Alphabetical thing: Bickley

Bickley railway station is way out in the suburbs, on the Southeastern routes to Orpington and Swanley. There are four platforms arranged in two islands. The exit is by the wood-panelled ticket office on the footbridge

Confusingly, the stopping trains to/from London Blackfriars use the tracks on the northernmost island, along with fast trains to/from London Victoria that don't stop here, while the Victoria stopping trains use the tacks on the southernmost island. Except when there are delays caused by signal failures, etc., because then the Blackfriars trains are unexpectedly switched to the southern pair of tracks so they don't hold up the fast trains, and everyone going to Blackfriars has to run like mad across the bridge to the other island to catch their train.

The idea of keeping one pair of tracks dedicated for slow trains and the other for fast trains hasn't occurred to the railway controllers. I guess their minds must be too highly trained..

There appears to be some rebuilding work going on there, but it's hard to be sure what. Cones are positioned on the platforms, while the people in orange stand around doing as little as possible. Apparently it takes six of them to operate one paintbrush!

What's immediately outside the station? A dry cleaners that thinks it's in Belmont, the spiritual twin of the mini-cab office that doesn't know whether or not it's in Belmont.

What's further outside the station? A footpath running along the top of the railway cutting towards Bickley village. Yes, it's all very suburban but in a pleasant way, and once again with a real village feel to it.