The Olympic Torch Passes By

An early rise on a grey drizzly Sunday morning to cycle down the road to catch the Olympic Torch as it passes through [wikipop search=”Chorlton-cum-Hardy”]Chorlton[/wikipop] on its way to [wikipop search=”2012_Summer_Olympics”]London[/wikipop] (the long way round). There was an impressive crowd given the hour and weather. The anticipation built…

…some succumbed to the freebies from the corporate sponsors…

…and then there it was…

The BBC’s excellent TorchCam dutifully captured the whole event…

 

….and my orange clad elbow…

Alas no one on the [wikipop search=”Greater_Manchester_bus_route_86″]86[/wikipop] was in the mood to wave back at the cheering crowd as they slowly followed the torch.

Chorlton trams opens Thursday?

As the previous piece about tram testing has been so popular I pass this on as a public service announcement. According to the man working on the testing today the line will be open tomorrow (Thursday 7th July). There is nothing to indicate this is the case…

…either at the station or on the Metrolink website other than the addition of Chorlton in the station listings…

Update: Now confirmed on the Metrolink site.

Metrolink’s new Chorlton line opens for business
Passengers will be able to travel on Metrolink’s new Chorlton line from Thursday 7 July.

Services will initially run every 12 minutes from service start to service end, Monday to Saturday. The Sunday 12-minute service runs between 9am and 5.30pm, with a 15-minute service from 6.58-9am and 5.30-10.52pm.

The journey time from St Werburgh’s Road to St Peter’s Square is approximately 15 minutes.

Testing Trams

Although Metrolink had originally promised the new South Manchester Line was coming in Spring 2011 they were still testing it in July.

The latest delay is a computer communication problem.

The problem is that the new system is as advanced as the current system is old, so it’s a bit like connecting your modern PC to a Commodore 64 and making them work together at this higher level.

Of course being [wikipop]Amiga[/wikipop] and [wikipop]Macintosh[/wikipop] people we would not know anything about that stuff. 😉

Update: 5th July 2011

The horn works!

Update: 6th July 2011
Maybe opening tomorrow.

Chorlton to Dunham Massey

April’s 30 Days of Biking came and went without our active participation. Our biking is mostly a daily commute to work and occasional shopping trips. But coinciding time off and some sunshine inspired us to venture out last week. Being new to the area we are still exploring various routes and are grateful for knowledge and insights shared by local bike bloggers (Note to self: Remember to sponsor Lorenza.) From the map we reckoned we could get along the [wikipop]towpath[/wikipop] on the [wikipop]Bridgewater canal[/wikipop] to Dunham Massey. So we set off to explore:

The Cascade Bicycle Club in Seattle have produced a video that pretty much says it all in under three minutes: