Trains from Farnborough in 1970 - terminating at Waterloo?

[HenryCrun69]

Hi,

I am simply checking that the London terminus of a train from Farnborough in Hampshire taken in 1970 would have been Waterloo?

Thanks!

 

[JonathanH]

Hi,

I am simply checking that the London terminus of a train from Farnborough in Hampshire taken in 1970 would have been Waterloo?

Thanks!

Yes, there's nowhere else other than Waterloo that a normal frequency train from Farnborough (Main) can sensibly run to.

 

[Gloster]

Hi,

I am simply checking that the London terminus of a train from Farnborough in Hampshire taken in 1970 would have been Waterloo?

Thanks!

Yes, if it is a regular service from the main station at Farnborough. If the train went from Farnborough North or North Camp it would probably still be Waterloo with a change at either Guildford or Wokingham. It would be possible, but a very odd route, to go from Farnborough North or North Camp to Paddington with a change at Reading, or to Victoria with a change at Redhill. But for all normal journeys, yes, it would have been Waterloo.

 

[HenryCrun69]

Thanks both

 

[norbitonflyer]

Farnborough North was a South Eastern Railway station so may at some time have had direct (albeit circuitous) services to Charing Cross.
But Farnborough Main would have only ever had services to Waterloo (or Nine Elmms, until Waterloo opened)

 

[Gloster]

Farnborough North was a South Eastern Railway station so may at some time have had direct (albeit circuitous) services to Charing Cross.
But Farnborough Main would have only ever had services to Waterloo (or Nine Elmms, until Waterloo opened)

Most of this was well before 1970. However, I think there was one return trip that ran from London Bridge to Reading via Redhill, Guildford and North Camp, but I am fairly sure that this ended with the arrival of the Tadpoles in 1965.

 

[30907]

However, I think there was one return trip that ran from London Bridge to Reading via Redhill, Guildford and North Camp, but I am fairly sure that this ended with the arrival of the Tadpoles in 1965.

5.25pm off LB, 7.27am back; it ended a couple of years earlier, IIRC autumn 1963. An 8-Lav or similar ran LB-Redhill or Reigate instead.
(The Oxted line was largely dieselised by the summer 63 timetable.)

 

[Big Jumby 74]

This is a tad bizarre. Was only speaking to someone yesterday about through services from Frimley to Woking/Waterloo via Sturt Lane. How strange, lol...

 

[midland1]

"Terminating at Waterloo" lets hope so

 

[Snow1964]

Back in 1970 there would have been lots of specials for the Farnborough air show from all over the place (which alternates with Paris air show, so every two years).

Just thought of it as Paris air show is currently on.

 

[Gloster]

The airshow took place at the beginning of September, but it is possible that for the first couple of days it was trade only. I am not so sure whether there would have been lots of specials from off the Southern Region: I would think that some trains from the west would have been strengthened and have stop orders, and there would be an improved service from Waterloo, including a few non-stop services. However, if they knew that Concorde was about to make its first appearance there might have been more.

 

[norbitonflyer]

Most of this was well before 1970. However, I think there was one return trip that ran from London Bridge to Reading via Redhill, Guildford and North Camp, but I am fairly sure that this ended with the arrival of the Tadpoles in 1965.

Apologies - I missed the reference to 1970

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: Monday at 18:54 ==

I would think that some trains from the west would have been strengthened and have stop orders,

Necessiting switching from up fast to up slow. That is indeed exactly what happened the one time I attended the air show in, I think, 1990 - as well as the airshow itself, it was memorable as my first ride on a 442

 

[Gloster]

Apologies - I missed the reference to 1970

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: Monday at 18:54 ==


Necessiting switching from up fast to up slow. That is indeed exactly what happened the one time I attended the air show in, I think, 1990 - as well as the airshow itself, it was memorable as my first ride on a 442

Remember that even as late as 1970 people had less disposal income, so if you went you really had to want to go and it wasn’t just a casual day out. That said, developments in aviation were probably (proportionately) a greater interest then than now. Weekend would be busiest because plenty of people still worked Monday to Friday and getting a day off wasn’t so easy.

 

[stuving]

Remember that even as late as 1970 people had less disposal income, so if you went you really had to want to go and it wasn’t just a casual day out. That said, developments in aviation were probably (proportionately) a greater interest then than now. Weekend would be busiest because plenty of people still worked Monday to Friday and getting a day off wasn’t so easy.

There were two public days, Saturday and Sunday, and in 1970 they were expecting 250,000 visitors on each of those. There were (at least) a couple of weekend trains each way between Reading and North Camp, and a train from Port Talbot on Saturday 12th (34s - with refreshments - but no mention of a return train!).

 

[nw1]

One thing I do remember from our telephone directory in the early 80s was an "Airshow" area code. What was that all about? Did the air show have its own area code distinct from Farnborough?

 

[stuving]

One thing I do remember from our telephone directory in the early 80s was an "Airshow" area code. What was that all about? Did the air show have its own area code distinct from Farnborough?

I presume that would be a temporary exchange for the exhibitors in their chalets. With a lot of them being big international companies, doing deals with each other, talking to head office was important enough to justify the cost of that.

 

[Taunton]

Quite off topic here but an AIRshow telephone exchange would be one where the letters corresponded to the groups of 3 letters against each dial number, and shown prominently on dials.

2 = ABC, 3 = DEF, 4 = GHI etc. Thus AIRshow corresponded to 247 as an exchange code, which presumably was fortunately (or by design) available. The first three that you had to dial were commonly capitalised, as here. The letters just were a mnemonic on the numbers dialled. There was a late renaissance of the relationship in the first incarnation of SMS text messaging when early mobile phones only has the 10 numbers keypad. CHRistmas as a mnemonic exchange name would give the same numbers.

Regular exchanges would be given such names as well - the area around Parliament was called ABBey, after Westminster Abbey, giving code 222. Phone numbers around there, still have such a number. The London Transport enquiry number, head office nearby, is 0343 222 1234. Long ago in London it was just 222 1234.

Installation of temporary telephone lines, sometimes in substantial quantities, was a standard task for British Telecom, or their organisational predecessor, Post Office Telephones. Despite being portrayed as a government department, they were pretty good at this sort of thing.

Back to Farnborough

 

[norbitonflyer]

Quite off topic here but an AIRshow telephone exchange would be one where the letters corresponded to the groups of 3 letters against each dial number, and shown prominently on dials.

2 = ABC, 3 = DEF, 4 = GHI etc. Thus AIRshow corresponded to 247 as an exchange code, which presumably was fortunately (or by design) available. The first three that you had to dial were commonly capitalised, as here. The letters just were a mnemonic on the numbers dialled.

If it was a London area (01) code it must have used spare numbers on the BIShopsgate exchange

Farnborough is on the Aldershot STD area (0252 at that time - 0AL2 - now 01252) It is possible a block of numbers on that exchange were reserved for use by temporary lines during the airshows

0247 (later 01247) was Bangor, (Northern Ireland) but has been spare since all Northern Ireland numbers switched to 028 in 2000

0240 (perhaps 0- AI- 0 ?) does not appear to have been used as a area code

The other 024x dialling codes were (and as 0124x codes, still are) all in use, respectively by ArbroatH, CHeltenham, CHichester, CHester, CHeLmsford, CHesterfield, BanGor (Wales) and CHippenham

 

[Steddenm]

If it was a London area (01) code it must have used spare numbers on the BIShopsgate exchange

Farnborough is on the Aldershot STD area (0252 at that time - 0AL2 - now 01252) It is possible a block of numbers on that exchange were reserved for use by temporary lines during the airshows

0247 (later 01247) was Bangor, (Northern Ireland) but has been spare since all Northern Ireland numbers switched to 028 in 2000

0240 (perhaps 0- AI- 0 ?) does not appear to have been used as a area code

The other 024x dialling codes were (and as 0124x codes, still are) all in use, respectively by ArbroatH, CHeltenham, CHichester, CHester, CHeLmsford, CHesterfield, BanGor (Wales) and CHippenham

024 is now Coventry/Nuneaton/parts of Warwickshire.

 

[stuving]

I've found a news item from 1962 about the 13 girls operating the temporary "Airshow Exchange" switchboard (240 lines) in Farnborough exchange building. At that date international calls would have been manually connected anyway. Now, how did that evolve - or get replaced - into the automatic but pre-mobile era?

 

[The exile]

024 is now Coventry/Nuneaton/parts of Warwickshire.

All the “letters to numbers” conversions refer to the time pre “phone day” (1995?) when the extra “1” was added after the initial zero. Take that 1 out and it’s still a good side to guessing where a landline phone number comes from.

 

[norbitonflyer]

All the “letters to numbers” conversions refer to the time pre “phone day” (1995?) when the extra “1” was added after the initial zero.

16th April 1995. This was the second stage of three in reforming the system.

- The first, in 1990, changed the London 01 code to 071 and 081. This allowed:
- The Phoneday change in 1995, where all codes had a 1 inserted - thus 071 became 0171, 0234 became 01234 etc. Also some new codes were introduced such as 0118 for Reading (previously 0734). This freed up all codes not beginning 01xxx for further use in:
- "Big Number Change" in 2000 - London recombined as 020, and a number of other areas got 02x codes such as Cardiff (029, previously 01222). This change also renumbered some mobile phone codes so they all started 07xxx, and all premium and freephone codes in the 08xxx range (eg 0800 had previously been Tongue, in Scotland, and 0865 had been Oxford)

The point of all this was so that all numbers would have eleven digits - for example by giving Cardiff a 3-digit code (029) instead of four (0222) the number of available numbers was increased by a factor of ten.

Incidentally, although I knew that there was an alphanumeric significance to most diallg codes (e.g 0222 and 0223 were CAmbridge and CArdiff, I only recently spotted that the 01x1 codes also fit:
0121 B- Birmingham
0131 E- Edinburgh
0141 G- Glasgow
0151 L- Liverpool
0161 M- Manchester

071 was originally intended for Sheffield, which would have fit the pattern, but that eventually became 0114
091 was allocated to the Tyne & Wear area, which fits W but not T.

But I digress

 

[stuving]

All the “letters to numbers” conversions refer to the time pre “phone day” (1995?) when the extra “1” was added after the initial zero. Take that 1 out and it’s still a good side to guessing where a landline phone number comes from.

I think you are confusing Phoneday with the switch to all-figure numbers which started in 1966. That broke the link with exchange names, and letters were removed from new phone dials. The introduction of Subscriber Trunk Dialling (STD) happened at the same time, and was much easier without the letters. While I don't remember it, I think the usage also changed so that "telephone number" became the whole dialled string in place of just the numerical bit after the exchange name.

 

[Cowley]

I think we may be getting a teeny bit off topic here…

If someone wants a thread about dialling codes, feel free to give us a list of posts and we’ll look at creating one.

Thanks