Royal Duchy 2015

David
The WSSE'S on the 15/8 and 29/8 are no longer listed on the RTC website.


Paul

 

As guycarr has pointed out, a diesel shadowed 60007 to Edinburgh and back a few weeks ago. More than a day trip but not a marathon like the GB so it seems where there's a will theres a way.

 

I would judge each tour on a case by case basis and would depend on loco and route. Casting aside the diesel debate for a moment, I'd willingly pay more for a Scot over Shap than a Scot across the Fens or a K4 over Rannoch than a K4 to Brighton. That said, £20 to avoid being shoved by a box would be a no brainer in my book. There is also the question as to which would increase ticket prices more, having a diesel shadow or make the trains shorter?

 

But the $65,000question is whether an extra £11 per passenger would cover it.

If you take a typical charter of say 400 passengers. Knock off two TSOs to bring the weight limit down to what is acceptable on the gradients and you lose potentially 128 seats - say £10,000 revenue @£79 per seat. Spread that £10k over the remaining 270 passengers on the train and you are looking at closer to £40 extra per head to cover the lost revenue.

Tom

 

The above assumes that the cost of seven coaches is the same as nine.

 

Where do you propose any savings come from? The loco cost is the same (that's a given seeing as this thought-experiement is about reducing loads to allow a given engine to cover the duty). The track access charges will be the same. Crew costs will be the same. The fixed overheads of the company in marketing, office expenses etc will be the same. All you save is the hire charge on a couple of coaches, which is likely pretty negligible in the total cost of putting train on the rails.

Tom

 

You've answered your own question.

 

So you think not hiring two coaches will save £10,000? For that maths to work, you have said that the hire charge per coach is exactly equivalent to the revenue that the coach generates - in which case, where is the money coming from to pay for all the other expenses?

Tom

 

Off course as the welsh mountaineer ran with only 6 coaches, were they running it knowing they were going to lose money? I doubt it.

 

Fair enough, each to their own. Regardless, I consider myself chastened and I apologise.

 

To break up the debates, I have a couple of pics of Tangmere from Dawlish on Sunday, before it all went wrong...

34067 'Tangmere' at Dawlish by bofur76, on Flickr

34067 'Tangmere' at Dawlish by bofur76, on Flickr

 

Sorry if I sounded off about it.

 

Exactly my point ...

The problem with short trains is that there are negligible savings to be made running them relative to a long train, but a significant reduction in revenue. Hence my feeling that those who want "all steam" are going to have to recalibrate their expectations of what they consider a viable combination of route, loco, load and price.

One issue is that often the "hilly" section of an itinerary may only be a small part of the total, but it is the steepest gradient that needs to be used when settting the load, even if that is only one mile out of several hundred. No problem putting 11 or so behind a West Country on a reasonably flat road. Which is why I wonder if there is mileage (no pun intended) in considering more creative itineraries, in which the loco + large train does the bulk of the journey, and those that want the "adventurous" bit do it on a smaller train for a supplemental fare.

For example, Exeter - Plymouth is a bit over an hour each way, plus say two for loco servicing. So you could have a morning trip of, say, three hours to Exeter from some starting point with West Country + 11 coaches + diesel for shunting purposes. Knock off four or five coaches and their passengers and the diesel for those who want to spend four or five hours looking round Exeter, then for a premium take the remaining six or seven coaches unassisted over the Devon banks, for a supplement to the main fare. That way those who want pure steam get it, at least on the significantly challenging part of the route, whereas the whole train is large enough to be financially viable, since the supplement for the bit on the banks would only need to be the marginal cost of the trip to Plymouth and back. Similar ideas might work elsewhere.

Tom

 

Nah, don't worry about it. In retrospect, I was in a bit of a combative mood when I wrote the offending post, so its good that you picked me up on it.

 

On the other hand, each time I consider that being shoved around by a diesel is not what I want the tour company loses income of about £400.