Sometimes it’s hard to keep up with the pace of change on the railway. This week is no exception – we have two major pieces of signalling work going on, and we’ve been hard at work all week updating our maps.

First off, the London Victoria to East Croydon (exc.) map has been updated to include data from the new control system at Three Bridges ROC. This WestCAD fringes with Three Bridges ASC between Norbury and Thornton Heath, and Victoria ASC between Balham and Streatham Common. It’s the first of several stages to move control from the panels at Victoria ASC to the ROC at Three Bridges.

Second, and no less importantly, the Wingfield Tunnel to Meadowhall map has been updated to reflect Sheffield PSB’s closure. Control moves to two workstations in the York ROC covering the Sheffield and Rotherham areas.

Since redrawing and updating these maps has taken a lot longer than anticipated, there are still some bugs which are waiting to be fixed. They will be fixed during this week, with another minor update being released next Sunday.

Until next time, enjoy the new maps!

// Peter

This week’s release has just gone live. Due in no small part to having far too much paid work, I haven’t been able to put as much of the new maps in as I’d liked to and I also have a massive pile of email waiting to be read. If you’re one of the many people who’s emailed over the last few weeks and you haven’t had a reply, I’m really sorry that I’m so far behind. I’ve replied to about a dozen emails this morning, and I’ll continue to reduce the backlog over the next week.

So, what’s changed this week? Lots of bug fixes!

• On the London Victoria to East Croydon map, VC780 signal at Streatham Junction was missing. The map has been redrawn to include space for the signal, which is now showing correctly on the map
• On the Cleethorpes map, the single track section between 979 and 982 signals was drawn incorrectly. This is now fixed
• On the North Kent map, the flyover at Lewisham was mistakenly drawn as a diveunder, and has now been redrawn correctly
• Line names on the Liverpool Street to Romford and Romford to Ingatestone and Billericay maps have been added to make it easier to determine which are the Electric and Main Lines, particularly difficult around the flyover at Ilford
• The Stoke on Trent map had signals 273 and 457 both showing green for the route toward Stoke-on-Trent. This was due to incorrect reference data, and has now been fixed
• Two signals were missing from the Guildford map, causing trains to disappear after signal 922 and reappear in signal 831. This has been fixed
• The missing crossover at Crayford on the North Kent map has been put in, and the trackwork on the London side of Dartford tidied up to make it clearer
• A variety of missing ground position light signals on the Merseyrail (Wirral) map have been added, as well as platform numbering, signal locations and sidings added. An updated Northern Line map will follow soon
• Some trains disappeared on the Hildenborough to Ashford International map due to the configuration of dual berths and the way they were drawn on the map – these trains now appear correctly
• Various maps on the routes in to Ashford now have inter-map links so you can jump between maps

Work continues on the Edinburgh map, and I’ve started a new map of Stratford-upon-Avon and Warwick to Tyseley. Neither are quite ready for public consumption yet, but I’m hoping to get at least one of them finished in time for the next release in a fortnight.

Until next time, please keep sending in your feedback and suggestions!

// Peter

Sunday rolls around again, far too quickly for my liking as two days of weekend doesn’t quite seem enough to keep up-to-date with all the changes Network Rail are making to the railway! Since there’s lots to do, here’s a very quick update on what’s changed on the site this week.

• The previous release broke some maps on IE11, resulting in only the top part of maps showing. This is now fixed and has been tested on Chrome, Firefox and Internet Explorer – please get in touch if this is still affecting you
• The Stafford area map has been updated to include the Norton Bridge flyover which was commissioned last weekend, as well as signal aspects for the re-controlled area between Norton Bridge and Basford Hall (near Crewe)
• The Nottingham area map, covering the area from Beeston to Nottingham and past Netherfield Junction to Newark Castle, Grantham and Allington Junction, is now live. The route from Lowdham to Newark Castle is due for resignalling in the next few months, and when this happens, this map will be extended

Emails of support and thanks continue to come in at a steady rate – many of them asking for new maps. If I could crank them out any faster, I would! One of the most popular requests has been for Edinburgh, and I’m hard at work on drawing the route from Haymarket to Musselburgh and Newcraighall. Expect this map in a few weeks, perhaps with another simpler, quicker map in the meantime.

Over a month has flown by since the last release. The day job is keeping me busy and entertained with freight operations, and I’ve had insufficient time to complete this latest release any sooner. So, onwards with the news!

• There’s a new map of the Stoke-on-Trent area, a much requested map. This enhances coverage of the West Coast routes out of Euston
• On the Staines map, some berths around Earley, controlled from Wokingham signal box, weren’t showing any trains. This has been fixed
• A problem with signal T883 on the Darlington map meant trains disappeared – reported by a couple of people (thanks!), and also seen by yours truly when on a trip to Edinburgh a few weeks ago. The berth has been fixed and trains show up correctly when departing platform 4

There are a couple more maps in the pipeline which I’m hoping to release in the next week or two – Nottingham and Edinburgh, both of which are popular requests. The Nottingham map will cover Beeston all the way through to the East Coast Main Line, and the Edinburgh map will cover the station area initially, but extend out to cover the routes in and out of Auld Reekie.

That’s it – enjoy the updates!

// Peter

Earlier this evening, we rolled out a ‘slippy map’ feature which lets you drag a track diagram around.

With hindsight, this wasn’t a good idea, and we didn’t test it with enough people who hadn’t requested the feature. It went down really well with people who wanted it, but several people have asked for the original functionality to be brought back.

We’ve therefore carried out an emergency code change this evening, prior to the site being much busier, to revert the functionality back to its original state. In the coming weeks, we’ll add a feature to enable the ‘slippy map’ to be toggled on and off so that, if you like it, you can use it – and if not, you don’t have to use it.

It’s been a whole month since the last release. I’d planned getting today’s release out the door much sooner – on the 7th in fact – but the day job gets in the way, and I’ve been ridiculously busy talking with freight operators and testing functionality on TOPS and TRUST.

There are only a couple of major new things this week:

• Swindon Panel closed this weekend, and the Cholsey to Radley and Chippenham map has been updated to show the new signalling. If you’re interested in the history of Swindon Panel, check out the Swindon Panel Society
• For those of you in Scotland, we have a map of Hillington West to Gourock and Wemyss Bay, and more on the way
• To make the maps easier to use, you can now click and drag maps in to position, as well as zoom in and out as you do with Google Maps and OpenStreetMap. Please let us know if you like this feature – we’re hoping to make it permanent, but if it isn’t to everyone’s liking, we’ll put an option to select either type of map

And as always, there are more minor things:

• The page footer now includes links to our Twitter and Facebook pages. Go follow us if you’re not already!
• Some newer locations on the railway were showing as their TIPLOC (timing point), and we’ve updated our database to include proper full names for these locations
• On the North Kent map, trains mysteriously switched lines at Blackheath Junction. This is now fixed – a signal was positioned incorrectly
• Some of the background code on the site has been tidied up and compressed, so it should load quicker – especially when you load maps you’ve already visited
• When a train movement is re-reported in TRUST as the result of a correction, the movement wasn’t showing up as a manual report. This is fixed
• On the Reading map, some of the TRTS (Train Ready To Start) indicators were permanently on – this was because we’d assumed each platform had its own TRTS indicator, which isn’t the case
• On the Chilterns map, two signals had the identity ‘9102’ near Oxford
• On the Romford to Ingatestone and Billericay map, berths around Ingatestone weren’t showing train descriptions
• On the Billericay to Southminster and Southend Victoria map, trains terminating at Wickford from Southminster disappeared due to an incorrect berth configuration at Wickford
• On the Cholsey to Radley and Chippenham map, the loops at Hullavington were drawn incorrectly

It’s been a few weeks since I’ve written about the site – the day-job has to take priority and the number of days when I want to come home and spend more time wrangling over railway data has dropped somewhat.

Rest assured, the site is still under development and I’m working on fixing bugs and compatibility issues before I start work on the next set of enhancements.

It’s been such great weather over the past week, and I’ve been so busy in my day-job that I’ve had little time to work on the site this week. However, I’ve managed to get the Fenchurch Street – Shoeburyness map finished.

There won’t be much happening over the next few weeks, as it’s likely to continue to be sunny – but I’ll try to get a new map every fortnight or so.

I missed the Sunday planned release date due to a family bereavement – I’ve had too many of those over the past year. However, it has been somewhat comforting to sit and concentrate on drawing maps.

So, a little later than planned, the Liverpool Street to Romford map and Rugby to Birmingham map are both now live.

Coming up next, the Paddington map will be returning, as well as Rugby and the Trent Valley.

Enjoy!

It’s another Bank Holiday weekend, which means an extra lie-in – unless you’re up at 8am in preparation for walking the tunnel between Rotherhithe and Wapping.

This week’s updates have been released on to the site:

• The Leeds to Harrogate map is now live
• Due to popular request, there’s a new Hitchin – Cambridge map, which is work-in-progress. If you can help out with the Cambridge end of the map, please get in touch
• The East London Line map has made a welcome return, slightly redrawn and extended to Brockley

A few other minor changes have gone in, such as mislabelled berths – and there are a handful more to go in during this week.

Once again, thank you to everyone who has given feedback. In the pipeline for the next few weeks are things like the return of the Liverpool Street and Marylebone maps, and more real-time data.