Photo-a-Day  (Monday, 31st January, 2022)

I like what you have done here Mike.
I think we have found another talented photographer.

A sunset in the south-east?

Well back in the day, like many kids, I collected train numbers. I knew of springs branch but never went there. Is it really in Wigan

Looking west towards Shevington

A composition full of speed and motion . Brilliant.

The line that passes through a lovely little town called 'Howfen'. (The best is left behind.!)

Its a good photo, train tracks disappearing into the distance.
Is Shevington in the west ? If it is, thats where I thought the sun set.

used to go there in the 60s to see the steam engines getting their fires up to steam

Nice angle and lines. Looking South-east. It would be better with a train though.

Looks like taken from Cemetery road bridge. George is more or less right with his direction.

Springs Branch is indeed in Wigan, Derek, although certain pedantic people on here will point out that it is in the Lower Ince/ Spring View area of Wigan rather than the town itself. I was very familiar with Springs Branch as a child, accompanying my much-older brother Colin to the railway sheds on a Friday afternoon to collect his wages. When you pass the cemetery as the nights draw in and draw out every year, (and I passed it regularly on the bus for many years when I was coming home from work), the sun goes down BEHIND the cemetery as you look through the bus window, so I just can't get my bearings here. That is just an observation, not at all a slur on the photo.... Good one!

Our Jimmys been on the phone and he says this photo is looking the other way towards the sunrise, he walks the dog down that road.

It was taken about. 10am it was just a figure of speech thought it fitted the photo that's all . So your all right it wasn't a sunset.

It is a bit dodgy playing dominoes on the track.

The sun rises in the East and sets in the West...something that never changes..

When this photograph was taken, Mike Lavin and his camera are looking
in a North Westerly direction. Approx one and a half miles north of here
is Wigan North Western railway station. The railway tracks going away to
the left of the picture lead to Liverpool, via St Helens. The sunshine in the
distance is a sunset.

Mike: Interesting photo going into the sunset, nice that you have taken it with perspective of lines to the distance well done.
But you can’t beat John Wayne looking in the sunset saying, get on your horse pilgrim, and get the hell outa here. It doesn’t have the same meaning with Train’s.

John Wayne also made a little-known film about herding a flock of sheep across the desert John G, at the end of which he uttered the now immortal words "Let's get the flock out of here" at least that's what it sounded like to me.

Ray… I disagree, looking on google street view standing on Cemetery road bridge this view is looking south. Wigan North western is behind the photographer. Also google street view shows quite clearly the blue notice on the large building to the left.

DeTease: I can understand that mate especially at your age, but don’t forget your cauliflower ear, and what your mam used to say to you about going deaf and blind if you carried on with what you were doing. “ It all takes effect as you get older.”

DTease, you've cheered me up! ....Actually, he made that film in Spring View down "t'sand-hole", and had a shot of red-eye in The Walmesley Arms. Veronica and I were saloon gals!

hahaha teehee! A good 'un Dt....
Didn't he also say "GED off your horse and drink your milk! But in the unique way he spoke...

Sometimes Big John didn't even need a horse John G . Like at the end of
' The Searchers ' , when he strides out through the cabin door into the magenta sunset and swaggers slowly into the desert . He looks bigger than Monument Valley silhouetted in the distance .
There's no sunset at all however in what I reckon to be the greatest cowboy exit of all time when in ' Pale Rider' , Clint Eastwood rides like a ghost back into the snowing mountains from which he was summoned .

Anne, Yes, you are correct, I must have been looking at the picture upside
down, so it will be a sunrise, not a sunset. The tracks to the left are heading
into Springs Branch Railway Depot. Many thanks, Ray.

What did you say John G? I can’t see your writing!

“just a figure of speech”?

“Send us three and fourpence, we’re going to a dance”.

DRease: Just keep taking the tablets, and make sure there’s no holes in your re-enforced pockets.

sorry Ray, this is taken at ten am so a sunrise not sunset, looking sarf.
If you look closely between the first two pylons on the right of the picture you can just make out the mottled brick wall running from the bridge downhill to where an old saadle tank used to shunt, I think it may of been a coal mine .We used to sit on the wall train spotting and there was a sidings line along the wall and occasionaly our view would be blocked.......Oooooo we could have crushed a grape.

That Mick thinks all roads (and railway lines) lead to Shevington.
Springs Branch is in Ince and Ince is in between Hindley and Wigan and that line doesn’t go anywhere near Westhoughton Veronica.

That line goes through Westhoughton and Daisy Hill. I catch it twice a week and I will do so tomorrow George. There's a train once an hour from Daisy Hill and also once an hour from Westhoughton both lines merge into the same line for Wigan. It passes through Hindley and Ince - I don't think I'm dreaming either. And Howfen is a nice little town... as you say not all rail lines lead to Shevvy La.

Actually if it's not the exact line it must be in the vicinity. Howfen is still a nice town! Even though we don't have a Parish Council!

Ha ha ha. You take the biscuit, Veronica.
The line which goes through Westhoughton is the Manchester to Southport line. The line in this photo is the West Coast Mainline.

Veronica, we do have a parish council, only it’s called a town council and we pay a parish precept.

I don't give a monkeys which line it is that comes through from W/H to Wigan . The pair of you are the most boring , pedantic posters that come on here. Get a life ... Tweedle Dum and Tweedle Dee!

Veronica , I hope you delivered that salvo in your best John Wayne voice .

I shoulda taken Dtease's advice Poet ... " Get the flock outa here'' ! ....;~))

Agreed, Veronica....pedantic isn't the word! Stick to the Siegfried Line, Dolly dear, and we'll hang our washing on it!

Good idea Irene, best not put my 'smalls' on though - might give someone a heart attack!;~)

Veronica, would you rather carry on not knowing the correct information?
There’s nothing wrong in correcting someone who thinks they know something, but they are barking up the wrong tree.
You learned two things here. One, that the photo is not of the line that runs through Westhoughton, the other is that you have a parish council just like Shevington has.

A town council George.

Parish and Town Councils are the same; they have the same powers and act within the same legislation. A Town Council is a Parish Council that has usually decided to have a mayor and call itself a Town Council.

Same thing Vera.

Always referred to as t'Town Council...
" Has't 'eared who's bin elected fot Teawn Ceawncul ?" - " Aye , he'll be no use....".
Definitely never referred to as the
" Parish Council" even if it's the same or not.
I'll go with the town's people where I've lived for 53 years.

Call it what you will. Westhoughton, Blackrod and Horwich are, officially, “Civil Parishes”. They each have a Parish Council, or a town council, if you like.
In my opinion, all the towns in a metropolitan borough should have one.

As Shakespeare was want to quote.. " a Rose by any other name would smell as sweet"..
A reference used to state that the name of things do not affect what they really are.. I'll stick with what we in Howfen call the Town Council..in fact I can't see the title 'Parish Council' taking off at all. Might have done many years ago when it was just a village in the back of beyond.