#Railnatter

#RailNatter Episode 55: Why Is Standard Track Gauge Four Foot Eight And A Half Inches?

In a change to the previously advertised schedule, I’m filling in with a pre-record in this week’s #RailNatter​ (we’ll have our first dual-guest episode next week)… We’re covering the origins of “standard” track gauge!
We’ll bust open the myths about horse’s bottoms and Romans (see also: the Space Shuttle episode) and look at the far more interesting reality of early railway infrastructure development – and not for the last time I am sure!
Join LIVE(ish) to keep up to date with the chat, even if I am not about to follow!
Enjoyed this? Please do consider supporting #RailNatter​ at https://patreon.com/garethdennis​ or throw loose change at me via https://paypal.me/garethdennis​. Join in the discussion at https://garethdennis.co.uk/discord​.

#RailNatter Episode 54: The Engineer’s Guide to Being A Good Crayonista (Part 2)

This week’s #RailNatter​ is a return to the railway colouring-in book!
In the previous Crayonista episode, we listed seven top tips for creating vaguely useful or realistic railway alignments. This time I’ll be jumping into Google Earth and looking in more detail at the process of actually creating sensible alignments using these top tips…
Where are we linking up? Well, I will be attempting to add Wetherby back into the national rail network!
Join LIVE to watch along and have your say!
Enjoyed this? Please do consider supporting #RailNatter​ at https://patreon.com/garethdennis​ or throw loose change at me via https://paypal.me/garethdennis​. Join in the discussion at https://garethdennis.co.uk/discord​.

#RailNatter Episode 53: A page-turn through the Scottish Greens’ “Rail for All” report

We’re flicking through another PDF on screen today, and this time it is the rather exciting Rail for All report created for the Scottish Greens.
No other UK party has created a document like this in modern history – and the country is all the worse off for it. But does it hold up to scrutiny?
Join LIVE to find out.
Enjoyed this? Please do consider supporting #RailNatter​ at https://patreon.com/garethdennis​ or throw loose change at me via https://paypal.me/garethdennis​. Join in the discussion at https://garethdennis.co.uk/discord​.

#RailNatter Episode 52: The #RailNatter Anniversary Special

We’ve done it – #RailNatter​ is a year old!
To celebrate, we’re getting all of the Patreon supporters on to talk about their favourite moments and episodes, and more importantly to hand out the GOLDEN PANDROL CLIP to the award winning episodes…
Join the chaos LIVE at the usual time!
Enjoyed this? Please do consider supporting #RailNatter​ at https://patreon.com/garethdennis​ or throw loose change at me via https://paypal.me/garethdennis​. Join in the discussion at https://garethdennis.co.uk/discord​.

#RailNatter Episode 51: Railway staff safety through time (with Mike Esbester)

Much as the situation appears to be improving year on year, the railways still aren’t safe enough, as we were tragically reminded of earlier this year with the death of Tyler Byrne at Surbiton station.
But how has railway staff safety changed over the years? Is there anything we can learn from accidents from decades and even centuries gone by? There are few better people to ask than Dr Mike Esbester, who leads the Railway Work, Life & Death project out of the University of Porstmouth. We’ll talk about both contemporary and historic safety incidents, and see what we can learn from both.
Join us LIVE as we chat about the project and what Mike has learned…
Enjoyed this? Please do consider supporting #RailNatter​ at https://patreon.com/garethdennis​ or throw loose change at me via https://paypal.me/garethdennis​. Join in the discussion at https://garethdennis.co.uk/discord​.

#RailNatter Episode 50: Space Shuttle Rocket Boosters (with John Morgan Cristoph)

This week’s #RailNatter​ is harking back to the days of AOL and email chains (oh, and more recently, THAT daft Twitter thread about track gauge, horses bottoms and rocket boosters)…
Yes, friend of the show John Morgan Christoph is joining us to bring his space and geology skills to bear and guide us through the more interesting spacey side-stories associated with this silly set of myths! Why did the Shuttle use solid rocket boosters? Why did they travel by rail? How did the railways help build the Kennedy Space Centre in the first place?
Join us LIVE at the usual time to find out this and more!
The Hyperloop paper is here: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/…​
The Native Land map can be found here: https://native-land.ca/​
Enjoyed this? Please do consider supporting #RailNatter​ at patreon.com/garethdennis or throw loose change at me via paypal.me/garethdennis. Join in the discussion at garethdennis.co.uk/discord.

#RailNatter Episode 49: West Yorkshire mass transit

It’s another solo #RailNatter​, and this week we are also doing another page turn…
This time we are picking through the West Yorkshire mass transit proposals. Are they any good? Is there anything that needs to change? What is the likelihood they will actually happen? Is there anything we can learn from them?
All this and more, LIVE and with you lot asking the questions!
Enjoyed this? Please do consider supporting #RailNatter​ at patreon.com/garethdennis or throw loose change at me via paypal.me/garethdennis. Join in the discussion at garethdennis.co.uk/discord.

#RailNatter Episode 48: Tunnels Under the US Capitol (with Ann Gavaghan)

We’re back for another #RailNatter​, and this one is somewhat topical…
A month after everyone got a really good look at the inside of the US Capitol buildings, we are joined by the brilliant Ann Gavaghan (@anngav on Twitter) to talk about the tunnels underneath this complex of buildings.
Join us LIVE as the secrets are revealed to ask all your questions!
Enjoyed this? Please do consider supporting #RailNatter​ at patreon.com/garethdennis or throw loose change at me via paypal.me/garethdennis. Join in the discussion at garethdennis.co.uk/discord.