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Thanks merlodlliw I think the building is listed, I expect the roof was in bad repair. (Wiki: 'The station was built in 1855 by the Lucas Brothers;their work which amongst other outstanding buildings include the Royal Albert Hall'). The station is owned by NR and operated by NXEA. I...

Thanks for the support. I'm just writing a project scope document in order to comminicate the concept. I expect we would need to establish a Restoration and Preservation Trust in time. Note: my involvement is purely altruistic, the station and town (visitors & rail users) would benefit from...

Looks like the Station is staying where it is. The first idea to move 400m west was dropped a while back, then 1st East (local URC) suggested 80m west 20m south, this sort of fizzled out due to lack of finance and interest, 1st East close down on March 31st so it will be back with the local...

Our local terminus (Lowestoft Central) had its old post & truss double pitched roof demolished in 1992 and not replaced. The station is now bland and cold. I have an idea/possibility of raising funding from various sources to have a new roof put back on in the Victorian style, this has proved a...

Steam, petrol and diesel driven buses were invented by different people it seems. BUT according to wiki answers .. I was curious about this.. The first bus was made in 1662. Blaise Pascal invents the first public bus - horse-drawn, regular route, schedule, and fare system. wiki.answers.com...

That must have been the worst survey I've ever read. Biased so much that your natural reaction is to rebel against the bias just to make sense of the question. Scott, I wish you well with the dissertation BUT may I recommend that you re-write the survey forms. The questions are biassed and in...

A classic successful example in business is the IKEA franchise, they are owned by an IKEA owned charity and have over £35billion* in reserves, not paid out; no dividends payable etc... (*Estimated; no up to date accounts published).

... and 60 for motorways, except lorries are limited to 90kmph (56mph) by the EU. And another thing (rant rant) why on the only decent road in East Anglia (the A14) does a lorry doing 55.9 mph try and overtake a lorry doing 55.8 mph? six miles later a hill appears and the overtaking lorry then...

Perhaps the 1 year ban is a bit harsh. I got stuck last Friday behind a trailer full of carrots (I guess there was a tractor in front of it), farmers are nornally pretty good in Norfolk and will pull over after 3 or 4 miles at 15mph;-) ...saying that we also have the fast-trac tractors which...

A11 dualling has been given funding from govt very recently, so maybe it will happen soon. I Liive in North Suffolk and the A12 is single lane most of way to Ipswich, A47 single lane to Norwich, London forget it by car! That is why I use NXEA quite often and then wish I'ld gone by car, it took...

Another route in for a NP-TOC could be via Micro-Franchising? If this option is available it could give a small NP-TOC time to prove itself, gain credibility and hopefully turn a positive balance sheet. Then the small company could bid for another micro-franchise and so on 'til it evolves into a...

The Germans also invented the Wankel engine and some new rocket motor in the 40's, we though did have Mr Stephenson who made the first Rocket engine, didn't we? :-)

Chris, you've given a good summary there. I'm looking at train design (style) for functionality, i.e. aerodynamics, physical strength etc, at the moment it is tending towards curves and minimal sharp angles, a bit like aircraft design in method, e.g. fluid dynamics over the surfaces.. The...

Peter I may be able to help. I own a specialist Research and Development company which specialises in conceptual and innovative engineering, amongst our past projects we have been involved with hovercraft design, indeed we a not a milllion miles away from where it was invented and tested...

Yes indeed. Germanys export level is 3 times higher than UKs., just heard Vince Cable say that on Parliament Channel. I think it is about time we started making more 'things', especially in advanced and skilled engineering.. instead of continuously importing just about anything and...

Oh found it on Wikipedia, looks like the mini-buses we have driving round the countryside. It isn't a 'real' locomotive or multiple unit by my own definition;-) True it runs on rails, but so do trams.. Think I'ld call it a ' Rail mini-bus' :-)

Is a PPM a real train? Never heard of it.. thought PPM = Public Performance Measure, or Parts Per Million ;-)

It seemed a shame that the Tornado boiler (for whatever reason) had to be fabricated overseas. You would have thought that someone in the UK could've made a boiler for a classic British locomotive. In the last 30 years we've lost so many skills and experience, not just in railway engineering...

Thanks for all the replies (so far), I didn't expect so many, 'thought it would be an easy question to answer;-) obviously not.. It must have been one of the early diesels?? Second point, IF we were to try to design, test and build a whole new train here entirely from UK sourced...

Thanks All, I think the above is a very good summary and makes interesting historical reading. Maybe we have to go back to the last steam days or early diesels to find the absolute answer:-) cheers... Dave