In the second of what will definitely now be a three-part miniseries on Ireland, we are joined by Iain (anoniaino on Twitter!) to talk about the what Ireland's railways look like today... lining us up nicely for the next and final episode on what's next!

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Before the election, the UK Labour Party commissioned Juergen Maier to head a review into railways and urban transport strategy... And it was published literally today. So the hell with the original schedule, let's take a look and see if it proposes anything useful - and more importantly consider if it will be ignored by Rachel Reeves.

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With the election approaching, we do a page-turn of the Public Accounts Committee's report into rail reform in Britain, as published back in May.

Six years have passed since the DfT said the railway needed reform, and four years have passed since initiating that reform programme, via its white paper (we've been through the ill-fated Williams-Shapps Plan For Rail already) in 2021. We were supposed to have Great British Railways by March 2024. No such organisation has appeared.

The reason it didn't tells us a lot about the challenges that the next government will face in changing the rail industry for the better - whether radically or incrementally.

You can download the report here: https://committees.parliament.uk/committee/127/public-accounts-committee/news/201745/rail-reform-noone-in-government-putting-needs-of-passengers-and-taxpayers-first-pac-reports/

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This week's #RailNatter is answering the ultimate (?) question - are Stadler's FLIRTs Britain's best train?

Joining me on this quest shall be friend of the show Simon Kendler, who shall guide you and me on an odyssey into the east...

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Much has been happening in the world of transport, so it's time to pause, take stock and catch up with current happenings again...

We'll be talking about strikes quite a bit, but there's plenty else to flick through, including the UK's broader economic outlook, the energy crisis and the impacts of the ongoing heatwave. Join #RailNatter live to get involved!

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It's a #RailNatter page-turn again - and we're sinking our metaphorical teeth into the Transport Select Committee's Integrated Rail Plan (a.k.a. #RailBetrayal) report... It's the one I appeared in Parliament for!

We'll dig into the detail, but it summarised by saying that there was little evidence of valid assessment in IRP, that government should prepare for their cuts to be reversed, that journey time benefits were not achievable and that there was not enough focus on capacity. In other words, they leave government's plans in tatters!

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It's been over two years since we've done a proper alternative history episode (Episode 7 was on what might have happened if the APT had made it) so for Episode 125 it's only right that we look to the InterCity 125 (a.k.a. the High Speed Diesel Train) and have a think about what might have happened if it had simply never come into existence...

What might have changed? Would the railway renaissance that came about in the 1980s never have come to being without them? Might we see a very different-looking railway network today had they not appeared and been so successful? Tune in to see what I reckon!

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For quite a long time, Scandinavia has been a quiet hub of railway modernity - indeed, Sweden had the most per-kilometre electrification in the world for a number of years. Denmark has constructed enormous rail infrastructure in recent years, and on average trains across the region are pretty young. X2000s and various excellent metro systems are a delight to behold.

To talk about all of this good stuff, and perhaps dig into what we can learn from our Scandi pals, we've the pleasure of being joined by writer Dominic Hinde on this week's #RailNatter... Dominic will guide us across the railways of northeastern Europe with aplomb, and you can all ask your questions as it's a live one!

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Well I am very pleased to say that this week, we are joined in #RailNatter towers by podcaster extraordinaire Alice Caldwell-Kelly (famed for @Trashfuture Podcast, @Well There's Your Problem Podcast and Kill James Bond)!

Alice and I will be going on a ferroequinohorological odyssey through time (quite literally) to see how small clocks and the operation of the railways are interlinked - and we'll also be gawking at some very fetching hand-held rail timepieces... Pocket watches and wristwatches galore!

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Well a lot has happened in the world since we last did a news segment, so it's another general news catch-up for this week's #RailNatter...

We'll focus in on Shapps' signalling tweet from a couple of weeks back, where he made a hash of just about every sentence he was fed - as well as looking at the horror show of the Tory leadership contest if our special boy Grant Shapps is the one who has the best stance on human rights.

Also, as promised last week, we'll do the Very Light Rail (both rural and urban) Q&A session!

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It's a question you've all been asking for a while - what is VLR, and is it any good? Well, tonight's #RailNatter will hopefully answer that question!

I was at the first (?) VLR "conference" a few weeks ago, plus you might have noticed that I omitted the Revolution VLR tour that I did at Rail Live for last week's episode... Well, all of this is to be combined into this week's episode, so there should be a bit of a feast for you all!

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It's Rail Live 2022 - and so I'm sending you another pre-recorded #RailNatter from the past!

Rather than running about like a headless chicken as I did last year, this time I'm running about like a headless chicken *with a plan* - we'll split the episode into four segments - exhibits, plant, trains and people - and have an explore accordingly!

There'll also be a couple of shorter videos to follow this one, including some nice timelapses of setup day...

Trashfuture rail strikes episode here for your listening pleasure: https://trashfuturepodcast.podbean.co...

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STRIKES! Solidarity to all RMT rail workers out on strike right now... I'm at Rail Live today, so I've pre-recorded this week's #RailNatter as a sort of Baby's First Strike History. Join in the chat in any case to add your thoughts and perhaps pick up anything I've missed... Live(ish) at 7pm on Wednesday!

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Okay, a cheeky local one this week, amongst some news... Haxby station is looking increasingly likely to appear in the next few years, so let's talk about if it is in the right place, what the wider railway network around York ought to look like, some of the timetable challenges of achieving that, and why it is being designed to look so awful again when the HUB station designs are now formally part of Network Rail's design guidelines.

Also: THE NEWS.

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This week we have the honour and pleasure of being joined by Alexandra Rose (@bigmoodenergy) to talk about a long list of rather goody gadgetbahns from the not-so-distant US past... We may see all shapes, we may see all sizes, but will we find any that are actually useful?

Tune in LIVE on Wednesday at 7pm to find out!

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This week's #RailNatter is diving back into the messy world of categorising urban transport systems... And I think I've cracked it!

Gone shall be "light rail", "rapid transit", "personal rapid transit", "bus rapid transit", "stadtbahn" and all the rest... In shall arrive a newer, simpler series of names that make more sense and will have actual, consistent meanings.

Join LIVE at 7pm on Wednesday to send me a pile of transport systems to see if the categoriser breaks immediately!

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For some reason, our old #RailNatter on the Welsh railway network went viral earlier this year, so I thought I'd take the chance to dig into the culmination of that episode and dive into what a north-south main line for Wales might look like...

If you like maps, alignment design, deciding where to put a railway, and understanding the bigger picture on railway proposals, then this is the episode for you! Also, there will be: maps galore, costings, timings, politics, opportunities and challenges. It's all here!

Join LIVE at 7pm on Wednesday!

The original episode that sparked all this off: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SyJBN...

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In a change to the published schedule, #RailNatter is heading to London because Crossrail (known by some as the Elizabeth line line) has just opened and we all need to talk about it... Not least that it (a) is not a Tube line and (b) has made a right mess of an already over-stressed Tube map.

We'll be talking about how to properly classify London's transport networks, why it may or may not be important to do so, and how fixing the Tube map is important and also almost impossible.

Join LIVE at 7pm on Wednesday!

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This week's #RailNatter should be a fun one... We are looking at what branding Britain's railways should have in a post-GBR world.

Should everything be uniform, devolution be damned? Or do we know better...

Join LIVE to have your say!

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CRASHWORTHINESS AND CONCLUSIONS

The RAIB report from the Carmont rail crash has been released, and just as we worked our way through the interim report, this week's #RailNatter is taking a detailed look at the final report.

What exactly happened that fateful day? What can we learn? What should we do to avoid it happening again?

This is the fourth and final episode of this miniseries, and will look primarily at the crashworthiness of the High Speed Train and how it turned a significant derailment into a fatal one. We'll end by summarising the findings of the report.

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This week's #RailNatter does what it says on the tin... I'll have spent the morning at a press session looking at the new modular station design that Network Rail and the UK Design Council have been developing alongside competition-winning architects 7N.

Will it be successful? Is it any good in the first place? Where might we see the first example being built?

Join LIVE (yes, not a pre-record as previously suggested) at 7pm on Wednesday!

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This week #RailNatter is joined by Professor Iain Docherty, Dean for the Institute for Advanced Studies at the University of Stirling and transport policy expert... Who better to tackle the subject of ScotRail's re-nationalisation?

That's right! After exactly 25 years of private operation, ScotRail is back to being an entirely (rather than defacto) state owned and operated railway network. Is it all sunshine and roses, though, or does this mean that the Scottish government will start having to face some spikey home truths?

Tune in LIVE on Wednesday at 7pm to find out!

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OTHER CONTRIBUTING FACTORS

The RAIB report from the Carmont rail crash has been released, and just as we worked our way through the interim report, this week's #RailNatter is taking a detailed look at the final report.

What exactly happened that fateful day? What can we learn? What should we do to avoid it happening again?

This is the third episode of this miniseries, and in it we look at a variety of contributing factors that increased the risk of the derailment happening and increased the consequences once it did happen. We'll also look at the condition of the High Speed Train following the derailment.

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It only took a few weeks, but we've fallen hopelessly behind with The News again, which means we need a catch-up... So #RailNatter shall be filling us in with all the newsworthy stuff that has been going on in the transport and transport-adjacent world!

Join in to share your thoughts, LIVE at the usual time!

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We're jumping back in time to October 2022, and flicking through Network Rail's strategic advice for the West Midlands and the urban area around Birmingham. Lots to learn from this one - there will be diagrams and pictures and thoughts galore!

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CRISIS MANAGEMENT

The RAIB report from the Carmont rail crash has been released, and just as we worked our way through the interim report, this week's #RailNatter is taking a detailed look at the final report.

What exactly happened that fateful day? What can we learn? What should we do to avoid it happening again?

This is the second episode of this miniseries, and covers the failure in crisis management and the broader impacts of climate change that led events to unfold as they did.

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For this week's #RailNatter, Harry Burr is joining us to talk about his experiences as a very young sustainable transport policy advocate who has already made waves across the Midlands...

As the founder of Sustainable Transport Midlands, we'll talk about how he got into making policymakers pay attention, how he keeps himself engaged in an industry that can sometimes brush off the inputs of young people, and what he thinks might come next.

Whilst you can tune in live at the usual time, actually you should GO AND WATCH/SUPPORT #RailwayHistoryForUkraine at historyforukraine.co! #RailNatter will be here for you afterwards!

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INTRODUCTION AND CDM REGULATIONS

The RAIB report from the Carmont rail crash has been released, and just as we worked our way through the interim report, this week's #RailNatter is taking a detailed look at the final report.

What exactly happened that fateful day? What can we learn? What should we do to avoid it happening again?

In the first of this four-part miniseries, we'll introduce how the crash unfolded. We'll then look in detail at the failure of the drain, and the failure of the assurance processes that failed to spot its inadequacy.

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This week's #RailNatter is looking for solutions rather than problems, and joining us is friend of the show Jon Stone (the Independent's policy correspondent)... Together we will be exploring why the UK *must* decentralise power to make public transport better!

Do you have thoughts on devolution? Join LIVE (if a little late) to get involved in the discussion!

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Seeing as the RMT have been on strike following Grant Shapps' blatant attempt to undermine their bargaining power as part of his deal with Transport for London, it makes sense for this week's #RailNater to unpick one of the commonly repeated myths that the Department for Transport keep referring to: that driverless Tube trains are anything other than a #gadgetbahn fantasy.

It'll be a pretty relaxed and open Q&A session, so bring your thoughts and queries!

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With the IPCC having released its latest #ClimateReport this week, we'll take a quick look at the headlines then dig into Network Rail's latest climate adaptation report to see how global warming is impacting on railway infrastructure in England, Scotland and Wales.

Join #RailNatter LIVE to ask your questions about climate, infrastructure and everything in between...

Download the NR report here: https://www.networkrail.co.uk/sustain...

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This week's #RailNatter is going to be a bit of a catch up on The News seeing as so much has been happening of late... The previously advertised episode shall follow next week!

Join to have your say on everything that's been going on in the transport world, and let me know if I've missed anything!

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Tonight, Jennifer Williams of the  @Manchester Evening News  joins us in #RailNatter towers to consider the context of the North's anger over the Integrated Rail Plan, how it fits into the broader failings of government's "levelling up" agenda, and whether the #RailBetrayal will stick...

Join us live(ish) at the usual time!

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Well, we did it. #RailNatter broke the ton.

Consequently, I think it would be a good idea (after what is invariably going to be a long news segment) for us to take a look back at every episode we've done to remember the highlights and perhaps work out if there is any kind of #RailNatter manifesto emerging from all of this...

Join LIVE to recall your favourite moments or indeed remind me of the bits where I messed up!

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Scaled down for COVID but aided by beer and gusto, #RailNatter's first recording in front of a live audience also happens to be ITS 100TH EPISODE!

Join us in Pivni as we wander through the ways to stop trains that have got away with themselves, punctuated by a variety of terminal calamities through recent British Rail history.

Don't worry if you had hoped to get tickets - there'll be another live event in York later this year, with much more venue capacity... Watch this space!

The ticket sales income (less Eventbrite's fee) for this event went straight to York LGBT Forum (https://www.yorklgbtforum.org.uk/) who do vital work. If you want to make an additional donation to them, you can do so via their website (feel free to mark your donation with #RailNatter if you've come via here).

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It's a proper techy one this week, and we're talking all things CANT or SUPERELEVATION. What is it? Why do we need it? Why don't we need it? All your questions, answered. Oh, and dust off your GCSE mechanics because we will be doing some MATHS with EQUATIONS.

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With the help of journalist and author Samir Jeraj (@sajeraj on Twitter), this week's #RailNatter is looking at the collapse of Carillion, unpicking its impacts on the construction industry, and thinking about the wider societal effects of contractor dominance...

It's a fiddly subject, so feel free to bring along your own experiences and expertise to help out!

Listen to the @Trashfuture Podcast episode I nabbed from here: https://trashfuturepodcast.podbean.co...

Samir's project is for https://www.ecnmy.org/, and if you want to speak to him about your experience of the Carillion collapse, you can contact him over Twitter or at sa.jeraj [at] gmail [dot] com (email snarled for obvious anti-spam reasons).

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Following yet another bout of Welsh politicians making stuff up about HS2, this #RailNatter is going to attempt to tackle the question head on: does Wales get any benefit from HS2? (YES IT DOES.)

Repeated claims to the contrary resurfaced again a week or two ago, and the worst thing isn't that saying as much is damaging for rail investment across the UK, it isn't that it is anti-expert, it is that by being patently untrue it greatly undermines the otherwise solid case for more devolved powers and funding for Wales. So stop repeating it!

Professor Mark Barry's blog (lots of good stuff on here as well as the less good HS2 stuff): https://swalesmetroprof.blog/

Professor Mark Barry's video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EH6xA...

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In the first of a new #RailNatter sub-series, we'll be joined by Rebecca Wilks (@WilksBecca on Twitter) who is a reporter with The National to talk about Wales' Rhondda line and everything that is wrong with it...

We'll then try and work out some things that might help fix it in the longer-term - join LIVE to ask your questions and make your suggestions!

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Well, straight off the bat dear friend of the show Dr David Turner and I talk about quite a bit of the Victorian period too, so this title doesn't make much sense.

In any case, David joins the third of this year's #RailNatter holiday specials with a bundle of historic delights under his arm that we spread across a table and pore over in no particular order.

What did Christmas look like on Britain's railways in decades and centuries gone by? How did the railways respond to passenger demand over the festive season? Where did we get our trees from? All questions we'll ponder with the aid of the archives!

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Ever walked into a railway station, looked up, and thought "well, that looks delicious"? No? Well, after this year's second #RailNatter holiday special you certainly will...

Storyteller and writer Emily Turner and I go on a boozy tour of the world's most edible-looking railway stations so that you don't have to - and the results are a feast!

Listen to Roundel Round We Go: https://anchor.fm/roundel-round-we-go

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It's the first of our three #RailNatter holiday specials, and this one is LIVE! For your entertainment, we are listing off The Official #RailNatter Top Ten Classic Railway Films and why I think this is the right order for them...

Do you agree or disagree? Are any films missing? Tune in 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.

Merchandise at https://masquette.co.uk/collections/r... (don't forget to use your discount code if you are a Patreon supporter)!

Last week I had the pleasure of travelling on the first scheduled passenger service through the newly grade-separated Werrington Junction with its impressive diveunder...

This week's #RailNatter shows you what I got up to, including not one but TWO cab rides, an outline of the physical works and an explanation of what the project achieves.

It's a pre-record, but do join the chat LIVE at 7pm on Wednesday!

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.

Merchandise at https://masquette.co.uk/collections/r... (don't forget to use your discount code if you are a Patreon supporter)!

With the impacts of the "Integrated" Rail Plan still not really having settled in, government also decided to release the final paper of their Union Connectivity Review... This week's #RailNatter is taking a look!

Given that Sir Peter Hendy - a man with the genuine best interests of the railway at heart and the nous to keep it alive - has put his name to the report, there is surely something useful in here? Right?

Join LIVE to find out - it's yet another classic page-turn!

Tickets for the LIVE, IN-PERSON show on the 22nd January can be bought here (limited numbers available!): https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/railna...

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.

Merchandise at https://masquette.co.uk/collections/r... (don't forget to use your discount code if you are a Patreon supporter)!

In the aftermath of the Salisbury rail crash, this week's #RailNatter is looking at the impact of the lowly leaf... Why are these little crispy menaces such a danger to the railway and what are we doing about them?

Join LIVE to get involved and share your thoughts!

Download the documents I reference in this: https://www.dropbox.com/s/6sajso7iootjzer/%23RailNatterEp90.zip?dl=0

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.

Merchandise at https://masquette.co.uk/collections/railnatter (don't forget to use your discount code if you are a Patreon supporter)!

It landed last week and it managed to be WORSE than the leaks had suggested - the Conservative government's Integrated Rail Plan cancelled the entire Eastern leg of HS2 and shredded the high speed line across the Pennines. Is there anything good in this document at all?

To find out, this dismal document needs to get the full #RailNatter page-turn treatment. I fear this one is going to be rowdy...

Join LIVE to share your thoughts and frustrations on Johnson's #RailBetrayal.

Watch me guesting on @BowlerHatMan's stream here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_EgNJ...

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.

Merchandise at https://masquette.co.uk/collections/r... (don't forget to use your discount code if you are a Patreon supporter)!

This one has been in the pipeline a while... Should we reopen the full Waverley Route from Tweedbank south to Carlisle? No! We shouldn't!

I'll explain precisely how we shouldn't, using maps, showing the route that any new Borders Main Line should take, and explaining how and why you'd choose between the two available options. I might even tell you how much it would cost!

Enjoyed this? Please do consider supporting #Railnatter at https://patreon.com/garethdennis or throw loose change at me via https://paypal.me/garethdennis. Merch at https://garethdennis.co.uk/merch. Join in the discussion at https://garethdennis.co.uk/discord.

This week is a bad week for Britain's railways, but thankfully this week's #RailNatter comes the day BEFORE we get to read just how bad it is (we'll page-turn it next week)... Nevertheless, it gives us a chance to look at High Speed 2 again, and to understand why the eastern leg between Birmingham, the East Midlands, South Yorkshire, Leeds and the North East is its most important section.

Hate HS2? Come and tell me why and I'll tell you why you are probably wrong... In any case it's another Q&A session so do join LIVE to get stuck in!

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.

Merchandise at https://masquette.co.uk/collections/railnatter (don't forget to use your discount code if you are a Patreon supporter)!

Tim is back! With only one episode remaining in Series 3, Britain's most effervescent ferroequinologist Tim Dunn be joining us on this week's #RailNatter to look back on 30 episodes of #TheArchitectureTheRailwaysBuilt, with behind the scenes pictures, bonus footage and some seriously saucy Bekonscot Model Village chat.

Join the two of us LIVE at 7pm on Wednesday to throw us your questions and get in on the fun!

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.

Merchandise at https://masquette.co.uk/collections/r... (don't forget to use your discount code if you are a Patreon supporter)!

It's #COP26, and (in a slight change to the schedule) this week's #RailNatter is going all green, as we have an open session talking about climate change and the different ways in which railways can play a major part in reducing GHG emissions.

It's a LIVE Q&A, so bring your questions and thoughts and we'll see what we can hash out together!

You can find the new merchandise at https://masquette.co.uk/collections/r..., and don't forget to use your discount code if you are a Patreon supporter!

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.