South Devon Railway 50th anniversary from 6th to 14th April 2019

a 1969 event with 1420,1450,1638,6412/30/35/4555 in attendance would have me on my way......4588 and 7827 would be acceptable too as I saw them there on my second visit,

 

SVR ASG 2005? I didn't go to SVR events at the point.

Edit - having just looked it up 1638 visited the SVR SSG 2005 and 9466 the ASG.

 

1501 and Barclay 1219 now confirmed, plus some of the timetables available. https://www.southdevonrailway.co.uk/category/news/

 

https://www.southdevonrailway.co.uk/2019/03/19/golden-anniversary-gala-working-time-tables/

All WTTs here.

Any news on loco directions?

 

5542 is going to Battlefield according to The Battlefield Line FB page.

 

Plus 1 would be nice to sit and plan for the whole event,

 

Per a post on Facebook:
"...5526, 9466 & 1501 will be facing Totnes. 1450, 6412, 6430 and 1219 will be facing Buckfastleigh."

 

Could u grab Caledonian Tank 419 while she down this oway

 

Not really, it's going to the Epping & Ongar for the same period.

 

419 will be at North Norfolk during this gala. It'll be at Epping Ongar in June.

 

I've bought tickets for this event online, can we exchange for proper tickets at the booking office on the day? Hate these print out tickets, just doesn't work for heritage railways in my opinion.

 

E-tickets showable on phone would have been better

 

For a normal running day, I get where you're coming from, getting a "proper" ticket from a ticket office is all part of the experience. However, on a gala day with potentially hundreds or thousands more passengers, having already bought a ticket and printed it out at home/in electronic form can save lots of time queueing to buy a ticket and potentially missing a service you wanted to catch. It's also a great money saver for the railway, not having to give out so many Edmondson tickets, and saving on potential postage if tickets are posted out prior.

But what do you also define as a "proper ticket"? Do you mean a classic Edmondson ticket, a generic card print out ticket like you would get online from the Glos Warks (though Dartmouth actually give these out in person from their ticket office!), or something like the Severn Valley's small piece of card with the appropriate info on it?

I'd be interested to know in what way you believe it doesn't work for heritage railways. In my opinion, the benefits outweigh the negatives, but each to their own!

 

I don't even mean Edmondson type tickets.

Carrying around an A4 piece of paper - which could be printed off several times or doctored - with details of the whole party, to me doesn't seem right to me. It works for building venues where they scan you in against a database, but on a train I'm not sure how it can be fool proof. In my case the order has been spilt over two pages. I also don't own a printer anymore (but work do..).

The SVR/GWSR/DSR (and what the WSR used to have before this A4 paper lark) type ticket works. Yes there's postage costs and some admin involved, but I just think it's better for the passenger as it's distinctive and for the railway because they can see it's legit. They have to pay somebody to produce website/ticket system for the tickets in the current format afterall.

Also, what happens if you have multiple passenger's tickets on one sheet and not all passengers wish to travel together all of the time? Cause it just says quantity of day rovers purchased. I've had 'building venue' print at home tickets that have given proper separate tickets. That would work for heritage railways but I'm yet to come across that in this sector.

 

Oh bugger.

 

1450 not making the first weekend according to the SDR facebook, may turn up later for the event, they will post an update. Passenger train times will stay the same, but some rejigging of the working timetables to accommodate.

 

That's a shame, but these things happen. Here's hoping the rest of the event goes well!

 

Thats the problem with booking a loco that at the time was already unavailable for service at the SVR, too late to find a replacement at this hour,
Chuck the 25 out,

 

Most day's there is a spare loco anyway

 

Is anybody on here going for the allnight steam?

I'm intrigued to see how popular this will be. Whilst SVR have been doing such for a number of years, they are fortunate in serving 3x rather large towns with plenty of hotels etc - so people tend to ride late before retiring or go and get some sleep before an early start. SDR doesn't have that luxury, so are people going to travel?

Having said that Talyllyn Allnighter brought a lot of members out wanting to experience something different. How did Isle of Wight version do?