For the last few years steam special trains have run in July/August from Crewe to Scarborough. It has been worth a short trip to watch the return run up the 1 in 100 gradient from Huddersfield to the Standedge Tunnel, the loco (and firemen!) working hard to haul over a dozen coaches up the gradient, the sound of the exhaust audible from a long distance.

But tonight, hardly a sound as it approached, because tacked on the rear a Class 47 diesel loco churning out black smoke with the effort, pushing so the A4 on the front had little to do.

One enthusiast said this was because Network Rail insist on a diesel in addition "to avoid delays in case the steam unit fails".

Now this may not be true, but if so, does the originator of this policy not know that these machines were designed to run 394 miles non-stop and did so reliably for years?

And if the idea is to keep to schedule, it didn't work, today it was 20 minutes late.