I used to live facing the freight avoider at Holgate Junction in York, and it was most comforting when you could hear the trains, even the class 60 hauled Jarrow Tanks that used to sit at the signal near my window was never a problem. The only restless night I had was when the Railgrinder was shuttling past one night!
I remember once, when I was working for Nexus (Tyne & Wear PTE) the metros were being diverted along a little used line around past the road entrance of South Gosforth depot, this very short peice of track passes a row of houses and is normally used by the odd ECS or engineering train. A resident of this street called up to complain saying "why are your trains using an illegal line", "we cant get any peace" and during her rank I heard a furious male voice shouting "theres another one going past" and "tell them I'm going to our MP"
