The 50 loco challenge
THERE was a time, and not all that long ago either, when seeing fewer than 50 locos in a day would have counted as an unexpected disappointment. Ever since Privatisation in the mid-1990s, however, the number and variety of locomotive-hauled passenger and freight traffic has ebbed away – most notably with the introduction of multiple units to services on the CrossCountry network and the West Coast and Great Eastern main lines, plus the withdrawal of HSTs from East Coast and Great Western inter-city work, the loss of wagonload and trip freights, and the introduction of Class 66s as the ‘standard’ freight loco. All of which means that today, even though passenger and freight traffic can be described as healthy – and still above pre-Privatisation levels, despite the Covid pandemic – you will…
