[lonegroover]

Hello.

My name's James. Travelling by train has occupied a special part of my psyche for a long time. For many years I've had a recurring dream in various different flavours at least twice a week, in which I'm travelling by train, often turning up at some unfamiliar station and trying to work out which train to take from which platform to get closer to home.

I think the seed was planted when, thirty years ago, I started travelling between Huddersfield Polytechnic and Hartlepool every weekend, by British Rail. I was fascinated to enter this obscure world of interconnecting rails in one town, and emerge from it in another. More recently, when I lived in London, I'd often travel between London Bridge and Charing Cross, over Borough Market, across the rooftops and across the river, and that was a joy.

But it was only after travelling on the Great Central Railway on Saturday, on a journey which was a gift from my charming other half, that I decided to dip a toe into the waters of Railway Enthusiasm. I'm by no means a railway anorak, never had a great interest in the 'hardware' really, know next to nothing about the various types of trains and carriages.

But I'm particularly interested to know one thing, and I'm sure many people here will know. On my travels on the aforementioned heritage railway line on Saturday, I had the great pleasure of travelling in an old-fashioned railway compartment (I'll try to attach two pics).

When were these phased out? I remember travelling on one from Huddersfield to Leeds sometime in late 1979, but even then it was a very rare treat. Any idea when this particular one might have been manufactured, or last used?

Thanks!
James