Our new Mid Week Team start at Coldham

Our new mid week group started today, meeting initially every 2nd Wednesday, plus maybe a few more in between. We started where our Sunday Team left off at Coldham. First up was to clear the level crossing gate the March side of brambles and grass and the fencing to the sides.

This is how the fence looked back in the Summer of 2009, the brambles a very unwelcome sight coming over the fencing, and through the gates. Very unkept and shows the railway up in a particuarly bad way.

As you can see it is very wet at Coldham, but the Brambles and trees have been delt with. Over the next few months, we will be looking to Refurbish this area, sanding down and repainting the fencing and gates, replacing the Red Targets on the gate and making it look like a Railway again. Much work is needed to be done here, but we hope to get it looking as good as Waldersea this year and smarten it up.

Having finished with the gate area for now, we moved onto the slog that was clearing a walkway through the Brambles north of the Level Crossing. This is how it looked when we started on Sunday

and after much cutting and hacking back the brambles between our team, it finished looking like this

Ok, so the grass in the four foot makes it look bad, but there has been a huge amount of Brambles cleared. We have only concentrated on the track area for the time being because we are clearing a path for the Sponsored Walk on Sunday, March 7th. We started at the crossing itself and where soon making good headway through the Brambles. Below our Chairman rakes some of the cut brambles away.

Not long after this, we needed a break. We got discussing the old gents toilet block which is still there, burried among trees and brambles south of Coldham station. So, we decided to pay a visit to it. Inside we found a cut down tree and some brambles which were dumped in there sometime ago. Nothing else.

Now, we found on the office computer this photo, taken back in 2005/6.

and also this photo of Coldham before Closure. The gents toilet block can clearly be seen on the left hand side of the photo.

Anyway, enough of this larking about in the gents toilets! People will talk. Onward and northward, we got back to work and as we got near the end the progress looked good. Shame about the orangemen.

The group is again working this Sunday at Coldham from 9.30am onwards. Work continues to complete the vegetation clearence work at Coldham. If you want to get involved, please get in touch. The more people we have volunteering, the quicker a lot of work can get done. Details of membership can be found here, and you can E-mail us at bramley_line@yahoo.com to get involved.

One last note of the day, Our chairman tries to recruit a young horse to the track clearing team, in the hope she will eat all the grass on the line.

Brambles claim revenge on Valentines Day

This Sunday, the group moved south to Coldham, where work took place to clear the line South of Coldham level crossing to allow the Sponsored Walk to progress through. This is how the line looked when it started:

While you can still make out the track for most of the way, this poses a significant risk in walking along the line. So the group set out to clear the line. During this time, one of the team had an arguement with one of the brambles, which came up and hit him on the ear. However as the day progressed, the team got the better of the Brambles, and a significant improvement was made.

Above is a number of the team working towards the camera to clear the line, and below is the line after clearing. You can see it is much clearer and provides a much better condition for walking on.

At the end of the day, this is how the line looked from Coldham Station.

Our next working day will be our new Wednesday gang which will be meeting this Wednesday, at 9.30am at Coldham to continue working around the Coldham area. If you are interested in getting involved, you can get in touch by e-mailing us at bramley_line@yahoo.com

More work at Waldersea

Work this Sunday, and for the next three weeks, concentrates on preperations for the sponsored walk on Sunday, March 7th. First of all, in to the side of the line, an area has been cleared where there will be fresh water, and an area where the Half Way break will be. The photo of the cleared area is shown below.

Some work was also done to tidy up, and fill in the gap which existed between the end of the road surface and the new fencing work. This didn't take too long, but makes it much safer than it was.

Once that was done, and swept level and packed in place, the work moved on to clearing the track south of Waldersea Farm Crossing, so unlike those who walked the line on January 20th, the members doing the sponsored walk on Sunday, March 7th will be able to pass without having to fight the brambles. We did joke we should be called the Bramble Line, as there is a very high volume of brambles in this area. The photo below shows the line immediatley south of Waldersea Farm Crossing before we started.

Sponsored Walk through that then anyone? Didn't think so, and neither did we. So we started working our way towards Coldham around 11.30am as you can see from the photos below.

By the time we finished the area above, we were 31 wagons from Waldersea Level Crossing (We know this because of the sign) and it was 2.30pm. As you can see in the background , the bad weather was closing in, so we decided to call it a day there. In total there was about 1/2 mile cleared, but this is more or less all of what was needing done in the Waldersea area. A comparson is shown below;

Moving forward, subject to the weather (possible snow end of the week), we will be at Coldham working from the Level Crossing towards Waldersea. If you would like to get involved, please get in touch. You can e-mail us at bramley_line@yahoo.com or just come along on the Sunday from 9.30am onwards.

Busy times at Waldersea

We are sorry for the lack of updates over the last couple of weeks, and photos. This is because the person who updates the site has been away. Over the last few weeks, volunteers turnout has been poor mainly because of the cold weather, but also some members visited the Great Central Railways winter steam gala.

Most of the work over the last few weeks has centred on making up and finishing the fencing work at Waldersea. All of the fencing is now down at the crossing. the photo below shows how it was over Christmas and New Year. All the fencing at both Waldersea and Elm Road will soon be given a white gloss, but this is likely to happen after the sponsored walk, when the better weather is here.

As you can see, standing from a distance, the overall look has now massively improved. The photo below shows the full extent of the new fencing at Waldersea. Once this has been glossed we think the whole area around Waldersea will look excellent. It is a shame we can't do something with the other gates, but we will look into this at a later date. The Waldersea depot sign has been resited and will soon be repainted and will look much better. We have also added "Refresh Notices" to say that the work has been carried out by volunteers of the Bramley Line.

Work this Sunday will take place again at Waldersea. The main object over the next few weeks will be working on Clearing work between Waldersea and Coldham, to clear a path through the Brambles on the line for our Sponsored Walk on Sunday March 7th.
More details of the sponsored walk can be found at our website by clicking here.

If you would like to get involved, please get it touch. E-mail us at bramley_line@yahoo.com