wrafter:
I am pleased to have complied with the terms of reference of the original challenge. This is the sort of schedules knowledge unfortunately that can have others just shaking their heads in disbelief !
I didn't go to Repton school but knew someone who did. Apparently a headmaster there in the old days, as a minor punishment, would give boys the national train timetable and tell them to find the quickest journey from, say, Northampton to Bradford. When the results were offered he would glower incredulously at it and then write a better version down off the top of his head.