HST railtour on The Robin Hood Line

[Intercity 225]

Hi,

I didn't want to hijack another thread about a separate topic where this was bought up but I understand that a recent St Pancras to Cleethorpes HST special may have been routed via The Robin Hood Line - can somebody confirm please?

Also if so, did anyone take any photos? Would especially like to see it around Newstead! And is this the first time an HST has travelled over The Robin Hood Line? Never heard of one being sent that way before.

Cheers

 

[LowLevel]

I believe it joined at Kirkby Lane End Junction having come from the Erewash lines - there's a very heavy penalty in speed for non Sprinter trains from Radford Jn to Kirkby so they can't go up there when services are running normally.

 

[nag67]

Not the southern bit through Newstead, but I remember doing the Grand Old Dukes 125 special that did the northern bit from Kirkby-in-Ashfield to Shireoaks in 1992, with a detour to High Marnham and back. http://www.sixbellsjunction.co.uk/90s/920111hr.htm

 

[Techniquest]

We did indeed use the Robin Hood Line, certainly unusual for an HST on that line but definitely not the first. I've obviously got no photos as I was on the tour, but there should be tons of photos as a lot of photographers were at Mansfield at least and no doubt all over the place too.

My only photo of the tour is of 43050 (43059 was on the other end) at Cleethorpes.

 

[Harpers Tate]

I believe it joined at Kirkby Lane End Junction having come from the Erewash lines - there's a very heavy penalty in speed for non Sprinter trains from Radford Jn to Kirkby so they can't go up there when services are running normally.

That figures - the extensive single tracking (increased to make way for the tram) on the section through Hucknall and Newstead presumably limits paths which are pretty occupied on the Mon-Sat service pattern of 2x per hour each way. The last time I did a diverted service down to and back up from Erewash, it was 20mph in a Sprinter both ways. I think it is (or was at the time) a simple limit for all traffic throughout.

 

[LowLevel]

The line via Pinxton (confusingly if you don't know the area the up and down Kirkby lines) is indeed 20 mph most of the way for all classes of trains. Lots of old mineworkings and the like about. The 'Robin Hood line' via Hucknall has variable speed limits but is basically 20 mph for non Sprinter differential units and up to 75 mph for Sprinters - while much has been replaced there's some very old and ropey bullhead track between Linby and Hucknall for example.

Obviously there's very little traffic via Pinxton and what there is is overnight generally so it's much easier to path things down there. With the death of freight into the Thoresby/Clipstone etc branch there's little constraint north of Kirkby either.