Mark Annand
@markannand.bsky.social
Born at 313ppm. If you're nearby, enjoy www.twotunnels.org.uk.
"Ghostbusters" 'cos, that clarinet on the sidewalk.
Profile photo credit @confluentious
"Ghostbusters" 'cos, that clarinet on the sidewalk.
Profile photo credit @confluentious
It's only a single data point, always regarded November 6th as crisp - the date that most of the last leaves came off the trees while some small boys scoured the streets for spent rocket sticks.
Fast forward to November 8th 2025 and this common darter(?) dragonfly was in the air above the canal.
Fast forward to November 8th 2025 and this common darter(?) dragonfly was in the air above the canal.
November 9, 2025 at 6:59 PM
It's only a single data point, always regarded November 6th as crisp - the date that most of the last leaves came off the trees while some small boys scoured the streets for spent rocket sticks.
Fast forward to November 8th 2025 and this common darter(?) dragonfly was in the air above the canal.
Fast forward to November 8th 2025 and this common darter(?) dragonfly was in the air above the canal.
Travelled on two GWR Class 80xs yesterday. On both, a longstanding defect which can impact passenger safety. The seat padding fails: the support structure then imposes pressure, leading to an increased risk of deep vein thrombosis.
You can check for this before sitting, the defect is often visible.
You can check for this before sitting, the defect is often visible.
November 9, 2025 at 11:36 AM
Travelled on two GWR Class 80xs yesterday. On both, a longstanding defect which can impact passenger safety. The seat padding fails: the support structure then imposes pressure, leading to an increased risk of deep vein thrombosis.
You can check for this before sitting, the defect is often visible.
You can check for this before sitting, the defect is often visible.
Stonemasons putting in a lot of weight-reducing stuff at height, right there.
November 8, 2025 at 5:32 PM
Stonemasons putting in a lot of weight-reducing stuff at height, right there.
Oh and while we're on it, Bath's 6 and 7 buses need to serve the rail and bus stations. No more of this Covid-era timetable please.
November 3, 2025 at 5:46 PM
Oh and while we're on it, Bath's 6 and 7 buses need to serve the rail and bus stations. No more of this Covid-era timetable please.
Why should buses call at the Manvers Street stops? Because that allows for a far more robust journey for people changing from rail to bus.
November 3, 2025 at 5:46 PM
Why should buses call at the Manvers Street stops? Because that allows for a far more robust journey for people changing from rail to bus.
Bath Southgate department store: the frontage in Manvers Street, with underused bus stops. Blacked out windows meant that the previous tenant trashed this space - Marks and Spencer is about to change that and these will be shop windows again - and it's past time to have northbound buses call there.
November 3, 2025 at 5:46 PM
Bath Southgate department store: the frontage in Manvers Street, with underused bus stops. Blacked out windows meant that the previous tenant trashed this space - Marks and Spencer is about to change that and these will be shop windows again - and it's past time to have northbound buses call there.
IWA are on the nail with this. Also, anecdote not data but on the Bridgewater and the Ashton Canals - maintenance done in a way that allowed insects and flowering plants (including orchids) to thrive - in the centre of one of the UK's big cities this was good to see.
Photos from 2023. #UKcanals
Photos from 2023. #UKcanals
November 3, 2025 at 10:12 AM
IWA are on the nail with this. Also, anecdote not data but on the Bridgewater and the Ashton Canals - maintenance done in a way that allowed insects and flowering plants (including orchids) to thrive - in the centre of one of the UK's big cities this was good to see.
Photos from 2023. #UKcanals
Photos from 2023. #UKcanals
The scaffolding of four long months standing
Now departed
The week it left
Low sunlight through pendant raindrops made autumn jewels.
Now departed
The week it left
Low sunlight through pendant raindrops made autumn jewels.
October 30, 2025 at 12:08 PM
The scaffolding of four long months standing
Now departed
The week it left
Low sunlight through pendant raindrops made autumn jewels.
Now departed
The week it left
Low sunlight through pendant raindrops made autumn jewels.
Railbus at the platform at the long closed station at Cirencester Town. An exhibition in the rarely-opened station building, its interior under heavy refurbishment, tea, coffee, biscuits. Nothing not to like - just today and Sunday.
A timetable on display too. Kemble - Cirencester: 11 minutes.
A timetable on display too. Kemble - Cirencester: 11 minutes.
October 25, 2025 at 5:13 PM
Railbus at the platform at the long closed station at Cirencester Town. An exhibition in the rarely-opened station building, its interior under heavy refurbishment, tea, coffee, biscuits. Nothing not to like - just today and Sunday.
A timetable on display too. Kemble - Cirencester: 11 minutes.
A timetable on display too. Kemble - Cirencester: 11 minutes.
Always gives me the feels to have been the originator of a segment on a @gwr.com info screen. Hat to @walkwheelcyclet.bsky.social and @bathnes.bsky.social for backing @twotunnelsbath.bsky.social. 20 years since that cunning plan was a twinkle in the eye.
October 24, 2025 at 8:21 AM
Always gives me the feels to have been the originator of a segment on a @gwr.com info screen. Hat to @walkwheelcyclet.bsky.social and @bathnes.bsky.social for backing @twotunnelsbath.bsky.social. 20 years since that cunning plan was a twinkle in the eye.
Liking Bath's new international trains. Here at the platform is the 8:57 to Fort William
October 24, 2025 at 8:04 AM
Liking Bath's new international trains. Here at the platform is the 8:57 to Fort William
This is what the view into a bin with at least five rats in it looks like. Widcombe footbridge behind the station. Made a rat squeal at the bin and the contents went off like a roman candle as they hid.
October 22, 2025 at 8:16 PM
This is what the view into a bin with at least five rats in it looks like. Widcombe footbridge behind the station. Made a rat squeal at the bin and the contents went off like a roman candle as they hid.
Hopefully not the same way the UK upgraded the channel tunnel rail link it built in the 1890s...
October 22, 2025 at 12:31 PM
Hopefully not the same way the UK upgraded the channel tunnel rail link it built in the 1890s...
That material, rather expensive, that when used for shoe soles, onon smooth wet stone pavements/rock/wood the grip is unexpectedly non-existent. That.
(Photo from 2012, Lyncombe Vale, Bath #ThatWasThen)
(Photo from 2012, Lyncombe Vale, Bath #ThatWasThen)
October 22, 2025 at 11:59 AM
That material, rather expensive, that when used for shoe soles, onon smooth wet stone pavements/rock/wood the grip is unexpectedly non-existent. That.
(Photo from 2012, Lyncombe Vale, Bath #ThatWasThen)
(Photo from 2012, Lyncombe Vale, Bath #ThatWasThen)
On this day, please spare a thought for external comms people everywhere.
October 22, 2025 at 9:51 AM
On this day, please spare a thought for external comms people everywhere.
Apropos Blowzabella / Andy Cutting playing Widcombe social club this week: here's Tom Kitching taking the oil tanker wooden narrowboat 'Spey' through Sydney Gardens, heading for the Bath lock flight in August 2022. #UKcanals
October 20, 2025 at 10:46 AM
Apropos Blowzabella / Andy Cutting playing Widcombe social club this week: here's Tom Kitching taking the oil tanker wooden narrowboat 'Spey' through Sydney Gardens, heading for the Bath lock flight in August 2022. #UKcanals
Ah, cats... *Wishes to disrupt the progress of the ones that are the habitual hunters and change their ways.*
*This little Orkney beachcomber, in a defensive position by a wall after finding something that amounted to seven birthday presents rolled into one.*
The language when I approached it...
*This little Orkney beachcomber, in a defensive position by a wall after finding something that amounted to seven birthday presents rolled into one.*
The language when I approached it...
October 20, 2025 at 10:01 AM
Ah, cats... *Wishes to disrupt the progress of the ones that are the habitual hunters and change their ways.*
*This little Orkney beachcomber, in a defensive position by a wall after finding something that amounted to seven birthday presents rolled into one.*
The language when I approached it...
*This little Orkney beachcomber, in a defensive position by a wall after finding something that amounted to seven birthday presents rolled into one.*
The language when I approached it...
If it still exists, Folkestone Central Station's 1961 clock tower is crying out for an installation of one of those. Wondering if Network Rail's design manual includes principles for fitting one to an existing structure. #brutalism
www.designbridge.com/news/rail-cl...
www.designbridge.com/news/rail-cl...
October 17, 2025 at 10:41 AM
If it still exists, Folkestone Central Station's 1961 clock tower is crying out for an installation of one of those. Wondering if Network Rail's design manual includes principles for fitting one to an existing structure. #brutalism
www.designbridge.com/news/rail-cl...
www.designbridge.com/news/rail-cl...
The other afternoon, a small-scale electricity supply failure to a domestic supply run at shallow depth beneath the pavement, just the sort of thing that, were it to happen on his patch, wouldn't be @engineerlondon.bsky.social's concern.
October 16, 2025 at 11:23 AM
The other afternoon, a small-scale electricity supply failure to a domestic supply run at shallow depth beneath the pavement, just the sort of thing that, were it to happen on his patch, wouldn't be @engineerlondon.bsky.social's concern.
Terrible phone photo. Through the window, last night's garden spider date. This didn't go well for one of the parties. #WhatsForDinner
October 12, 2025 at 2:38 PM
Terrible phone photo. Through the window, last night's garden spider date. This didn't go well for one of the parties. #WhatsForDinner
The kind of day when you're wishing @davethroup.bsky.social was going to post an image from the top of the Malverns.
October 12, 2025 at 12:59 PM
The kind of day when you're wishing @davethroup.bsky.social was going to post an image from the top of the Malverns.
Having become used to governments dragging the view through the Overton window kicking and screaming to the right, now this newly nationalised rail franchise is content to slowly obscure it behind window dirt.
October 6, 2025 at 8:28 AM
Having become used to governments dragging the view through the Overton window kicking and screaming to the right, now this newly nationalised rail franchise is content to slowly obscure it behind window dirt.
Cafe on Bath Spa station. Trip hazard screens for @gwr.com's passengers, as one unfortunate heading-to-work person has just demonstrated. Probably best deployed elsewhere in the multinational chain's empire.
October 6, 2025 at 6:25 AM
Cafe on Bath Spa station. Trip hazard screens for @gwr.com's passengers, as one unfortunate heading-to-work person has just demonstrated. Probably best deployed elsewhere in the multinational chain's empire.
Wherever a musical instrument is positioned in a room, a sunbeam will find it. Or a cat. And sometimes both.
October 1, 2025 at 9:44 AM
Wherever a musical instrument is positioned in a room, a sunbeam will find it. Or a cat. And sometimes both.
Something I'd not considered: the forward view from the cab of a Deltic is from a vantage point that is a loooong way off the ground. (Though not exactly treetop height as this photo suggests.)
September 26, 2025 at 4:57 PM
Something I'd not considered: the forward view from the cab of a Deltic is from a vantage point that is a loooong way off the ground. (Though not exactly treetop height as this photo suggests.)