SUDDEN CHANGE OF TOPIC - DOCTOR WHO "WARRIORS' GATE"

This blog is dedicated to my autism so I am allowed to change the topic very suddenly to something else I want to talk about. In this case, it's the 1981 Doctor Who serial "Warriors' Gate". I am a huge fan of how weird this is and how it doesn't really make any sense!! 

It went over budget and behind schedule because the director wanted a load of fancy shots which really aren't that fancy but I think were for 1980s television. Also the only other things I can find that the director directed were documentaries about films, so I am really not sure why they got him to direct this. He got fired halfway through (then later rehired) due to the serial going over-budget and behind schedule.

I enjoy the sets even though I think there's only two of them - the Gateway and the slavers' spaceship. The Gateway appears in two forms though, a past form and a present form, the present form being covered in cobwebs and dead Gundan robots. The cobwebbed present form is really creepy looking but they probably did overdo it with the cobwebs (I do not care though, ha ha ha). 

The Gateway and the TARDIS

The Gundan robots also I think look very cool, but I have been told by my friend, who I watched it with yesterday, that they look like plastic, which is probably because they are plastic but that's OK. They were made by the human slaves of the lion people (Tharils), in order to get to the Gateway and kill the Tharils, as the humans could not approach the Gateway because of the time winds (I think). I don't see how that allows the human slavers to approach the Gateway, but maybe that's because its power is gone or something? Unsure.

The Tharils can see through time and even alter time, and they seem kind of like the Time Lords of E-space but then have become enslaved for use as navigators on human spaceships. 

Biroc the Tharil

The captain of the slavers is a guy called Rorvik and he's like a super cheesy villain but his crew just don't care about anything he's saying and only want their money which is quite funny. 

The cliffhanger to part 3 is one of my favourite things ever - rivalled only by the terrifying tiled floor cliffhanger in Death to the Daleks. The Doctor has just found out that the Tharils were the cruel masters that the Gundans were built to fight, and he throws wine on the table in anger. Then Romana says that the Doctor's in danger, rushes down towards him, the Gundans burst into the Gateway and then time changes and we're back to the dusty cobwebbed gateway, surrounded by the slavers. It doesn't make a huge amount of sense to me but I am a big fan.

Watching this story makes me want to write science fiction but then I always realise that writing fiction and especially speech makes me actually just turn inside-out from cringe. 

Bache railway station

Another relatively new one (1984)! Bache is one of the four unstaffed stations on Merseyrail, the others being Capenhurst, Overpool and Little Sutton. I have wondered whether this is because they are all technically outside Merseytravel's area? But really I have no idea. 

An interesting thing to note, that sadly I could not get a picture of, is that just before the train gets to Bache when going towards Chester you can see the disused platforms of Upton-by-Chester station, which was replaced by Bache.

This green station sign perplexed me. Was it intentionally green? Seems unlikely, but none of the others have become green, and I don't see how a grey sticker would age to become green. 

Another sign-related curiosity is that Bache doesn't seem to have a cube sign. We searched quite intensively for it and could not see any sign (ha ha) of it! However, we did see a foliage-covered sign signifying the entrance to the station, which is not much use since it is barely visible. There was what must be a sign dating from at least close to when the station was built, showing that people must walk to the other side of the station for trains to Chester.

One of the entrances we found while searching for the elusive cube sign led to a suspicious Morrison's tunnel (the Morrison's was built at the same time as the station I believe). The tunnel was actually fine, it was just a bit strange.

The Customer Information Screens are also smaller than usual, which is odd and probably something only sad people like me would notice. This is similar to the ones at Green Lane, and another station I think which I have sadly forgotten (please forgive me!). 

It seems that in a bizarre attempt to beautify the station, Merseyrail have put stock images on the fences of each platform? I'm not sure what the purpose of this is, and maybe they aren't stock images? I have no idea really.

Last but not least, here is a view of the station from the footbridge. The all-important Morrison's can be seen to the left of the image, looking very depressing. 

I would recommend a visit to Bache if you want to be bored and leave immediately! 

Privatisation (and its effects on railway signage!)

The privatisation of British Rail in the 1990s makes me really mad, and I wasn't even alive when it happened! I understand that British Rail did a lot of closures of stations and lines, but I think we can blame a lot of this on Ernest Marples (evil), who wanted business for his company in building the motorways. Privatisation has led to more public money being put into the railway than under British Rail, and yet all the profits go to the shareholders of the Train Operating Companies (and ROSCOS, who are also evil)!

Another thing it has done (not the main problem at all but it upsets me) is make variations in all the signs and liveries! Each company wants to have its own corporate identity, and so Rail Alphabet was mostly gone, apart from on Merseyrail for some reason, and weird liveries were introduced.

Here's an example of the visual mess that privatisation has caused! Gobowen station is still primarily painted and decorated in the style of Arriva Trains Wales, but with Transport for Wales stickers on the signs and with Transport for Wales posters in the blue-framed notice boards. It's very upsetting!

In addition to this, there is one sign I noticed that dates even further back. The below sign has a crudely painted blue stripe, signifying Arriva Trains Wales, but under that stripe you can just about see the logo for Wales & Borders, the TOC that came before. The fact that TOCs can change so quickly means that there is not a rational reason to change all these signs, and when they do it creates a lot of waste.

At least it's in Rail Alphabet!

The government's proposal for "Great British Railways" is a VERY slight improvement, with a silly attempt at patriotism by adding "Great" to the name. To me it seems to be a sort of half-attempt at nationalisation, with franchises being replaced with concession contracts to run certain parts of the railway. GBR would set fares and hopefully make the branding uniform, although Rail Alphabet 2 is silly and gross. 

To add to the confusion, Labour have said that they will only end franchise contracts at the end of their pre-agreed term. This means that by the end of Labour's first term in government, some contracts will still be running. This seems like a disorganised method which will prolong a sense of transition and confusion, and seems motivated by a desire to look "sensible" and "pragmatic". 

The point of privatisation was always very clearly a money-making exercise, and it caused deaths due to Railtrack's negligence in the late 1990s and early 2000s, which should not be forgotten! 

Aigburth railway station

 Another on the Hunts Cross line, one of the three that was there from the beginning as well! Due to this, Aigburth is quite similar to Cressington in its design. It can only be accessed from one side of the track, on which there is a quite old and elegant station building. Both platforms can only be accessed by quite steep stairs, making accessibility an issue.

One thing I noticed, and have noticed at other stations on this line, is a prediction of the future! On the sign which shows the stations on the line, a "Liverpool Baltic" station is visible. This station is planned to open in 2027, on the site of the disused St. James station. However, for some reason Merseyrail have already made the signs that include it? They put stickers over it, but of course on a lot of these signs the stickers have already been removed. Must be very confusing for people unfamiliar with the network.

Some of the signage at Aigburth was quite old-looking, in particular this Rail Alphabet no smoking sign in the waiting room.

There are waiting rooms on both platforms, which is quite unusual for most stations today, and the station, like Cressington and St Michaels, has a very suburban and almost rural feel to it, despite where it is.

I hope you feel informed about Aigburth.

Wavertree Technology Park railway station

You cannot imagine my disappointment and shock when I arrived at Wavertree Technology Park only to discover that the signs had very recently been changed!!!!! Very shocking and means I have missed out on a chance to document the signs as they were, not that they were very exciting but that's OK. I still have things to talk about!

First of all, this station is relatively new, so its design is very grey. It is accessed by a bridge that goes over the track, which is also where the ticket office is. It's vaguely similar to Kirkdale, but I haven't written about that yet so there's not much point making the comparison.

A class 331 going through Wavertree Technology Park

I wasn't able to get a good picture of the signs on the bridge, but there were some good ones in Rail Alphabet saying which platforms to use to get to Liverpool and Manchester. 

Here is one of the new running-in boards. Notice how it is in Rail Alphabet again, which the previous ones weren't. It also has the Merseytravel logo on the left side, rather than the Merseyrail logo that they previously had. In the below image is one of the old signs, with the old Northern logo hidden behind a white sticker. In addition to this, you can see one of the old Information signs, with the Merseyrail logo in the bottom right corner. 

The replaced Information sign.

Another interesting feature of the station is the two analogue clocks, one on each platform. Both show the wrong time, and both show different times from one another. I would imagine this is because they are now considered obsolete, due to the digital information screens on the platforms. 

Ince and Elton railway station

This will be a slightly different post! Me (Athena) and Super Autism Blog special correspondent Ray went on a train and bus journey to Ince and Elton, and so part of this post will be detailing that journey! First, some context. Ince and Elton is on the Hooton to Helsby line, and when the line was electrified to Ellesmere Port in 1994, Ince and Elton was not included. This left a short line from Ellesmere Port to Helsby, which was very uneconomical to run and so was cut to two services a day in each direction. This is why Ray and I took the bus there from Ellesmere Port, as the trains are only at around 6 in the morning and 6 in the evening - not very convenient!

We started our journey by meeting in Hamilton Square on the Chester and Ellesmere Port-bound platform. I was worried Ray had got lost in between the two platforms, but this turned out not to be the case. I asked them to provide some comments on the stations we passed through, and some of them were even funny!

"Ince and Elton. There is no Elton John there!" - while passing through Rock Ferry.

"I have nothing to say about Port Sunlight. It's all old people." - while passing through Port Sunlight.

"I'm getting spat on in Spital." - at Spital. 

"I'm rakin' the Bromborough." - at Bromborough Rake.

"I get angry when I think about 4K footage." - at Eastham Rake, and while there we also talked a lot about an upcoming Among Us TV show.

"Should get bigger." - at Little Sutton.

"When water is too cold I get scared to drink it." - at Ellesmere Port.

While the train was stopped at Overpool, we noticed that, similar to Aughton Park and some other stations, including Ellesmere Port itself, the running-in boards did not have the Merseyrail "M" logo. This perplexed us slightly, but could be something to do with it not being in the Merseytravel area?? Unsure. 

Ellesmere Port station. The line stretching into the distance goes towards Helsby.

Once we arrived, we walked to the Ellesmere Port bus interchange, where we waited for the number 2 bus towards Runcorn. We got off at Elton, and walked about 5 minutes to the station.

Ince and Elton station.

While at Ince and Elton, I noticed something vaguely interesting about the signs - again, likely only interesting to me! For some reason, the signs have somewhat recently been replaced to be more plain ones written in Rail Alphabet. These new signs seem to have been placed directly over the old Northern ones, and the edges of the old signs can still be seen, as in the picture below.

We also thought it would be funny to conduct a brief interview with Ray once at the station, which I will reproduce for you here:

Q: How are you finding Ince & Elton station?

A: It's very busy, there are many people around.

Q: That's true and confirmed by the Super Autism Blog fact checker. Could you describe the station for our loyal readers?

A: Hi Ray, the loyal reader. It's very crowded, so many people, so overwhelming.

Q: Could you also give a real description?

A: It's very quiet, it's very peaceful, there's lots of trees. There's a lot of litter, there's mushrooms which is cool, and the shelters are a bit shit. 130 people came here last year!

Q: What do you think of the crossing?

A: I like the crossing, I like that I could probably stand there for hours and not get hit by a train. (This is a bad idea and is not endorsed by the Super Autism Blog.)

The platform 2 waiting shelter, complete with litter. The dark blue rectangle shows where a poster used to be, perhaps a timetable?

Mushrooms.

The crossing between platforms. The path on the left side of the crossing leads to a different bridge over the tracks.

Nature is healing in the platform 2 waiting shelter.

Another interesting signage autism point for you all - on platform 2 there is a very outdated sign that says that trains to Chester and Hooton call at that platform. This has not been the case since 1993. The sign is shown below. 

Once we had spent about an hour at the station, we decided to return to the bus stop and make our way back! I hope you have been informed about Ince and Elton station.

Cressington railway station

From what I have seen, (so this may be wrong, I will find out later once I have visited and documented more stations!) Cressington, St Michaels and Aigburth are quite different in the way they are constructed. I would imagine this is because of their being part of a seperate railway before they were connected to Merseyrail via the link tunnel during the late 1970s. Brunswick, Liverpool South Parkway and Hunts Cross were added to Merseyrail later, so do not share these design differences. 

In the above image, two class 507s (now shockingly rare!) are going through Cressington station towards Southport, with the bridge being the only way in and out of the Southport-bound platform. This station is once again very inaccessible, as there are no lifts or ramps. The station building has a steep staircase leading up to the street-level ticket office.

The real important stuff at last - the signs!! I think, due to the fact that they have a relatively unusual tone of grey on the bar and obviously use the older form of having the Merseyrail text in the bottom right corner, these running-in boards are from the 1990s or at least have been made to look like it! They are also, unusually, all either set into the wall or on top of a lower wall, rather than using free-standing signs. 

I did also notice this drinking fountain thing, with 1871 on it - 7 years after the station was first opened!!