The SOCIETY FAMILY DAY on the South Devon Railway is now CONFIRMED for Saturday 6th September! Society Family Day – South Devon Railway Bubble Car.
Full information is now available on the Society Family Day – South Devon Railway page.
It will be a great day – see you there!
Thank you to everyone who came to Didcot Railway Centre today, it was great to see so many people there.
We enjoyed a visit to the two signal boxes of the Railway Centre – Frome Mineral Junction and Radstock North, followed by the Society AGM.
Tom, Roger, Brian and Danny all gave their speeches about the various aspects of the project and progress so far, and a discussion session was held after the meeting where many people suggested and developed ideas, particularly on the theme of the presentation and interpretation of the the interlocking aspects of MAS.
Thank you to everyone who came along to Didcot Railway Centre over the bank holiday weekends – it was great to meet you all.
Saturday 24th May was a particularly important day for us as it was our ‘grand signing’ of the agreement between Didcot Railway Centre and Swindon Panel Society, which cements our future as a permanent exhibit at DRC and the commitment for the construction of the new building.
Heavy rain was forecast all day but the sun came out at precisely the right time for Tom O’Flaherty (SPS Chairman), Richard Croucher (GWS Chairman) and Ann Middleton (GWS Commercial Manager) to sign the agreement in the presence of Tim Leighton (Network Rail General Manager, Western Route) and Scott Wilgrove (Didcot’s Town Mayor and also a volunteer guard!), in view of many members, supporters and cameras.
We had a meeting at Didcot on Friday (11 April) to discuss the many arrangements required to be made for our forthcoming move.
Final agreements have been reached on access arrangements to the site, provision of services, insurance arrangements etc. We are very grateful to Didcot Railway Centre for the help and support they have given us and we look forward to working together in future in the setting-up and running of the Panel.
We then hosted a visit to Banbury North and South boxes on Saturday (12 April). 20 members enjoyed a very informative tour of the signal boxes, both of which are due to close in the next few years.
Several members have posted their photos of the day:
Photographs by “Llangollen Signalman”:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/llangollen_signalman/sets/72157643853412823/
As well as on our Facebook page:
https://www.facebook.com/swindonpanel
Thank you very much to all who attended and if you would like to put up any photos of the day on Facebook or email them to us then please feel free to do so. Thanks also to the signallers in the boxes for putting up with us!
We attended the “Once in a Blue Moon” event at Didcot Railway Centre this weekend with our stand. The event was well-attended and we were particularly pleased to have a presence at our future home site.
The event was hosted to celebrate the coming-together of three steam locomotives in BR express passenger blue livery – King Edward II, Tornado and Sir Nigel Gresley.
Lots of visitors, both from within the Great Western Society and outside were very interested in what we were doing, which is very encouraging. We hope to build some stronger links between our organisation and the GWS volunteers in the near future; watch this space!
Thanks to everyone who came from far and wide on 15 March to our talk and visit to Swindon Panel.
We managed to Squeeze in 31 visitors in two groups during the day with much photographing and talking and seemingly a good time was had by all.
Additionally thanks to the NR staff in the panel for putting up with us and also to all who signed up and/ or donated. The non-stop loco hauled special was a nice little bonus too.
If you have any photos you would like to share of the day then please feel free to post them on our FB page.
We displayed our stand at Swindon Model Railway show (MODRAIL) this weekend. The event was held in one of the former workshops of Swindon Works, so made an excellent surrounding!
Thank you to everyone who came and chatted to us. Lots of leaflets and information was given out and lots of people showed lots of interest, which we hope will get more local Swindon people involved.
We will displaying at MODRAIL in Swindon this coming Saturday 8th March. This is in Swindon STEAM Museum between 10am and 4.30pm.
http://www.modrail.org.uk/modrail-2014
If you’re in the area, why not come and visit us? Be sure to introduce yourself so we can put a face to a name. Visitors to the model show can also get a discounted ticked to visit the Steam Museum which well worth a walk round. The Steam Museum is easy to find driving to Swindon by following the brown tourist road signs, or is an easy walk from Swindon station (approx 10 minutes) (link to route below).
Or if you have an hour or two to spare why not come and help us on the stand? There are no special skills required, we just chat to visitors and give them Swindon Panel leaflets to take away. It’s amazing some of the stories of involvement with signalling in the Swindon area people seem to have, which we are especially looking forward to as this event is in Swindon itself. Let us know if you can help 🙂
We look forward to seeing you there!!
We displayed our stand at Newbury Model Railway show this weekend. Thank you to everyone who came and chatted to us.
Lots of leaflets and information was given out, which we hope will spread the word a bit more.
Swindon Panel mugs and pin badges are now available!