Vrigne-Meuse

Transcription

Welcome to Aiguillages, let's go back to Nouvion sur Meuse this week, I already told you about Expo-Trains, the exhibition organized there every 2 years, and introduced you different layouts that were displayed there, today we're going to talk about the organizer : the Nouvion Miniature Railway association. Nouvion is situated in Ardennes, along the Meuse, and is a shrine of railway. It's not surprising that an association was created to play with trains and organize a railway model making exhibition every 2 years. During the edition of June 2014, the Mosan was able to operate for the first time, thanks to the assembly of 5 clubs, a project that was initiated by a model maker, and supported by Aiguillages. Daniel Robinet is one of the organizers of this event. We're in Nouvion-sur-Meuse, right in the midle of what we used to call the biggest classification yard of Europe. Lumes classification yard was the biggest until the 1950's, with its depot and its freight station, and its 8 km long yard. Today, it's what we call a brownfield land, there aren't any SCNF agents anymore there, only 3 come from time to time. As observing trains inspires railway model makers very often, here in Nouvion sur Meuse, some privileged observers of Lumes' classification activities ended up creating Nouvion Miniature Railway. We started in the 1995's to create the club, with a handful of model makers, and in 1997 we created the club officially, and in 2000, with Dominique, we created the first exhibition, Expo-Trains, in Nouvion-sur-Meuse, and since 2000 we organize it every 2 years. We gather railway model makers and other figurines : boats, trains ... Here we gather very atypical people, loyal people, people with an exceptional model making philosophy. And in Nouvion-sur-Meuse we favor friendliness, brotherhood in the exhibition, so as everybody feels good. The exhibition is multidisciplinary, but predominantly railway, and the 2014 edition was marked by an international train's operation, but an imaginary one. The main step is the Mosan. The Mosan gathers 5 clubs that were connected to make a 71 m long layout. The Mosan, as the fans call it : « this prestige train », leaves from Dijon via les Ardennes, Belgium and Holland to serve, by sea, England. The Mosan is the main theme but we didn't gather the Dutch because it's a bit too complicated to organize, but in the future we want to include the Dutch to this project. The Mosan is a project I will keep talking about in Aiguillages, as it's still progressing : some extensions of the layout are being built, other clubs got closer to those that already are connected, and before starting to operate in the Netherlands, some things should probably happen in Belgium soon. For now we're watching it operate, among other trains, on the Nouvion Railway's Ho scaled layout. The layout forms an about 9 meters by 2 meters oval. On the one side Nouvion village and station are represented, on the other side, a small part of Lumes depot, during the 50's/70's, with the flying junction near Vrigne Meuse that connects the 2 parts of the layout. The layout has 2 faces : the Nouvion Station side, and the Classification side. Nouvion station is situated on the Mohon-Thionville line. Mohon, whose roundhouse I made you visit in a previous Aiguillages episode, also being a shrine of railway. Today, Nouvion-sur-Meuse station is a stop served by the Champagne-Ardennes TER. Lumes' classification yard, after being the biggest of Europe, also has a reduced activity. Nowadays, it's used to store wagons awaiting service, or work trains operating on the region's lines. Before the 2000's, this classification yard was also equipped to restore cars. That's where the RIO trains, looking like those stainless steel cars operating in the Paris region, were coming for their verification visits. Lumes' yard was created in 1906. A depot was built there between 1908 and 1910, on the same site, to avoid the creation of a third roudhouse in Mohon, and the roundtrips of dead mileage locomotives between the depot and the yard. Lumes could thus shelter 30 locomotives under a roudhouse, that could access their garage by a 24 meters swing bridge. As the war was coming, many projects regarding the depot's expansion were stopped. The second World War didn't spare it either. Its installations were bombed. The arrival of the 25000 volts made it cease its activities. Lumes' yard side was created by the East Company, along the Meuse. Its installations occupy 3 km 5 between Lumes and Nouvion sur Meuse. This place wasn't chosen randomly. It's the nearest place to the junction of the lines forming Charleville's node. During its greatest period, 12 signalling controls allowed the daily classification of 2500 wagons. Next week in Aiguillages, the Côtes du Nord Railway Association, an association that operates a 40 cm track railway on its Boutdeville site near Saint-Brieu and that mainly restores equipment that operated on the breton network in the hopes of making it operate on a tourist line soon. Aiguillages offers a new report every week about railway model making or tourist trains. To be sure not to miss any of the next episodes, subscribe to Aiguillages' newsletter on the site : www.aiguillages.eu Until next week, here is as every week some suggestions of reports to watch for a first or second time.