- Hello, Welcome to Whitstable, the sign's there.
The station is right here, I haven't travelled here by train.
I am allowed to work though so I've driven down here today
but also, if I wanted to come here by train today
I couldn't because as you can clearly see in the background
there's some engineering trucks going on there
because, like a bad penny in a lot of my videos,
it's Chris.
Chris - [Chris] Hi
why have you officially as part of Network Rail,
invited me down to Whitstable this weekend.
- We're still renewing the railway,
throughout November, throughout lockdown,
we're still rebuilding the railway.
We still need to explain to people why we're doing it.
We're right behind people's gardens.
So I invited you down to show you what we're up to.
We're digging up the railway, whole lot tracks, sleepers,
ballast, everything right down to the
clagging nasty clay underneath
and yeah, come and have a look.
- Chris does this mean I get to wear PPE?
- What's a Myzone Chris?
- This is a little thing that goes
on the back of your helmet.
And if you get too close to a piece of operating machinery
that might have a big arm swinging around or whatever it
goes off and vibrates and warns you that you're within the
exclusion zone.
I look foward to the train being nice and smooth next week.
- You're gonna look like Bane.
- Bane?
Oh, Batman.
- Yeah.
- Can you do a Bane impression?
- No
We all know Chris. I'm also introducing now ... Daren
[Daren] - Hello.
Daren could you explain,
for the benefit of the viewer
why you have a white hat and why I have a blue hat.
- I'm fully trained and competent with
lots of experience.
And unfortunately you're not,
you're brand new to the railway and you haven't actually
taken the PTS Certificate.
So I'm just looking at the age of that
particular piece of rail,
which is probably comparable to what was on this side,
or that was 1972.
- So that's how many years old?
That's err 48 years old I believe.
- Is it normal for rails in Britain to be
almost 50 years old before they're replaced?
- Certain routes have less traffic, less weight on them.
So they last a bit longer. This one obviously has done.
So it doesn't appear to be anything
significantly wrong with it,
but that will be replaced in due course.
- This is Whitstable station and a view that I've never,
never seen before.
Feel like my head is popping up above the track.
- [Geoff] Here go the train coming in.
So he's bringing in empty wagons to take old, ballast away.
Is he about to sound his horn very loudly as he goes past
So there's the train. As the train moves Daren,
you spotted some lumps of clay ??
What we got here?
- [Daren] This is clay.
This is what's underneath our formation.
So you can see what the railway is built on.
It's very malleable.
- [Geoff] So I can just break that with my hand.
It's just, but you were saying so in the winter,
obviously it gets wet.
And then in the summer, it dries out.
- It dries out.
So it shrinks down, which is why we get the,
the movement on the geometry of the track geometry.
- Okay, so up ahead, I can see the gang, the crew,
the team, they've cleared the old track bed
and they're loading the old
ballast onto...
- All the old ballast,
old spoils going onto a train to be taken away now.
So the first part was we cut the rail,
we cut it into sections, 30 foot sections.
The second phase was we've actually lifted out the panel.
So that's the sleepers and the rails
at the same time onto a separate train.
And then we come through and we start digging into the,
the correct levels.
So the next stage obviously will be,
to put a sand blanket down.
So that'd be another separate train.
That'd be the sand blanket here,
and that'll be levelled out and we'll put a geomembrane down
and then we'll put the new
ballast spread on top of that.
After that new sleepers will go in.
And then obviously these are the rails.
These are the new rails that are under the train at the
moment in the forefoot,
they'll be thimbled in and all clipped up
and then be ready to tamp.
- I love that phrase thimble,
because you make it sound like sewing.
- It's quite similar.
So one of the machines actually lifts up one rail at a time
and he just lifts it across.
And it's very flexible. As I said earlier,
the rail will bend and snake into place.
- [Geoff] Chris, just repeat what you just said.
- Up until in railway terms
until relatively recently
trains on this line emptied their toilets straight onto the track
i mean they haven't done that for a long time, about 20 years
but back in the day, the Mark I's they empited their toilets
are you ... are you telling me that we're about to walk in, you know
we already are!
so you've got to imagine that this has got centuries
over a centuries worth, of human effluvia
that's soaked into it!
What word did you just use?
[*keyboard clicks*]
[*toilet flush*]
when you see them digging out the track bed
and dump ing it, there's a reason why
you wear a mask, and it's not just silica dust, it's .. that!
this way Chris
follow the blue hat! *chuckles*
(machinery)
Daren, just re-cap, so at the moment, digging all the old stuff out
when the new rails come in, clearly
people don't lift those up 'cause they're heavy
so where are your cranes and stuff that lift the rails into place?
They're actually these kind of machines ...
so these just have a different attachment on
and they will actualy lift the rails in, in place
and Chris, what we're gonna do
is that we're gonna come back
tonight ... and get some nighttime shots
so i'm disrupting the timeline
wibble-wobbly - Doctor Who - of the video
by cutting foward, to when we came at night, so stand on the footbridge, and then i'll
i'll cut back to the daytime
(rattle of Diesel train engine)
and Chris, what we go here? - Chris, well this is a spider
it's a mechanical spider that we let loose on the people of Whitstable it displeases *chuckle*
and when it's not doing that?
it's a hydraulic sleeper-spacer
so what it does you have the sleepers stacked on the back of the train
and they're just stacked in a row
this picks them all up, and then the driver presses a button
in the cab, and it automatically
spaces them out the correct distance apart
and lowers them onto the track ... BOOM!
i'm not sure whether this RRV is actually get back onto track
to carry on diggging, and join and help these guys
just makes the dig go quicker, bit more machines obviously
I gotta ask!
how do you get this job?
were you previously a bus driver, or train driver, how do you switch to driving ... this?
i just came onto it from ... the plant side
and progressed, to the rail side, for more of a challenge
so what is your job title, what is it you say you do?
errm... Road Rail plant operator!
OK, so this is what you do, all the time, you drive these vechicles?
Yes
OK - it must be a unique view of the railway
it's different *laughs* it's very different
Chris you've just spotte, hang on, so this is a different train to that train, that's three trains here today
yeah, that's right so there's one right in the distance which is
which has got all the old track panels and rails and scrap on it
there's these ones that'll have all this muck on it
and then there'll be a conveyor belt of engineering trains
that run through the side all day
dropping off different things, and taking different things away
oh, and by the way, your "MyZone" i can see on the back of your head, it did buzz didn't it?
oh it's been buzzing all the way through yeah, absolutely
there's actually, you can see the MyZone box
it's on the RRV over there
it's got a .. a little unit on it
that talks to these on the back of your helmet
so yeah, it's been buzzing all the way
right Darren, we've got some old rail here
so ... if you can see on the end
you can see it's kind of sharper on the field edge, or this is the 6-foot edge
and it's worn slightly, on the internal edge
which is the running edge, so the wheel
rail interface, is on this side
and the metal, actually, sometimes moves across
it doesn't run out very often, but it moves across
and obviously there is a certain limit
to how long it can
be like that before we have to change it, and obviously this one
in this case, is being changed
we're walking back ... somebody, err
somebody leave an iPhone?
just ... found! *laughs*
if this is your phone
it's here ... we've found it
we're back at Whitstable, i've taken my
hat off ... you can take your hat off!
we're gonna wrap up, my final question is
again, i'm always
conscious, so many people ...
regular punters, commuters
they turn up at a station and they just see a sign that says
"no trains" and they go "uuuh, gotta get a bus" or whatever
but, it's really important work
that you do, because what maintaining rail, it prevents
accidents, it allows train to run at high-speeds, what does ...
what's the actual point of replacing rail?
Obviously, a lot of our equipment becomes life-expired
and that's the safely aspect - number one
number two, as you just alluded to there
train speeds, if we get them higher speeds
people get to where they want to go, quicker
we don't have delays, it costs money as well obviously
and .. reputational
Network Rail are trying to make sure we maintain a perfectly safe
speed ... railway, that runs on time, and to budget
and you're out .. every weekend, and overnights
and Christmas, doing this kind of stuff right?
that's correct yes, not personally - i'm not out every single weekend
but, i have enough projects a year
about thirty projects a year that i oversee
so this is just one of those thirty for this year
Ok .. Covid! we can't shake hands
from a distance
do you wanna do like ... like a fist bump?
cha-ching! there we go
thank you, thank you very much!
see you on another site somepoint
take care
bye Daren, bye!