Smug was not the word. Warnings of horrendous traffic queues stretching for miles around the East of England showground last Wednesday were confirmed on my IPad as I climbed aboard the Edinburgh-bound train at Kings Cross that would whisk me to its first stop at Peterborough in just 45 minutes. A special LAMMA shuttle bus would then ferry me from station to the showground.
And then we stopped at Biggleswade.
Apparently, someone had unfortunately been hit by a train at Newark – and all the trains were backed up for miles ahead.
Nothing we could do but wait . . Opposite me a guy who was due to deliver a speech at Perkins Engines at 2.00pm was naturally getting restless – and as I was on a day-trip from Salisbury to LAMMA, I feared that I was not going make it all.
“Why don’t we share a taxi, I’ve been told Peterborough is only 15 minutes away” he said (duff info, its almost 35 miles up the A1)
Good idea, can we get off here, we asked the guard. “Absolutely not” was the reply, the train is ‘locked-down’ and not authorised for non-scheduled door openings (jobsworth speak for ‘decision above my pay-grade’). “Who can take that decision if you, the guard, cannot?”
It took a passenger phone call to East Coast Trains to finally persuade the train staff that the doors could be opened fleetingly to let us off . “But don’t think you can get back on if you can’t get a taxi!”
The space outside Biggleswade Station at that time of the day was completely bereft of taxis.
Another couple of ‘train-refugees’ who were trying to get to a 1.30pm funeral at Peterborough Crematorium were one step ahead and had already phoned a local cab company, so my speech-giving friend and I agreed that we would share the quoted £60 fare if we could all travel together.
After much tapping of postcodes into the sat-nav, we set off for Peterborough. First stop had to be the Crematorium, then Perkins Engines and lastly me to the showground a route which took in most of the ‘environs’ of Peterborough (the Milton Keynes of the East Midlands).
In the end I managed a couple of hours at mud-splattered LAMMA before it got dark, and did most of the important stuff I needed to. However, all the time I was rather wishing I was taking tea at Bettys in Harrogate (or more likely supping a pint at Wetherspoons with the post show BTME crowd).
Either way, organising a show in January is always going to be fraught with worries about the weather. LAMMA remains a superb no-frills show with reasonable stand rates. Nobody is badged or recorded. They said 40,000 attended over the three days, but who knows? Access and site conditions were far from ideal - and it seems that they have simply moved the traffic jams some 50 miles south down the A1 from Newark. But its popularity remains - and there would be no traffic problems if people didn't go in their droves!
