Too long since the last post, much too long - nine days ! Well, it just allows the contractors to get on with their job, and they certainly have been. Just as well, as it is getting increasingly cold and winter is definitely on its way.
Here is a little round up of the work in progress, bridge by bridge:

Bridge 2, Childswickham Road

Good progress here, and the steel repairs are due to draw to a close tomorrow. Shot blasting of the repaired parts and priming of all of the steel will start on Friday.

Corrosion damage to deck ends on bridge 2. Why so bad? See below.

However the bricklayers have also been in action thickening out the back of the abutments and piers to provide support for the ballast retaining walls.

New ballast retaining walls built.

What appears to have happened is that, because the abutments both lean inwards by approx. 200 mm, the correct position for the ballast wall to fit just under the end of the deck plates, would have been in mid air. The original ones which we removed were set in by approx. 400mm, leaving the steel exposed to corroding weather effects instead of being protected. In turn the overhanging deck plates have rotted much more (see top photo) due to that exposure!

Unfortunately the thicker brickwork that we needed to build from was 1.2m down instead of the 450mm that it should have been ! The two pictures above show the brick raising that was required.

Bridge 3, Pry Lane

No news on this bridge for quite a while, but no news is good news in this case. With the completion of the new timber post and rail fencing up all 4 slopes this bridge is now completed! Another one off the list, two more to go.

Pry Lane bridge from the Cotswolds side - all done.

 Bridge 4, Peasebrook Farm

The first delivery of steelwork and reinforcing has arrived (see above) and installation will hopefully commence by the end of this week.

Bridge 5, Little Buckland

This is now totally complete, and a picture from the Cheltenham end is attached. The ramp is still in place at the Broadway end to give access to bridge 4.

News on the Bridges to Broadway EIS scheme: 
During the volunteers meeting last Saturday we learned that the EIS share issue had now run its full year, and had closed. The result was - a success ! Final applications were still being processed at the time of the meeting (being the day after the final day) but we have achieved the £500.000 target ! Oh happy day. What wonderful shareholders we have. We own this railway together, and we are forgeing ahead together. The mood during the meeting was ebullient as we learned that the minimum required for the bridges of £500k had been exceeded by approximately 10%. This is brilliant. While we don't know the final costs of all the repairs (due to various problems unearthed along the way), the railway is confident that there will be a bit left over with which to start the extension itself, and the first 800m of new rail have been ordered, and indeed now part delivered as well.

Want to know more? We have set up a new Extension blog for this very purpose. You can follow progress here:
http://broadwayextensionblog.blogspot.co.uk/

There is also a link to it on the side of this blog.

Pat yourself on the back, shareholders. What a great bunch of guys you are.