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''The Bristolian'' is a named passenger train service from London Paddington to Bristol Temple Meads. It starts at Weston-super-Mare in the London bound direction. ''The Bristolian'' name was retained by British Railways and is still used by its successor, First Great Western. ==Story of the train== ''The Bristolian'' was inaugurated in 1935 by the Great Western Railway (GWR) to celebrate the opening of the Great Western main line from Paddington to Bristol in 1835., and is notable in that the route taken differed in the up and down directions. The down train (from Paddington) took Brunel's original route via Bath, but the up train (from Bristol) climbed the 1 in 75 of Ashley Hill Bank through what is now Bristol Parkway and then continued climbing up the 1 in 300 of the Badminton Line to Badminton before rejoining the down route at Wootton Bassett. This meant that the up train had a slightly shorter route of 117.6 miles (compared to 118.3 miles in the down direction via Bath), but with the stiff climb was probably the harder. The train was scheduled to leave Paddington at 11.00am, and take 105 minutes for the non-stop run to Bristol Temple Meads, with the return leaving Bristol at 4.30pm with the same non-stop time. It was initially made up of 7 Collett coaches and hauled by a ''King'' class locomotive, at the time the top GWR passenger class. Later the ''Castle'' class steam locomotives and, from 1959, by ''Warship'' class diesel-hydraulic locomotives were used. The service was suspended during World War 2, and it was not until 1954 the 105 minute schedule was again achieved.〔 During this time ''The Bristolian'' became one of the few named trains to be scheduled for haulage by a gas turbine locomotive when, between April and May 1952 it was scheduled for haulage by 18100, the Metropolitan-Vickers experimental locomotive but otherwise the mid 1950s was a time of very fast running under steam haulage, the intention being to reduce the regular schedule below 100 minutes. The fastest recorded was hauled by 7018 ''Drysllwyn Castle'' in April 1958 taking 93 minutes 50 seconds with a top speed of 102 mph.〔 The change to diesel traction saw ''Warship'' class D805 ''Benbow'' haul an 8-coach ''Bristolian'' on the opening day of the 1959 summer timetable in 93 minutes 48 seconds, and over that summer several similar times were recorded until civil engineering concerns placed a strict 90 mph limit on the line, and the 100 mph running required for such times was no longer possible.〔 By 1966 ''Western'' diesels had taken over from the ''Warships'', and although not officially advertised as ''The Bristolian'' the train, now sometimes having 12 coaches, was still achieving the 105 minute schedule even with a stop at Bath included (the up route having been changed in 1961). In 1971 the route as again altered, this time both the up and down trains were routed via Badminton and called at the newly opened Bristol Parkway, and the load limited to 10 coaches giving an overall schedule of 110 minutes. The final version of the loco-hauled ''Bristolian'' came about in 1973 with the introduction of air-conditioned Mark 2 coaches, and the replacement of the Westerns by Class 47 diesels. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「The Bristolian (train)」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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