and lurches, the adjoining track, looking like and maybe was an unmaintained siding! Cant difficiency was not in it, I'm sure it had none at all!

Andrew

[222007]

For me it was the amount of travelling i did on trains. I started to become facinated on what type of train i was travelling on and other general railway information such as signal types. I'd not call myself a train spotter but a railway enthusiast. I have actually just applied to Central trains so hopefull i'll get my dream of working on the railways and trains. Fingers crossed hey?

[pavorossi]

Good look 222007!

Adam

[paul miller]

As a very small boy some 55 years ago I lived in a small place in Nottinghamshire called Awsworth. The Great Northern line from Derby Friargate to Nottingham Victoria went through the village. I would lie in bed at night listening to the loose coupled freights picking the couplings up as they started up the incline. That noise started my life long love of railways, I spent every hour I could by that trackside. In 1957 my mother let me go to Grantham for the day with some boys older than myself. I defy anyone to have gone there in the height of summer and being surrounded by A4s, A3s, A1s, V2s and come away without a love of steam engines. It has been with me ever since.

[swisstrains]

That's a great description Paul. It really sums it up for me also but in a different part of the country. From where I lived I could hear trains on two main lines and I would lie awake at night and try to guess the class of loco. The sound of a Super D on a heavy freight or a Stanier Pacific on an overnight sleeper would travel for miles.
Nowadays, If I have the window open, I might just about hear a Pendolino