Mike
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mikeyashworth.bsky.social
Mike
@mikeyashworth.bsky.social
730 followers 230 following 1.5K posts
Ex-London Underground and retired back to "The North" - transport, design history, things industrial, architecture & heritage - all tickle my fancy. Postings often link to my Flickr account for more things!
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mikeyashworth.bsky.social
A fine work by noted artist Frank Henry Mason (1875 - 1965) on the cover of the 1930 edition of the Ports of London & North Eastern Railway; at the time the railways were major owners & operators of port & dock installations in the UK. #railways #shipping #graphicdesign

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Ports of the London & North Eastern Railway 1927 : compiled by H. N. Appleby : London & North Eastern Railway : London : 1930 : cover by Frank Henry Mason. The mainline railways were major owners and operators of shipping infrastructure and, following Grouping in 1923, the LNER became responsible for a number of East Coast ports, docks and harbours; East Coast with one exception. The lone West Coast port of Silloth, west of Carlisle, was an LNER facility. This large tome is the first edition of what became an essentially annual publication and it gives details as to the various ports, their services and many of the shipping lines, destinations and times. There are also many adverts for associated companies and services such as coal, steel and iron producers in the LNER's operating territory. Coal was an especially important export trade for the railways. This edition is again 'compiled and arranged' by H.N. Appleby who had much involvement in such publications for both the LNER and other railways. The cover on this of the 1930 edition is by noted maritime artist Frank Henry Mason (1875 - 1965) an artist who was regularly commissioned by the LNER and other major clients. The fine dockside scene viewed across the ship's deck reads over both front and back cover. Amidst a background typical of the Tyne or Tees a steam locomotive is being slung aboard a vessel for export. The view is in a muted abstract style, the ship in the foreground being in light Turquoise & black, lettering on the hull, with the scenes in the background in a Turquoise wash. On the front cover the crane and locomotive are the dominant feature.
November 11, 2025 at 10:34 AM
mikeyashworth.bsky.social
Oh wow! A London Underground station being officially Listed is always great news - this one especially so. Southwark station, 1999 by MacCormac Jamieson Prichard, has just been Listed at Grade 2. Now for the other JLE stations. @c20society.bsky.social

historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-...
Image of lower concourse at Southwark tube station, London, showing the 'ships prow' illuminated central feature in the staircases looking up from platform level towards the lower escalator landing. Pic by Luke Agbaimoni (Tubemapper)
November 11, 2025 at 6:08 AM
mikeyashworth.bsky.social
c.1950 Official Guide to the Metropolitan Borough of St. Pancras & street plan showing the narrow long N - S orientation of the borough that became part of Camden in 1965. It contained three major London rail termini - King's Cross, St. Pancras & Euston. @lccmunicipal.bsky.social

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The ninth, and first post-WW2, edition of the official guide to the London Metropolitan Borough of St. Pancras and produced by their authority by the Cheltenham based publisher E.J. Burrow who specialised in such guides and handbooks. The Guide gives details as to the municipality, its administration, amenities and business life with many adverts for local companies. The Metropolitan Borough of St. Pancras was formed, along with the other London boroughs, in 1900 under the reorganisation of local government in the Metropolis and was abolished in the next round of changes in 1965 when it became part of the new London Borough of Camden. The borough stretched, long and thin, north to south, from the Euston Road where it included the three major railway termini of King's Cross, St. Pancras and Euston, up through Camden Town, Kentish Town and on to the eastern side of Hampstead Heath and Kenwood. The card cover is dominated by the Borough coat of arms with the motto "With Wisdom and courage" underneath is a black panel with the borough title and below, in black, the Official Guide. The Metropolitan Borough of St. Pancras : The Official Guide (Ninth edition) : C. White : St. Pancras Borough Council : E.J. Burrow & Co. Ltd. : nd [1950] : street plan. The ninth, and first post-WW2, edition of the official guide to the London Metropolitan Borough of St. Pancras and produced by their authority by the Cheltenham based publisher E.J. Burrow who specialised in such guides and handbooks. The Guide gives details as to the municipality, its administration, amenities and business life with many adverts for local companies. The Metropolitan Borough of St. Pancras was formed, along with the other London boroughs, in 1900 under the reorganisation of local government in the Metropolis and was abolished in the next round of changes in 1965 when it became part of the new London Borough of Camden. The borough stretched, long and thin, north to south, from the Euston Road where it included the three major railway termini of King's Cross, St. Pancras and Euston, up through Camden Town, Kentish Town and on to the eastern side of Hampstead Heath and Kenwood. The plan, at half inch scale, shows the streets and major buildings with the borough boundary outlined in red.
November 10, 2025 at 11:51 AM
mikeyashworth.bsky.social
Give Way. I probably will when I cycle as far up this hill to the sign at the top of the lane. #cycling #photography #yorkshire
I probably will when I get to the top of the hill. A lone Give Way sign stands sentinel at the top of Askwith Moor Lane in North Yorkshire and I'm cycling up there. Out on the bike on an autumnal afternoon just before the sun starts to set. the photo shows a lane rising through fields towards an horizon under a clear blue autumnal sky. On the right a row of electric poles and overhead cables parallels the lane.
November 10, 2025 at 11:43 AM
mikeyashworth.bsky.social
Pages from a c.1936 Revo Electric Co. Ltd. of Tipton showing a range of illuminated electric signs they manufactured. The London Transport roundel & "Electricity House" is plausible - until 1933 the Underground Group part owned NorthMet electricity who supplied much of Middlesex

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Electric Illuminated Signs : Section No. 12 : Electrical Lighting Equipment : Catalogue No. 16 : Revo Electric Co. Ltd. : Tipton : Staffordshire : [1936] The catalogue, Issue Number 16, "Electrical Lighting Equipment" was a near 250 page book issued by the Tipton based Revo Electric Company Limited and although undated is believed to have been published in 1936. It shows thirteen sections of equipment and accessories that were also, I suspect, possibly issued individually. The company also issued other catalogues for their domestic and industrial electrical equipment as well as traffic and road signs and equipment. The company had its origins in the Cable Accessories Company Limited formed in 1907 by F.H.Reeves and the company prospered over the coming decades becoming the Revo Electric Company Limited in 1930. In 1956 Revo became part of Duport, originally known as Vono and with whom the Revo founder had links, and in the 1960s the company was effectively split up with the lighting business becoming Relite. Section 12, Electric Illuminated Signs, is one of the shortest sections running only to four pages. The two pages here show an illuminated sign and a projection sign. The first, catalogue number C6540, is an all cast, highly decorated advertising sign that is for "Electric House". The appearance of a London Transport roundel is not at all impossible; the Underground Group in pre-1933 days part owned the vast North Metropolitan Electric Power Supply Company (Northmet) and the company used the 'roundel' symbol both before the formation of London Transport in 1933 and when their share in the electric generation and distribution undertaking was sold off, and after until Nationalisation in 1948. That said I think the design purists at 55 Broadway would have kittens over the florid design of that sign! The other example shows a sign for the company's own Trade Counter.
November 10, 2025 at 9:12 AM
mikeyashworth.bsky.social
21 November 1971 - the Lord Provost of Edinburgh is off to Powderhall to open the city's new Waste Disposal Works. The site had operated since 1893 - incineration ceased in c.1985 & bulk transfer of waste continued until closure in 2016. @threadinburgh.scot has written about it.

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Edinburgh Corporation Cleansing Department : opening brochure for Powderhall Refuse Disposal Works, 1971. The cover shows the new works, a large white structure, topped in black, with ancilliary buildings around and dominated by the 250ft high concrete chimney. The whole is printed in a blue tint - title to the left upper and the city's coat of arms to the right.
November 10, 2025 at 9:01 AM
mikeyashworth.bsky.social
Thanks to @showmeasign.online I'm now not cleaning my teeth but perusing the rather glorious Massachusetts Digital Commonwealth Collections; but then again 1949/50 image of a Boston PCC car ... #transit #transport #archives

cityofboston.access.preservica.com/uncategorize...
1949/50 image of a Boston PCC car fleet number 3203 at Tremont Street - the streetcar/tram on curved track rising to the surface with a cityscape behind.
November 9, 2025 at 10:24 PM
mikeyashworth.bsky.social
Autumnal morning here looking out of the window across the River Wharfe here at Otley, West Yorkshire. #autumn #landscape #photography #yorkshire
Autumnal view - sun rising through low clouds and mist looking across park land and the River Wharfe in Otley, West Yorkshire. The now bare trees and light are reflected in the water.
November 9, 2025 at 10:45 AM
mikeyashworth.bsky.social
Worthy of Remembrance : My mother's brother, Cp. Jack Clegg of Rochdale, Lancashire, who was killed in action in Germany/Belgium on 1/2/1945 aged 21. #remembrance
A wooden crosses and red poppies, symbol of remembrance, at the War Memorial in Otley amidst fallen leaves. The front cross is to the memory of Cpl. Jack Clegg of Rochdale, my mother's brother, who was killed in action on 1/2/1945 on the German/Belgian border. He was 21.
November 9, 2025 at 10:23 AM
mikeyashworth.bsky.social
Time to head back as daylight begins to fade. #cycling #yorkshire
Image of me, in cycling gear, against a background of a rural lane, moors in the distance and the setting sun partially obscured by patchy cloud.
November 8, 2025 at 4:47 PM
mikeyashworth.bsky.social
OK, this was a day early for Bonfire or Guy Fawkes Night in 1937 & I'm a day late but - it's always a good time to share the marvellous work of German artist, designer and teacher Ernst Aufseeser (1880 - 1940). Night & Day was a shortlived UK magazine. #illustration

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Night & Day magazine cover ; 4 November 1937 : London, 1937 : artwork by Ernst Aufseeser. Night & Day was a short lived magazine, produced under the auspices of the Chatto & Windus publishing company, that appeared for only six months from July to December 1937. It was an attempt to mimic the "New Yorker" magazine here in the UK and as well as humerous articles and cartoons it contained a selection of 'pleasures and places' in London such as concerts, plays and exhibition listings. In its short life it attracted some fine cartoonists and artists. The cover was a day early for Guy Fawkes or Bonfire Night and I'm posting it, on 6 November, a day late! But this marvellous cover is by the German artist, designer and teacher Ernst Aufseeser (1880 - 1940). Aufseeser's main training was at the Steglitzer Werkstätten in Berlin but he also studied in London, including at the Slade, and spent time working in the UK. From 1919 he was Professor of Applied Arts and Commercial Graphics at the Düsseldorf Academy and, being of Jewish ancestory, he was dismissed from his post by the National Socialst regime in 1933. He died in Düsseldorf in 1940. His son was Hans Tisdall who spent his working life in the UK as a book illustrator and famous textile designer. It shows on a purple background agroup around a bonfire with a figure int he foreground lighting a match to set fire to it. A stick protrudes with a 'guy' wearing a jacket and hat. The figures include a well dressed couple to the left, a schoolchild with his back to the viewer and to the right a family group, a woman holding up a child to see the scene.
November 6, 2025 at 5:54 PM
mikeyashworth.bsky.social
20th Nov 1960 & the abandonment of #Glasgow 's once great tram system, completed in 1962, marched on. Partially a decision in line with the prevailing 'anti-tram' environment in the UK it was also partially driven by the loss of 'out of burgh' routes agreed as part of the Blue Train schemes.
Glasgow Corporation Transport : curtailment of Tram Service 29 : 6 November 1960. By 1960 the scale and pace of the abandonment of one of the world's finest tramways systems was steadily accelerating and as well as complete route conversions other routes saw curtailments. This was often as part of the enablement of sections of track and overhead that were 'jointly' used by multiple services could be removed or that services operated by more than one depot or garage could be operationally split to allow conversion of a particular depot to bus operation. In the case of this curtailment there was no direct replacement of tram service 29 to Broomhill, the route from Tollcross to Maryhill surviving for the time being. As this waterstained window bill, that looks as if it was peeled off a car or bus window, notes from Sunday 6 November 1960 service 29 was amended to terminate at Tollcross rather than Broomhouse. The 29 latterly had a claim to fame in that it was the haunt of the ex-Liverpool cars that Glasgow purchased second hand from the English city prior to its final conversion to buses in 1957 but that had rather an unhappy time in their new Scottish home. Electrical issues on these cars proved expensive to sort out and concerns as to their length and overhang saw them banished to a couple of routes in normal operation. In less than two years the General Manager, E R L Fitzpayne, would have overseen the complete closure of the tramways driven largely by the prevailing 'anti-tram' environment in the UK at the time as well as decisions agreed around the investment in Glasgow and Clydeside's "Blue Train" electrification of suburban railway routes by the British Transport Commission that was underway. A simple letterpress poster giving details under a heading of "Tram Service 29 - Maryhill and Broomhouse" and issued by GCT at 46 Bath Street.
November 6, 2025 at 10:34 AM
mikeyashworth.bsky.social
5 November 1979 & the new winter timetable for British Rail's East Coast Main Line between Scotland, NE England & York & not long fully operated by the HST 125 train sets. #railways #transport @doublearrow64.bsky.social

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British Rail Inter-City 125 services - pocket timetable - East Coast Main Line services 5 November 1979 - 11 May 1980. The pocket timetable for the ECML services between Aberdeen, Dundee, Glasgow and Edinburgh to London Kings Cross via Newcastle, Darlington, York and Doncaster. The cover features a fine graphic of three HST 125 sets bursting through and promising faster and more frequent services. That they certainly did and the HSTs survived electrification as far as Edinburgh and have not long been finally withdrawn from ECML services. The timetable has a blue background to the upper third, with white text, and below the artwork of three HST cabs bursting from a black circle with the BR Double Arrow and Inter-City 125 in blue text above.
November 5, 2025 at 9:12 AM
mikeyashworth.bsky.social
It's time for breakfast here - as it was on a Scottish Motor Traction coach tour of Scotland at some date in the 1930s. Menu card depicting one of the SMT's motor coaches as alongside a steamer sails serenely over the loch. #travel #ephemera #scotland #menu

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SMT Menu card : Scottish Motor Traction Co. Ltd. : Edinburgh : 1930s. A charming generic menu card showing a breakfast offering and possibly from an hotel used as part of an SMT coach tour of Scotland. The artwork shows one of the company's AEC coaches amidst Highland scenery with a steamer gliding across the loch. The artwork is positioned in the top third of the card and the view of the motor coach, the loch and the background hills is primarily in blue (the company's then livery) with red and black highlights such as pine trees. Underneath is typed the menu - prunes, porridge, and many other options. The Scottish Motor Traction company grew to be the country's most dominant bus and coach operator in the 1930s and effectively subsumed other operators such as Central SMT, Western SMT and Alexander's into the SMT Group. Coach tours, that often included sections of the journey by steamer and even train, were highly popular at the time and the SMT put much effort into advertising and operating them.
November 5, 2025 at 9:01 AM
mikeyashworth.bsky.social
@municipaldreams.bsky.social appears to have been in Derby of late so - some Trusteel system housing construction from the c.1947 official handbook "Spotlight on Derby" showing the 21-house constructed by the Corporation's Building Works Dept as part of the post-war housing drive.

flic.kr/p/2rDuo3f
November 4, 2025 at 2:21 PM
mikeyashworth.bsky.social
Eleven years ago today I was back in Malaysia; a KL Rapid train making its way through Kuala Lumpur as seen from the apartment. #railways #transport #malaysia #transit #photography #night

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A night view of Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia - KJ train heading to Gombak terminus, 4 November 2014. A view I took when in KL in 2014 and I miss my trips to Malaysia. A sticky and humid night and a view across the teeming city of Kuala Lumpur - at the bottom a RapidKL train on line KJ, just leaving Sri Rampai station, heads towards Gombak terminus. It sort of sums KL and eastern cities up in many ways. Taken from high in an apartment block it looks down on an illuminated 4 car train on tracks through a darkened surviving patch of forest with, in the background the bright lights and grid of the city's suburbs.
November 4, 2025 at 11:11 AM
mikeyashworth.bsky.social
100 years of the Hastings & St. Leonards Gas Company 1832 - 1932 celebrated in an advert by local artist M. Strickland of the town's School of Art. A happy family enjoy the warm glow of gas. #vintage #1930s

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100 Years of Service (1832 - 1932) : Hastings & St. Leonards Gas Company : Hastings : 1933 : Frontispiece : M. Strickland, Hastings School of Art. A suitably warm glow in this artwork designed for the frontispiece of the Centenary book of the Hastings & St. Leonards Gas Company issued in 1933. The Company appear to have commissioned - or perhaps it was a local competition? - the work from M. Strickland of the town's School of Art and it shows a family around the warm glow of a gas fire under the bright light of a gas luminaire. The advert uses shades of red, orange and yellow to denote warmth and light; the title in red on grey sits on the lower edge of the work.
November 3, 2025 at 7:29 PM
mikeyashworth.bsky.social
Weatherbeaten. The sign at the foot of the track leading up to the remote Ribblehead Station in N. Yorkshire. @doublearrow64.bsky.social #sign #railways
The double plate sign at the foot of the track that leads to Ribblehead railway station. The top plate reads "Settle & Carlisle Railway Visitor Centre" in black Rail Alphabet. The lower reads "Ribblehead Station" in black, with the BR double arrow in red ranged left and lower right a blue 'ahead' arrow. The sign is weathered in this remote landscape and the lower plate is creased top right.
November 3, 2025 at 10:56 AM
mikeyashworth.bsky.social
Treat them to CWS - Co-operative Wholesale Society - Custard. A mid-fifties recipe & publicity leaflet very much of its time. The CWS was the central manufacturing & selling agency owned by the individual retail Co-ops they supplied - many products made in house.

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A folded publicity leaflet advertising CWS Custard Powder and giving examples of recipes using the product. The Co-operative Wholesale Society was the central manufacturing and purchasing agency for the then many independent retail Co-operative Societies across Britain. It manufactured most of the Co-op's own branded goods, having a massive estate of production works and factories, and that would have included this custard powder. The leaflet is not dated but, by style, it feels very 'fifties with Mother playing the traditional role for the 'happy family'. The front cover is dominated with a cartoon of a happy housewife, steaming bowl of custard in hand, approaching a table where two expectant children and a beaming husband wait for their sweet treat. The colour yellow dominates with red highlights. The leaflet also uses the CWS 'Wheatsheaf" symbol and brand on the back cover where, in a yellow frame, a sketch of a tin of custard powder with a jug and two bowls, dominates.
November 2, 2025 at 12:56 PM
mikeyashworth.bsky.social
The Watford branch of London Underground's Metropolitan line was opened 100 years ago today by the then independent Metropolitan Railway. A mid-50s LT pic of Watford station - an image I used in a talk on street furniture thanks to that lamp centrestage! @lccmunicipal.bsky.social

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An official photo of Watford Metropolitan line station taken in the mid-1950s. The house like station building, by the Metropolitan Railway's architect C W Clark, is in the background with its low hipped roof and four chimney stacks - various cars are parked in the station forecourt and centre is an old style electric lamp standard. To the left, at the side of the station railings is a LT free-standing "UndergrounD" roundel. It is a winter scene as the trees are all bare.
November 2, 2025 at 9:28 AM
mikeyashworth.bsky.social
There's a lot of rail replacement across Yorkshire today but - LNER - this seems to be taking it a bit far. I mean I don't mind the odd mile or two but Darlington?.... #railways #railreplacement #bike #Leeds
A hire bike stand in a Leeds street. One beryl bike stands parked badged up for the sponsor LNER - London North Eastern Railway.
November 1, 2025 at 5:46 PM
mikeyashworth.bsky.social
An evocative cover to a mid-30s guide issued by the Western National bus & coach company to their services in South Devon. #travel #transport #graphicdesign #1930s

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Guide to Omnibus routes & motor coach tours in South Devon : the Western National Omnibus Company Limited : Abbey Publicity Service Ltd : South Croydon : nd [c.1935]. A rather evocative cover to a mid-30s guide issued by the local bus and coach company, the Western National Omnibus Co. Ltd., to their services and destinations in south Devon. It was one of a trio of such guides, the others covering Cornwall as well as one for servcies in Somerset, East Devon amd Gloucestershire, and produced for them by the Abbey Publicity Service of South Croydon. It would have been aimed primarily at the many tourists and visitors to the area. By the 1930s the company was one of the many regional operators who were benefitting from investments made by the main line railway companies, in this case the Great Western Railway. The cover, in a very contemporary 'poster' style, is sadly uncredited. The cover shows moorland rising from wooded valleys, with in the forground, a stream issuing from under an old stone bridge. A Western National single deck bus can be seen running through the scene that is depicted in a 'poster' style dominated by green for the hills, trees amd fields. Western National appears in a modern style lettering as a title.
November 1, 2025 at 5:36 PM
mikeyashworth.bsky.social
A bus of the SMT companies thunders along the open road. Cover of the Oct 1948 all-Scotland Bus Timetable. The Group, inc. Alexander's, Central & Western SMT, were in the process of being nationalised; the rather London Transport roundel starting to appear. @threadinburgh.scot

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Scottish Motor Bus Time Table : October 1948 : Travel Press & Publicity Co., Edinburgh : 1948. The cover to the compendium timetable of the companies that formed the Scottish Motor Traction group of bus and coach operators issued a few months prior to the sale of the concerns to the newly formed British Transport Commission in 1949. The change can already be seen as the pre-Nationalisation interests of the London Midland & Scottish and London & North Eastern Railway's in the SMT Group had passed to British Railways upon its formation on 1 January 1948. The all-Scotland bus timetable of the SMT companies had been issued since the early 1930s. The cover of this uses the generic artwork of the bus on the 'open road' seen in early nationalisation years, in white scraperboard style on a blue background, that features the rather London Transport style roundel in the centre of the landscape with the road running vertically through the symbol and out into the artwork towards the bus.
November 1, 2025 at 6:15 AM
mikeyashworth.bsky.social
London Underground extensions & improvements : the story of the 1932/33 Piccadilly line extensions as told in a supplement to the Railway Gazette in November 1932. The cover advert shows the track & station tunnels north of Finsbury Park to Arnos Grove under construction.

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Underground Extensions and Improvements : Supplement to the Railway Gazette : 18 November 1932 : cover : A special supplement, issued as part of the Railway Gazette for 18 November 1932, looking primarily at the Piccadilly line extensions undertaken by the then private London Electric Railways, part of the Underground Group. The scheme, that saw the Piccadilly line extended north in tunnels and on surface tracks from Finsbury Park to Cockfosters and westwards from Hammersmith along adapted District Railway tracks, was mostly funded by way of Government Treasury loans as part of Unemployment relief. There were also significant modernisations of certain extisting central area Piccadilly line stations in connection with the scheme as well as new, additional, trains. The supplement looks as the construction and civil engineering of both tunnels and stations, fitting out of both railway and passenger infrastructure as well as architecture. There are numerous adverts for suppliers to the scheme such as on the cover; Charles Brand & Son were the main civil engineering contractors for the tunnelling north of Finsbury Park to Arnos Grove as seen here. This included stations at Manor House, Wood Green, Turnpike Lane and Bounds Green. These works were the last major project delivered by the Underground Group prior to the formation of the London Passenger Transport Board - London Transport - in 1933. The cover, on the Gazette's orange cover background, shows four photos of tunnelling underway and a completed station as part of an advert by Charles Brand, the engineers.
October 31, 2025 at 9:54 AM
mikeyashworth.bsky.social
Walking : out for a walk up in the Yorkshire Dales and alongside the mighty Ribblehead Viaduct that carries the Settle and Carlisle railway line across Batty Moss. A breezy, brisk autumnal afternoon. #engineering #photography #landscape #walking
Walking : out for a walk up in the Yorkshire Dales and alongside the mighty Ribblehead Viaduct that carries the Settle and Carlisle railway line across Batty Moss. A breezy, brisk autumnal afternoon. The viaduct is silhouetted against an almost clear blue sky, Whernside towering above. A lone walker strides along the track to the right of the viaduct.
October 30, 2025 at 5:48 PM