West Somerset Railway General Discussion

Is that what's it called, no chance of a pair of 66s bring ballast up the line ha

 

Those from other parts of the country would appreciate a link if possible.
Some strange bodies rather like how others do relays.

 

Pictures link here:

http://cgibin.wsr.org.uk/cgi-bin/gallery.cgi?h=Latest+pictures&t=pics

Use the >>> to scroll across

 

Thanks for that.

 

I agree with you , but what else can you do to make better use of Platform 1? For the future I'm sure you'll agre BL needs to be more flexible, at the moment it is a one platform station, well, maybe one & a half!.
I'm sure when the station farm plan was first mooted there was talk of having a carriage shed , and / or an engine shed.Is this still the case?

 

I must preface my answer by saying that:

(1) I haven't seen the consultation document and (2) I have not spent much time on this so far. However, I do have approaching 40 years experience of Railway operations of all sorts including the operational design of station and resignalling schemes.

The philosophy of the proposals appears to be to have a car park on the east of the line and 'force / lead' customers to use the facilities on the western side by taking them over the line on a footbridge.

The significant operational difficulty is that the western platform is narrow. Too narrow, for example, for a wheel chair / scooter ramp to be used other than in the gap at the south end of the station building, or north of that building. Given the practice of putting the brake in the middle of WSR trains (for a whole host of good reasons) that appears to be very difficult. The western platform cannot be widened without moving the station building, goods shed and SM's house. The track cannot be moved east to allow widening at the platform edge without rebuilding the road bridge.

It is hard to avoid the conclusion that using the western platform as the principal departure platform is not sensible operationally, and unlikely to be compliant with disability legislation.

As it happens, I have made a proposal for next year's Quantock Belle operation which makes greater use of the western platform.

Even on operating matters, the western platform seems to be running into difficulties.

And then there is the heritage aspect.

It seems to me that the philosophy of the scheme needs to be re-thought.

If operational flexibility is sought, then an 'arrival loop' solution north of the station would be an option, but at considerable resignalling cost.

I am not aware who the Operations contributor to the present project team might be, but it does seem to me that there is a lot more thinking and talking to do, particularly from an operational perspective, which must be done fully, openly, and without any form of 'sacred cow' or 'not invented here' approach.

Robin

 

I see there has been another outburst from a bedroom in Minehead attacking various WSR personnel under the news tab. I wonder who writes this stuff for him?

 

Give him enough rope he'll hang himself ... skating on very thin ice me thinks

 

An "in-cider", perhaps ?

 

I could not possibly comment on this scheme specifically. However most "heritage" railways need to beware of the temptation to turn themselves into ersatz mainlines If it has gone too far, the W.S.R. would not be alone.

PH

 

Thank you Mr Yorkshireman. What a confused article. It claims that I was influenced by what Robin had said at the opening of the meeting and then claims that it was pre-meditated. What I asked for was a show of hands within the room in order to get the measure of how the more active membership viewed the situation. It was a "litmus test" and was not binding in any shape or form. No count was taken so it was not a vote.

As for leaping to my feet, I only move that fast when someone else is buying a round.

 

I always thought the author of the ramblings from the bedroom in Minehead were delusional and now I know . I was at the AGM and to the best of my knowledge ' Chairman ' Whitehouse hadn't been elected chairman until after the meeting . As I understand it the chairman is elected by the Trustees not the members .
I think I best leave it at that .

Paul . K.

 

I am not going to comment on the latest musings from Minehead.

The important thing is that the WSRA recovers its shares and the monies wrongfully spent. The present Trustees are pursuing that and know that they have my support (and where they ask for it, assistance) in doing that.

Detailed public comment from those closely involved, however tempting it might be, will not help at present.

Kind regards

Robin

 

Sorry, I honestly thought all WSR fans knew of Steve's site. In fact I thought it was their first port of call for WSR news.

 

I am not so sure that the person behind the keyboard resides in Minehead. The styles used at different times seem to point to two individual contributors.

It was interesting to read the (real) reason for offloading the shares. If I recall correctly, Chairman Chidzey wrote that it was to avoid becoming liable for costs during the current maintenance programme.

 

The hole does get deeper and deeper. We now seem to be into openly naming people and calling them liars, the pressure must indeed be increasing.

I was at the AGM so saw exactly what happened and comment only as an ordinary uninvolved Member, there is a very strong feeling amongst the rank and file WSRA Members that the selling of the 4160 Shares was not conducted in a morally correct or legal manner. It would also be fair to say that a large element of WSRA Membership want immediate legal action in order to have this issue resolved.

In light of this before the meeting started a well-known member (we will call him BF to protect his identity!!) stood up and asked for an indication of feeling from the members present to be given to the then new Trustees. He asked the audience to put their hands up if they felt that the WSRA should pursue with all vigour the retrieval of the 4160 shares, in my estimation 95% of the audience put up their hands me included. BF went out of his way to state clearly that it was not a vote as he was not in a position to call for one, the meeting had not started and it was merely an indication of feeling from the Members present. The Chairman of the meeting was not in a position to stop this happening as firstly the Members felt that they had something to say and secondly the Chairman graciously allowed his Boss’s the Members (let’s not forget it’s a Members owned Association !!) to speak and have an opinion, which is my view is right and proper. Was it unusual ? Yes it was, but then selling assets in this manner under these circumstances is equally so.

As for the latter part of the article and its claims about the Chairman I’m not even going to go there apart from saying what happens or doesn’t happen in peoples previous working lives has no place in this debate and is a very, very low blow.

So if we want to talk about “Disinformation and spin” then perhaps some people should look a little closer to home. There are also a number of other ‘facts’ in this article which I have to say I don’t recognise but I’m not going to go into them currently.

However one interesting item does come out of this article. “the six Trustees took the full board decision to sell their holding in 4160 Ltd back to the Directors of 4160 Ltd. “ So all six previous Trustees took the decision and need to be pursued in equal measure.

The pressure is mounting to act, the Members want their shares back.

Having said all of that I would really love the Hysteria site to continue on its current path, its great entertainment whilst not letting facts get in the way of a good story. Keep smiling !!

 

More on station farm site from planning application in 2007 first the plan of what it should have looked like https://www2.tauntondeane.gov.uk/We...e.aspx?SRBarCode=Ty1DGrmDJrsgFyCBwT&ExtID=PDF https://www2.tauntondeane.gov.uk/We...e.aspx?SRBarCode=Ty1DGrmDJrPuipCBNT&ExtID=PDF https://www2.tauntondeane.gov.uk/We...e.aspx?SRBarCode=Ty1DGrmDJrCnMpCBJT&ExtID=JPG
Look at No 5 for what was proposed for the land and think back to the dark days of the WSRA, and the man involved with the freehold bid for the railway and one of his other interests as an investment. https://www2.tauntondeane.gov.uk/We...e.aspx?SRBarCode=Ty1DGWmDJrX27nCBDT&ExtID=PDF

The pub and office sites marked on the plans are now going for housing.

 

I think Robin has given sage advice and I really am concerned that we do not get ourselves into hot water again with the Nat Pres mods.
The only thing I will say is that if anybody wants to read the Actual Proceedings of the 2016 AGM they are available in a public section of the WSRA web site:http://www.wsra.org.uk/documents/

 

I can't work out how having the shares in the hands of the 4160 directors made it more resistant to an "outside takeover" than having them in the hands of the WSRA? After a moment's pondering, the only thing I can come up with was that perhaps there some fear that the WSRA itself, and thus the shares, would fall into hostile hands? It certainly is a rather extraordinary - and revealing - statement.

Noel

 

I can't remember if that decision was actually recorded in any of the minutes now published. I have a feeling it wasn't. (Perhaps it was in one of those "confidential" sessions that no minutes seem to exist for.) The simple answer is that if it wasn't minuted - legally, it didn't happen so no decision, no approval to sell, no leg to stand on.