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Virgin Trains London Euston service 21 April 2004
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virgin trains service
afternoon
traveller "...
 Running
ten minutes late, likely to miss my connection at Macclesfield. [Train
manager]
suggests I change at Preston (which I do). Realise after I've been
sitting on the London Euston train at Preston (waiting for thirty-five
minutes) that I should have stayed on the Bournemouth train and changed
at Reading [and travelled in to London Paddington].
[After Wigan North Western:] Beautiful soft light, low through the
trees and over the roofs and houses at Wigan. Mist... is creating a
dreamy, peaceful air. The wide windows let in flashing beams of sunlight,
broken by catinery pillars - creates a luminous strobe effect. On the
other side of the train the sky is a dark grey and stormy, like the
North Sea in winter. I am struck by the polarity that the train creates.
Two weathers, two worlds... The thick layer of dust on the windows gives
the sunlight a softer yellow, the soft air of summer, reducing the while
edge of winter sun. Although the birch trees lining the track are bare,
the warm stuffy carriage relaxes me. I can imagine summer and spring.
[After Warrington Bank Quay:] Many of those around me look out at the
dotted mobile radio masts, the marsh-planes and town beyond, the dark
watery sky and sun brightened pylons, almost white, the power lines
lit up, white arcs against the sky... The sun has gone. Wetter clouds
are arriving from the South.
[Before Crewe:] The cloud is speckling the sky, coalescing into dark
clouds. The yellow sun, a disk appearing and disappearing within their
midst. The countryside is flat, light undulating. Large farms dot the
space, with Georgian farmhouses, several corrugated outbuildings, white
painted cottages. Land Rovers, green silos, and everywhere a trail of
pylons, telephone cables and mobile antennae criss-crossing in the air.
The networks interweave amongst the occasional oak trees and chimneys.
Then, suddenly, we are in suburbia, and the network is television. Each
building seems to have four, sturdy, bristling TV aerials, all pointing
North, back down the train line.
[After Crewe:] The light is beginning to fade, clouds are thickening
and the day is drawing slowly to a close.
It is cold in the carriage. The air from the vestibule sends a draft
through as the door rocks back and forth, trying to close, but kept
open [by luggage on the pressure pad].
Dusk. Blue light and orange fluorescence. It feels hot and stuffy [in
the carriage] like an oppressive summer heat, contributing to a sense
of low frustration and waiting impatience. [notebook: 10 March 2004
2pm]
how will you make this journey?
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