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Recommissioning after Coronavirus

Discussion in 'Heritage Railways & Centres in the UK' started by johnofwessex, Mar 24, 2020.

  1. Gladiator 5076

    Gladiator 5076 Part of the furniture

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    Other than Brocken is it not all just public services really.
     
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  2. Sidmouth

    Sidmouth Resident of Nat Pres Staff Member Moderator

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    tricky one this but preserved railways are not public transport , although they preserve public transport of a bygone era . as one commercial manager observed on facebook ( and I think I've got this right) but they should also be looking at museums/theme park guidance

    reading so many posts across social media we seem to have convinced ourselves that we can't run and not running is the best thing to do and some trumpet it with an evangelical zeal .
     
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  3. Sidmouth

    Sidmouth Resident of Nat Pres Staff Member Moderator

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    After a bruising day yesterday across social media I will give you two thoughts


    "The hardest part of playing chicken is knowing when to flinch" It is a great line . A situation of high stress, multiple variables , constant stream of information and conflicting expert knowledge as well as a torrent of highly differing personal opinions . A moment it is all too easy to be swept up by the emotion , panic and flinch , way too early . The world economy feels like it is playing that game now , trying to navigate its way through a minefield to a new normal . The successful ones will be those that make objective decisions , calmly and that charts a path that says they can . Those whose decision is they can't will be playing catch up , if they then can

    The heritage movement is fragmenting into two camps , those that say they can't and shutdown and those that say they can . For each one that flinches and calls out they can't another raises the determination level to say they can . Too many are assuming no one will volunteer, no one will come as customers . Each needs to be asking that fundamental question to their volunteer and customer bases, use the time now to be getting the insights . Summer and school holidays are coming , many won't have a traditional week away so days out become ever more critical. there may well be a high level of pent up demand come July

    whilst not directly related and it is a story I shared before but you can expand the logic . My chippy closed on lockdown . No one told them they could reopen , there was no government pronouncement but they worked out a way they could reopen and they did . people queued responsibly and they are doing a roaring trade . Preservation is sat waiting for the ORR/HRA/Gvmt to say they can reopen , I've read the ORR guidance , it is just that, Guidance , it isn't as prescriptive as some read it as , it is helpful and each railway needs to satisfy it can demonstrate that the core steps were taken
     
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  4. cav1975

    cav1975 Member

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    One of the issues is that the regulations state that museums are not allowed to open:-

    STATUTORY INSTRUMENTS

    2020 No. 350
    PUBLIC HEALTH, ENGLAND

    The Health Protection (Coronavirus, Restrictions) (England) Regulations 2020
    ....
    SCHEDULE 2
    Businesses subject to restrictions or closure
    .....
    10. Museums and galleries.


     
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  5. toplight

    toplight Well-Known Member

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    All this talk about keeping people separate on trains etc is just nonsense. You can't inforce it, but passengers will choose to sit apart where they can.

    Far from gloom and doom, I suspect when railways reopen demand will be quite high and lots will want to get out and do stuff including travelling on steam trains.

    In particular this will be the case in tourist areas like Devon/Cornwall and the Lake district. Lots of people myself included have had foreign holidays cancelled and once lockdown is lifted will be looking to go somewhere in the UK instead. There could be a real sudden boom in holidays in Britain from Brits staying here. Remember there is a pent up demand, and many are desperate to get out and go places after it has been stopped for so long. They will want to go whilst the weather is still good.
    Railways if they can should be ready to cash in to make up for revenue already lost.
     
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  6. misspentyouth62

    misspentyouth62 Well-Known Member

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    Yes a tricky one. Imagine the irony though of someone being able to drive across the country and say travel to Sherringham from Holt on the North Norfolk Railway, but similarly being 'barred' from travelling from Norwich to Cromer for leisure.
     
  7. misspentyouth62

    misspentyouth62 Well-Known Member

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    An interesting viewpoint based on the herd gaining some immunity :

    What doesn't sit well with me given the 'everyone for themselves' approach to managing risk is that many won't do the 'right thing' and for those at greatest risk will be left completely isolated from those able to manage their risk.
    Other countries have not approached this as we have chosen to do and keeping spread to a minimum has been achieved in many countries who do not just accept that hundreds of thousands of their people will die before their time.
     
  8. Sidmouth

    Sidmouth Resident of Nat Pres Staff Member Moderator

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    can you share the link please
     
  9. misspentyouth62

    misspentyouth62 Well-Known Member

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    Points well made Noel although accepting that nature can take it's course seems a tad defeatist when so many other countries have done so much better and managing spread to a minimum. Imagine if spread could be managed well enough for sufficient time allowing those most at risk to benefit from some yet-to- test & implement vaccine and/or treatment(s)?
    Isn't there also a game taking place where those asking many to take risk on the chin so to speak, aren't necessarily taking those risks for themselves? A certain POTUS might be an exception however :)
     
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  10. toplight

    toplight Well-Known Member

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    Couldn't railways just get around that by closing their museum bit. Take a railway like the Severn Valley. Close the museum at Highley and Kidderminster, open everything else. It is a live railway not a museum.

    It is time this whole lockdown ended. The 99.73 % who don't have this phantom Corona want to get back to normal life. Thatcher was right, there is no such thing as society, we are a nation of individuals. If individuals want to remain locked down forever more, that is their individual choice.
     
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  11. 35B

    35B Nat Pres stalwart

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  12. misspentyouth62

    misspentyouth62 Well-Known Member

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    I'm still struggling with how you have the discussion with your most-at-risk family telling them that they're on their own - it's Thatcher's way and that's that?
     
    Last edited: May 20, 2020
  13. 35B

    35B Nat Pres stalwart

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    I want to get back to normal life, but not at any cost. What Thatcher actually said - not the bastardisation that has gone into mythology - was that society is not a thing, but that it is created by the actions of individuals. This individual acknowledges, as neither you nor Lord Sumption appear able to understand, that there is a benefit to society as a whole in modifying our conduct and compromising my individual freedom in the interests of others.

    That doesn't mean I take the view of @misspentyouth62 or others that we need to stay locked down for an open ended period - the costs of lockdown will rapidly far exceed the benefit once Covid spread is under control - but nor do I believe that a quick reversion to the way we were before lockdown is practical or plausible.
     
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  14. DcB

    DcB Well-Known Member

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    From the wikipedia seems to be part modern railcars and part heritage steam, and the limited timetable is on the website (which can be translated by Google translate).
    https://www.hsb-wr.de/Fahrplan-Tarife/Fahrplaene/Sommerfahrplan/
    No clarity yet from the UK Government when non essential journeys by bus and train, but noticed here many people using buses for food shopping trips as getting to work.
    If and when the UK Government relax the rules on rail travel then will depend on full risk assessments as to what can safely open.
     
    Last edited: May 20, 2020
  15. misspentyouth62

    misspentyouth62 Well-Known Member

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    Did I say that 35B? Maybe you're just jumping to that as a conclusion. I want Normality Version 2 as much as the rest of us but I want to ensure that I have enough information and understanding that we have the lowest risk we can achieve before allowing Thatcher's people loose on my most vulnerable family members. I'm not happy at my children thinking that Grandad has to be locked up for his own good any time soon. :)
     
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  16. Kinghambranch

    Kinghambranch Well-Known Member

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    Lord Sumption would like to be able to go to the theatre. My daughter would like to be able to go to a London theatre as she works at one. However, it's closed, as they all are at the moment, and that's it. I would imagine that being a lord does have some unfortunate hubris with it.

    I wish I could share Toplight's optimism at post 405. Personally I think that the UK heritage railway sector will never recover to its pre-COVID 19 level. If it does, (and I really would love to hope that it does) then it will take a long, long time. These last few years have been the "golden time" for heritage railways and all the nostalgia that goes with it. This age, with its line extensions, new builds etc, has ended, as all things must. This is almost like that palaeontology-related KT boundary which marked the end of the Mesozoic. That said, life flourished again, but in a different form in most cases!
     
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  17. JEB-245584

    JEB-245584 Member

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    Those seem like positive results from the survey.
    Would be interesting to know though how the "front of house volunteers " voted, after all it's those people who would possibly have more contact with the general public rather than those of us who work behind the scenes.
     
  18. jnc

    jnc Well-Known Member

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    But have they stopped it, or just slowed it down? And if only the latter, at what cost?

    I know it sounds awfully hard-hearted (or worse, actually) to say 'we can't save everyone', but life is unfair. There may, in recent years, have been the illusion that we could change that, but COVID is showing us, most forcefully, that the world is still the same on that score, and that it was hubris to think we had fundamentally changed that (or had the power to do so). A while back, I made the analogy that COVID was like the sinking of the 'Titanic', which showed the then-world the limits of humans' much-vaunted technology; like that, the lessons and repercussions will be a long time sinking in.

    Noel
     
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  19. 35B

    35B Nat Pres stalwart

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    Clarification noted.


    Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
     
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  20. misspentyouth62

    misspentyouth62 Well-Known Member

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    Indeed so Noel life is unfair but then so is allowing large numbers to die when firmer action could contain & delay and I don't see how this should cost more than adopting say a US-based strategy.
    Life is precious so delay of death is good, prevention with medical solutions that 'might' arrive could be good too. What price on Granma's head aye?
    I think also that you're right about your analogy. We've grown used over last few generations that life expectancy has been creeping up (in the UK anyway) leading up to more recent austere times. The bubble may have burst and funding for care and pensions may find things eased to a small degree.
    I'm still struggling personally with the concept of letting my older relatives I look out for, fight their own corner though. :) Ideas on a postcard for this one please.
     

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