On yesterday’s post, another local one for me. Things I notice from the image as it comes: the splay in the negative rails in the centre of the view, fairly strong and high sun, 8-car P Stock, lighting masts in the yard, plenty of vegetation and a loco in respectable condition, outwardly. It’s on running lines, on its own and is either at rest or on the move slowly, most likely towards the camera and into platform 1.
I’ll suggest this is an ‘outside-the-peaks’ or weekend test run, fairly normal [*]. It is possible that the photographer had a hint to be there but my hunch is that the photographer has been on the trip, and has arranged for the loco to pause briefly, just in good light and nicely framed, and hopped out to get the shot. Skimming the Working Timetables, it seems as if P Stock 6- or 8-car trains were part of the Uxbridge service in varying quantities from the 1940s up to and including the June 1962 book, fewer in the very last years but typically up to seven 8-car trains out of a 20-24-train service. It's easily possible for a train in that part of the yard to be spare, or not required for service. Broadly, the picture might be any year from mid-1950s to 1961, and if I had to guess, either the middle years of that range or 1961 when so many pictures were taken. There’s a small date mark, on the left front panel of the loco, top left, just below the waist handrail. If the original will allow a very selective enlargement, this mark could suggest the most recent planned lift or overhaul, so may give us an ‘earliest’ date.
I’m behind by about three pages on observations for some pictures and my reflections on some of the comments made, partly because I’m going through drawings for evidence and partly work/life. Will get there eventually.
as an edit, a clarification [*] test runs to Uxbridge are convenient for Neasden, Ealing Common and Acton Works, and happen today, still.