Wednesday 29 February 2012

The life of living next to a busy rail line.

Whilst casually sitting at my desk, refreshing my twitter/facebook feeds & realising iTunes manages to find my least favourite songs when on shuffle, I found my peace shattered by the screeching brakes of a passing train...

For the last five months, I have lived beside what seems to be one of the most used railway lines in the country. It seems like there's a train passing every 10 minutes, the lovely silence of my studio being disrupted by the constant sounding of their horns, screeching brakes & engines running. 


My least favourite train has got to be the one that sits outside my window every single morning without fail, engine running, just sitting there being noisy and often spoiling my much needed lie in. This is closely followed by the freight trains which pass regularly, causing even more noise than normal trains, these are usually the horn culprits. My hatred for these trains comes at 2 or 3 in morning, when you're in bed, literally nodding off when the rattling of an industrial train towing around 20 carriages wakes you up. This is made worse by people who don't live near trains saying 'why don't you just ignore them?' only people who regularly encounter such noise should be able to comment, the racket they make is IMPOSSIBLE to ignore.

Saturday night/Sunday morning, saw my first experience of maintenance works on the line, definitely the single most annoying thing about trains. It must have been about 3/4 times louder than a freight train. This huge machine, slowly passing at 2am, not the best time to decide work needed to be done. Social networking sites were covered in posts from people who had to put up with the awful noise as they tried to sleep.

The annoyance of trains doesn't just occur in the flat, it seems like everywhere I go a train is determined to make life unpleasant. I miss being able to make a simple trip to town that doesn't contain a 5-10 minute wait for trains to pass, I'm actually sure I've gained a sixth 'there's a train coming' sense. I can guarantee that if I'm in a rush, the beeping will begin, accompanied by the red flashing lights, this is followed by the slow dropping of the barriers as people run to cross before a train appears. Everyone then spends the next few minutes awkwardly standing in silence, waiting for a train to pass... The only good thing about this, is the perfect road crossing opportunity you gain from traffic coming to a stand still.

I definitely wonder why someone thought it would be a good idea to build a whole city, let alone a university campus which is split into two by a busy rail line. 

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