Waverley!

[mjt60a]

I went for a short (or so I thought) trip on Waverley yesterday (friday 23rd) from Tilbury to London - or so I thought! Of all the things that could've happened to interrupt the sailing (mechanical fault on board, severe weather etc.) the last thing I expected was for Tower Bridge to fail to operate at the required time, delaying arrival in London by hours! (in fact, arrangements had to be made to return to Greenwich instead)
On the plus side though, I did get more time onboard for what would usually have been quite a short cruise, got to see some of the sights after dark and, finally, to sit in the drivers seat on the DLR train going back to London - at least for the first part of the ride as the driver didn't get on the train until about four stops later - the train was on some kind of 'auto-pilot' until then!
Oh, and the look on the faces of passengers at Greenwich onboard the Elizabethan and those waiting to board Dixie Queen, on seeing what a real paddlesteamer looks like, was priceless!!!      

[Waverley]

Hi Mick & all - Tower Bridge not opening would have had a nasty knock-on effect - there was supposed to be a PSPS charter from Tower Pier that evening (at 1930) - and could have an affect on other Thames sailings as well if they don't fix it.  

I believe, under normal circumstances, their is an obligation to open the bridge whenever required for navigation - one day Waverley arrived at Tower Pier at about 1600, epearted downstream almost immediately (for fuel) came back an hour or so later and then left on an evening cruise. While she was absent, it was also opened for a traditional Thames barge  - meaning it was opened five times in all - in the rush hour!    Cue serious traffic problems, no doubt.

By the way (and off topic) the Docklands Light Railway is supposed to run on "auto pilot", actually a very clever computer program (hope it doesn't use Windows) all the time.  The conductor only needs to drive it when there is a fault.  Its very impressive when it works.

Regards

David