West Somerset Railway General Discussion

Two Questions

Was that part double tracked , and if so will be put back ,Either for storage of carriages or used as loop

And the track that is being replaced , is it suitable for heavier locos , although most of line would need to replaced as well.

 

Yes, it was converted to double-track in the 1930s, similar to the section from Norton Fitzwarren Jcn to Bishops Lydeard.

 

Could it be related to modern day manual handling regs?

Peter

 

I have just received an "information statement" from the Plc about Washford station and yard, where it states, "The West Somerset Railway has not yet made a final decision regarding future use of the site, .." I seem to recall that the reason given for the eviction of the S&DRT was that the Plc had immediate need of the site and yet, here they are, years later, still wondering what to do with it.

 

Given that my WSR volunteering started 43 years ago at Washford over the Easter weekend, I find the whole sorry business unspeakably depressing and shameful.

 

Hold on a moment, was it not said that the ORR had instructed the plc to relocate their P-Way department so the decision to evict the S&D was being forced upon them ? Then there was a plan for an urgently required petting zoo situated on the far side of a running line.

Now it appears that the nice warm dry shed will be removed, Any organisation in possession of the same should start looking over their shoulder.

 

2022 timetable now available. https://www.west-somerset-railway.co.uk/timetables

 

Difficult to remember the pre Covid timetable but that does appear to be far fewer services operating than I remember. That may be a good or bad thing, I do not know enough about the railway really to have a personal view.

 

Yes you are correct, the mid week running has been reduced and the red tt now only has 3 round trips. Pre covid the red tt had 4 round trips.

 

Compared with the timetable for the last "normal" year of 2019, it is certainly retrenchment, with fewer operating days, and fewer trains on those days. But that is probably to be expected, since no-one can be sure how quickly business will recover in the wake of Covid.

 

A good operator with a machine and Plate grab can pick up a pack of 5 and then place the sleepers to rough line aided by a paint spray line on the ballast.
2 men ( I have done it on my own before now) then fine line the sleepers to position, either by hand or using bars.

 

I'm interested to know what is planned for 2/3 April 'Return to Minehead' event.

 

on the red timetable, when the Steam/Diesel service is Steam Hauled, what is the difference in operating costs between running a steam loco on one or two round trips? Clearly there is a higher coal consumption but presumably a lot of the 'fixed' costs remain unchanged?

 

The old red timetable is basically now the blue timetable. 3 round trips in the quieter months on red, usual four in the busier months on blue.

 

There may be non-monetary operating costs e.g. loco crew. If an extra round trip tips you over into needing a second steam crew which you'd struggle to resource, but you can find someone to drive a diesel for a round trip late in the day to keep people on the move.

 

What a mess, what lies, someone's head should roll for this!

 

For Bob's sake please don't give 'em ideas. It's all been quite messy enough already.

 

That doesn't save you any crew, since the diesel crew would need to have signed on before the steam crew finished (i.e. splitting a two trip passenger diagram steam / diesel doesn't mean one crew can cover both, because of the long disposal time of steam after the service has finished). That's before you consider the rostering challenge of whether the steam crew are also diesel-competent.

Tom

 

I imagine not all steam crews at any line have any desire to be 'diesel competent', but for the rest, given the likes of route knowledge aren't the issue they would be with 'foreign' crews, how long is a pice of string does it take to add the requisite skillset? To keep it a bit more straightforward, given it's the WSR thread, does it help to restrict things to diesel hydraulics?