Upgrading the Railway Network

by The Stainmore Phoenix

Chapter 22

Chapter 22

For part 2 of his plan, Dangersignal was talking with his brother about his idea.

“I’m sure it’ll work, if Pinestreak, Stormcloud and Coalstreak agree,” she said.

Dangersignal smiled in agreement. Coalstreak, his niece, who’s an Earth Pony had an interesting talent for finding best quality Anthracite coal. Pinestreak and Stormcloud were both unicorns and the sons of Dragonstorm and Lightning Dust. Pinestreak had Forest green eyes, coat, mane and tail. No cutie mark on his flanks.

Stormcloud had a dark storm cloud gray mane and tail with a light storm cloud gray coat and no cutie mark on his flank. He had storm cloud gray eyes that were two shades lighter than his coat.

The two boys were both bookworms that could easily put Princess Twilight Sparkle to shame. At times, they often assisted their mother with courier duties when not in school or helped polish the engines when they were done with school.

Coalstreak, had a coal black coat, mane and tail. Her eyes were the same coal black color that her mane and tail were, but lighter by one shade. She was brash only when required (and that usually lead to her putting both Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon in their places). On her flank was a white outline of a coal shovel with a small mound of coal on it. Other times, she was very nice, and wanted to make friends, which lead to her making friends with the CMC.

The one thing that she and her brothers enjoyed more than anything, when not in school was being taught by the humans who her uncle employed about the railways of the UK. To her, it was interesting, and she had been taking cabrides in the locomotives as they trundled all around Equestria with their goods and passenger trains.

Of course, when she heard that her uncle had a plan to help them with their assignment for the underappreciated, her eyes lit up. It was like the greatest Hearthswarming gift that she got.

The group spent the holiday helping prepare the town. Passenger and goods trains hurried to and fro, carrying their precious cargos. Dangersignal was out helping track crews deice points, so that way there were no delays in the schedules. The kids volunteered to aide in helping station staff load wagons and coaches. The schedules were hectic and the station staff were grateful for the help.

During that time, a young trainee driver had been hired on. His name was Coupling Rod and he was a reckless sort. Disobeying speed limits, running through danger signals, treating the wagons roughly, damaging coaches and not listening to good advice. He was a few years younger than Rainbow Dash and was trying to impress a female Pegasus named Bright Eyes.

His resume of disaster doesn’t stop at minor rule infractions, but he has been reported several times for a more sever breach of regulations.

One rule that Dangersignal implemented on the railway to prevent accidents is that all “fly shunting” moves are done in the yard. “Fly shunting” is when wagons are uncoupled from an engine, then the engine moves forward to give the wagon enough momentum to move on its own, then the engine falls back, allowing the wagon to carry on to the siding.

The origins of that rule came out Alistair letting Dangersignal read a book about railway accidents and there was an accident at Abergele where a train of wagons ran away after three timber wagons were “hard fly shunted” on the head of the waiting goods train. The shunt was hard enough to break the cogs that held the brakes on the brake-van. The train smashed into the Irish Mail.

From then on, all “fly shunting” operations had to be done on sidings, where they had buffer stops to halt the wagons or if they break the buffers, they can stop on the grass beyond the sidings. It was for the protection of the main line, so passenger trains and fast goods trains were no longer in danger of being in a serious accident.

To Coupling Rod, that was the most foolhearty thing he ever heard and decided he knew better than an Alicorn who had lost his family, was involved (albeit uninjured) in a derailment, as well having a leg broken after jumping into a brake-van.

“Listen, kid,” Dangersignal would tell him. “You need to learn your lesson quickly.”

“Pah,” he would retort to the Alicorn’s advice.

However, with Hearthswarming Eve and Hearthswarming, the railway was in a rest period as crews went home to their families. The humans had finally gotten a rather large home, which had been built for them as a thank you for their hard work.

Soon, Hearthswarming was over and everyone returned to work, with Dangersignal taking up fire duties on the extended side tank LBSCR E2 class tank engine, which became Baltimare Harbor’s main stay shunter, while also running short goods and passenger trains. Normally, the controller of the railway would be sitting in his office, which was in Equestria Canterlot Railway Station, but ever since the hiring of Coupling Rod, Dangersignal had to take up his old duties to train the youngster.

The Alicorn hadn’t forgotten his promise to his kids, but it was merciful chance that they were last on the presentation roster and it made his work easier than ever. Of course, being on the first commuter train of the day put him in a brilliant mood. That meant that he’d be able to prepare the special for his kids’ project.

Of course, being on the first commuter train of the day and on light shunting meant he could carry out his plan without any hitch.

After he finished the commuter run and topped up the little tank engine’s water tanks, he went about preparing the mixed train for the Black 5 to take to Ponyville. The plan he had was to give the school children a special train trip while his kids presented their project on the underappreciated.

Dangersignal had been used as a base source for their paper and from there, the kids talked to the humans, who leant them books on the topic and after reading and making notes on paper, they wrote up the paper, which was twelve and a half pages, surpassing their instructor’s minimum of two pages.

“I’ll tell you one thing dear,” he told Rainbow Dash when she came into the room they shared. “I’ve been used for many things, but an information bank is a first.”

“At least your getting some usage of the knowledge you gained over the time you spent out of Equestria,” she said, kissing him on the cheek.

“Your right,” he said. “Well, we’d best get some sleep. G’night.”

“Night,” Rainbow Dash yawned.

The next morning, Dangersignal was up five minutes after Rainbow Dash, who was off to go and create a storm on the northeastern end of Ponyville. He teleported to the yards, where the Black 5 and special train was waiting. He was getting if fired up when Coupling Rod appeared.

“Oh, I’m working with you,” he hissed.

Coupling Rod was an Earth Pony. Steel gray eyes, Coal Black Mane, Dark brown coat, light brown tail. He had a steam locomotive coupling rod cutie mark, hence his name. He was roughly Applejack’s height and he always wore a cocky smile, even when he was paired with someone he didn’t like working with.

Dangersignal had tried time and again before the Hearthswarming vacation to break him of his “tough guy” attitude, but since he came from the backwaters of Manehatten, the Alicorn Controller found him a tough nut to break open.

“Yes,” he said. “I’m letting you be my fire pony for this special train. If you can behave yourself, I may consider you for a promotion from cleaner to shunter.”

“Why shunter?” he demanded. “Why not driver? I mean that suits me much more than shunter.”

“The railway promotion ladder works like this: Cleaner, Shunter, station porter, booking office attendant, guard for trains, fire lighter, fire pony, driver. Sometimes retired drivers do become stationmasters,” Dangersignal explained. “On a railway, having many different facets of knowledge and experience is a good thing. It helps if you have to cover other shifts.”

Coupling Rod sighed in defeat. He knew that the Alicorn was right. Jumping aboard, the Earth Pony took up the coal shovel. Dangersignal stopped him.

“Boiler’s stoked up and there’s plenty of coal and water for the journey,” he told the Earth Pony. “Give us a toot on the whistle and we’ll be away.”

Coupling Rod did as he was told and the train jerked into motion. The journey to Ponyville was rather plain, by Dangersignal’s standard, but informative to Coupling Rod. He’d only ever been in the yards, cleaning the locomotives, so for him, the main line was a rather big jolt.

“I always thought the main line was some kind of fantasy story,” he said. “The busyness of the line is a real change.”

“Right,” Dangersignal told him.

The two fell silent and soon pulled into Ponyville Station, where the class was waiting. Dangersignal glanced out of the cab on the driver’s side, which was next to the goods platform, to see Rainbow Dash dive into the brake-van. He turned back around and looked at Coupling Rod.

“Do we have the green?” he asked the Earth Pony.

Coupling Rod turned around to see Rainbow Dash blow the guard’s whistle and hold up a green lamp in her mouth.

“We do!” he called back.

Dangersignal gave one toot on the whistle and the train started away. In the first class coach, Coalstreak was giving the class her findings on mixed traffic engines. She was great at presenting facts. When she finished, Pinestreak presented his information on the importance of mixed traffic engines on a railway.

Breezeblaze was next and she explained that mixed traffic engines had a small start, with many of them being 0-6-0 tank engines, with some railways having 0-6-0 tender engines.

“History soon proved that railways needed bigger and stronger engines,” she said. “So, Sir William A Stanier, in 1934 built the Black 5’s to bring the newly formed London, Midland and Scottish Railway up to date and with 842 being built, they were a success, and were a favorite with loco crews and passengers.”

When she finished, Flash Freeze picked up with how many different railways found that having different sized mixed traffic engines played to the benefit of wherever they were needed.

When it was down to Firestrike, he stood up and explained how unappreciated mixed traffic engines really were.

“To many people, mixed traffic engines fall into the “if you’ve seen one, you’ve seen them all” category and don’t draw the crowds like an LNER A3 pacific or any flashy express engine. A point of comparison, express engines are like the princesses-built for one purpose and looking flashy while carrying that purpose out. Earth ponies are like the mixed traffic engines, they do whatever work is required of them and they rarely get noticed,” he said.

“A better comparison is with Princess Twilight Sparkle and my father,” Breezeblaze added. “The two are Alicorns, but both serve different purposes. Princess Twilight Sparkle goes to all royal functions and acts as a basic problem solver with the ponies of Ponyville. My father, Dangersignal is the Controller of the Equestrian Railway, but he doesn’t rely on his position and power to get what he wants, often times working with the humans and helping them sort out the problems without it getting too out of hand.”

“Ah,” Ms. Cheerilee said. “So he does whatever is required of him, whether it be the usual paperwork or firing on a tank engine.”

“Correct,” Breezeblaze said. “And Thanks to Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon, they have shown that he doesn’t always get the respect he deserves.”

The two snobbish ponies gulped. They were hoping that everyone had forgotten that statement.

“In fact, as an added bonus, My father is right now working this train with a Black 5 and a new pony who was a recent acquisition from the rough part of Manehatten,” Firestrike said. “Now, how many of you recognized him?”

No-one raised their hooves. He continued.

“My mother, Rainbow Dash is the guard of this train,” he said. “Anyone recognize her?”

Again, hooves stayed down.

“This proves that the underappreciated don’t care about the appreciation of being noticed, but that they’ll do their job regardless of who notices or who doesn’t,” he pointed out. “The underappreciated are often underappreciated because of the type of work they do.”

“Oh,” came the chorused reply.

“To point something out,” Coalstreak said. “Many of the underappreciated locomotives and even characters make it into fictional stories. An example is in the famous “Railway Series” books that one of my uncle’s human friends let me read, they have one Black 5 in the book, named Henry.”

From there, they explained at how many underappreciated characters have rarely made it into fiction and if they do, they really have to prove themselves, but that fame doesn’t really last, because they just see it as another job and go back to their original work.

When the kids finished, the train drew to a halt at Dodge City Station, where the class stepped onto the platform and looked at the scenery while Rainbow Dash, Dangersignal and Coupling Rod shunted around. No-one noticed them at all, but they didn’t care.

When all the shunting was done and the Black 5 was coupled onto the other end of the train, Ms. Cheerilee looked at the train.

“Why is the engine looking like that?” she asked.

“There’s no turntable, so they have to run tender first, which is a danger,” Coalstreak said. “Breezeblaze, Pinestreak, Can you two act as Dangersignal’s eyes, looking out for caution and danger signals set “against” our engine?’

“We can,” the two pegasi said.

With that, Breezeblaze took up position on the tender’s water tank with Pinestreak acting as messenger. The train trip back took longer, because they had to go slower due to their “situation”. To Dangersignal, better to be safe than sorry. At Ponyville station, the railway’s 4700 2-8-0 was waiting to act as a pilot engine. When the kids had left and the 4700 took up position, the train was soon off.

“That was a great report and day out,” Ms. Cheerilee said. “Coalstreak; you, your siblings and your cousins are really lucky to have such an important, if not always recognized family member. This performance deserves a passing grade.”

“Thank you,” they said.

At the end of the school day, Lightning Dust picked up the kids and took them back to the castle. As they passed the railway station, a goods train clanked slowly through. The setting sun made the passing train’s grimy paint dance.

‘Now that’s a beautiful sight,’ Breezeblaze thought as she headed to her room.