The Colin Allbright Collection, Part IV: Peachfield Bridge

This week's blog post sees us returning to Peachfield Road bridge with some of Colin Allbright's shots from the late 1970s. Apart from the ancient rolling stock and the signal posts which were trimmed down in July 2016, not much has changed around here in the intervening decades. Nevertheless, these pictures provide an interesting glimpse of a site which was at the time still coming to terms with the closure of its local station. Note the old buildings belonging to Malvern Wells GWR station still standing in the abandoned station forecourt and the comparatively well maintained lineside brambles!

A DMU passes the abandoned Malvern Wells station.

A DMU on the way to Great Malvern.

A clear shot of the line down to Malvern.

Peachfield Road bridge from the north.

The semaphore signals (replaced and shortened 2016).

The underpass beneath the railway line on Malvern Common.

More Pictures of Brotheridge Green Shed

For this week's blog post I decided to return to one of my favourite spots near Malvern; Brotheridge Green nature reserve. I snapped my original series of pictures here in March 2016: it was late on an afternoon and the crummy camera phone I had with me at the time decided to turn a lot of the pictures a very evocative but also very distorted sepia red colour. With my photo editing skills today being much better than they were then, I decided to repair these old pictures and to take a few new ones along the way. I think the Brotheridge Green page (and particularly the photographs of the tumbledown permanent way hut there) are now much improved.

The Colin Allbright Collection, Part VII: Great Malvern Station

This week's update includes some more pictures of Great Malvern Station. These pictures are from the late 1970s, and show the station before it was gutted by fire in 1986. The shots taken from Platform One are particularly interesting, as they show the long-derelict Midland bay a few years before it was finally filled in and sold for housing. Notice also the old British Rail trappings, also now consigned to history.

The front of the station with the old British Rail awning.

Looking across the station car park.

Looking across Platform One to the derelict Midland bay platform.

The view from Avenue Road bridge, 1/2...

...and 2/2.

'The Worm' and the wooden track crossing below the bridge.

Dymock Daffodil Trail - Vell Mill

Last week I decided to pay a visit to Gloucestershire Wildlife Trust's beautiful nature reserve at Vell Mill, a small field adjoining the River Leadon east of Dymock. During the heyday of the railways, special excursion trips were aranged from the large cities to see the daffodils in south Herefordshire and Gloucestershire, so I took some pictures of this year's array. Dymock station itself sat on the Ledbury-Gloucester Railway and opened in 1885, closing eventually in 1959.

Today, Dymock has no railway station or indeed any railway line nearby, although a few relics remain. For example, a tell-tale hedge line still bisects the village from north to south, and an old railway bridge continues to carry Kempley Road over a now abandoned cutting.

This post is not strictly railway related, but after my interesting walk along the Ledbury Town Trail over Christmas I thought it would be nice to take another look at sites outside Worcestershire.

The information board at Vell Mill.

Looking west towards Dymock.

Looking east across the field.

Two trumpets.

A cluster of daffodils.

The bend in the River Leadon on the southern flank of the reserve.

Nice weather for it!

The Colin Allbright Collection, Part II: Fruitlands Estate

This week's blog update takes us back to Colin Allbright's collection, this time to fill a gap by revisiting the old buffers outside Malvern Wells signal box. These shots were taken in the late 1970s and show the area behind the new Fruitlands housing estate, north of Colwall Tunnel. There will be more from this collection to come in the following weeks but meanwhile, enjoy!

Skid row: the buffers, 1/2...

...and part 2/2.

Down the line, with the Fruitlands estate on the bend.

New houses on the railway line. Shame they got rid of the nearby station!

Malvern Wells box in the distance.

Back down to the lineside.