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Great Western Railway 60xx King Class No: 6024 King Edward I hustles East on the Up First Great Western Relief-Line at Hayes & Harlington (HAY) at the head of the Steam Dreams Up Cathedral's Express, Help for Heroes Special and St. David's Day Special from Cardiff-Central to London-Euston. KE1 hauled the Down train earlier today in the fog. It's Thursday 1st March 2012 at just after 22:35 hours and KE1 was running 50 minutes late. From HAY KE1 would head straight up the Main-Line to Acton East Junction. Here KE1 would turn onto the London Overground Up line and then immediately swing to its left onto goods lines at Acton Wells Junction. Then at West London Junction it would turn onto the West Coast Main Line arriving at its final destination, London-Euston. Trivia time. This was the 6th return main-line steam excursion of 2012 in the London area. At this stage last year there had been 8. This was the 2nd return main-line run of 2012 by KE1. She's running into and out of London in two-days time and then its boiler certificate expires. It's the 2nd return Cathedral's Express of 2012. At this stage last year there had been none. The Help for Heroes Special is a unique one-off that was actually planned to run last year. Also the St. David's Day Special. Last year it ran into and out of London-Victoria and was hauled by 44932. Today's train was the 2nd Up steam special to run through HAY in 2012. Last year there had been none at this stage of the year, HAY has 5 platforms. Platform 1 is the Down Fast. Nothing stops there except in emergencies or altered running because of engineering. Platform 2 faces the Up Fast and has a similar usage to Platform 1. The fast services are normally frequent with First Great Western running trains to Cardiff/Swansea, Worcester, Plymouth/Penzance, Weston-Super-Mare, Worcester, Oxford and Bedwyn. There are four Heathrow Express trains per hour, to Heathrow Airport. All Up fast trains go to London-Paddington. Platform 3 (the south side of Platform 2) serves the Down Relief. This is where I stood. Normally there are 9 trains per hour. 3 Heathrow Connect to Heathrow Airport,4 First Great Western trains of which 2 go to Reading and 2 go to Oxford. Platform 4 serves the Up Relief and is where KE1 ran by. There are normally 7 trains per hour. 3 Heathrow Connect and 4 First Great Western. All go to London-Paddington. Platform 5 is a rarely used bay platform. The station at HAY opened on 1st May 1864, just 26 years after the Great Western main-line opened. Its name then was just plain Hayes. The original station was just two-track and Platforms 1 and 2 are where the original station stood. Hope you enjoy and please give me your feedback.