This lot are being re-engined and being used in pairs instead of 66s, it seems. Largely because there are so few new freight locos that fit UK loading gauges and EC emissions regulations! Daft ain't it.

Just been reading that these re-engined 73s are to be used on the West Highland Line sleepers. I could never get used to seeing 33s on the Cumbrian Coast Line, but pairs of 73s on the Fort William sleepers is just wierd!!

They seem to get everywhere now. Very strange when one considers their initial, much more restricted working zones. Travelling by St.Leonard's Railway Engineering Ltd. fairly frequently over the past five years, I have seen, and almost as often photographed, quite a few 73s - there and at Hastings, where they used to run to reverse to go back up the Tonbridge line.