SVR General Discussion

The basic lesson to be learnt is that when employing senior management try and find people who know about heritage railways and the dedication and passion that they were built on. Alienating the membership, supporters and loco owners is a recipe for disaster, how much better the WSR would be without all the infighting.
Secondly everyone associated with any railway should be a salesman for it, marketing is probably the weak point of most railways. The exception is the Welsh Narrow gauge with a big presence in the locality with a lot of joint marketing ( who was responsible for the phrase, Great little trains of Wales?)
I remember going to the SVR to collect some timetable leaflets to put out at various tourist locations on my travels and the company head office in Stratford. I was warned not to take too many as they were expensive to produce, I couldn’t help seeing a box of similar leaflets from the previous year on the floor unused. It’s all about getting the name out and in the public eye, anything happening on the railway, issue a press release. I’ll give the Valley full marks for milking the Lilac Liz episode, awful as the loco looked.
I can only say it again, look at some of the stuff being churned out on social media by the K&ESR and learn.

 

It is far from clear to me that the issues the SVR faces today have much to do with Helen Smith not being from a heritage railway background. Although I agree that coming in from outside the industry is really challenging.

I tend to think that their financial problems are rather deep rooted and perhaps track to two long standing issues 1) the cost of the infrastructure maintenance - the line has suffered more than most in this respect with big structures and poor underlying geology. 2) having run too many trains for the traffic on offer for many many years and not being able to change that for internal reasons.

 

Agreed, but that number is similar to the Swanage, but needed far greater resources to achieve.

It is an impressive number of visitors, but not enough to justify the number of trains I suspect.

 

I think the disillusionment among the groups I mentioned are a lot to do with her, why she was ever promoted to MD I can’t understand. I read somewhere in her published CV that she was a good problem solver. I prefer the thoughts of Einstein; Clever people solve problems wise poeple avoid them.

 

Possibly. Although as an outsider I wonder if the SVR has been a bit resistant to change for a while and someone trying to deal with that might well become unpopular.

 

The Bridgnorth yard appeal is run by the Charitable Trust and so it's reserved funds for the appeal purpose, ie the yard.

 

I have a number of friends at the KESR, and they all note the remarkable turnaround. It is not limited to just social media but stakeholders and volunteers feeling valued. Their current GM understands the concept and importance of social capital in ensuring a railway's organisational sustainability. And similar to your observation on marketing, their members are great ambassadors for the railway. This does not ensure economic sustainability but by God, they have a better chance of survival.

 

This. In spades. That's not a defence of the outgoing GM in any way, by the way.

 

I know the new GM quite well, he’s a good businessman, a railway enthusiast and photographer. An idea combination.

 

Or, and I hesitate to say this because it'll call down the wrath of the god of castles, Didcot. For my money (never mind what the rest of the organisation is doing) they are the gold standard at railway preservation social media - making skipping between posts about family fun, the centre, wider GWR heritage etc look effortless. You can actually see other lines starting to take on board how they've been doing it for years already. I'm not a GWS member, and don't agree with some recent decisions, but I do follow many railways on social media and Didcot are *very* good.

 

Although whether he wants to do the job permanently is a question. He's (at the moment) the *Interim* GM

 

Whilst not a big fan of Ms Smith, I don’t think all the blame can be laid at her door, I’ve said this before but certain board members need to have a look themselves, and why they continually ‘backed the wrong horse’ these are the people who need the questions asked of them.

I think Gus knows that bridges need to be rebuilt, being up there 3 weeks ago it was good to see him having a bit of a poke about and having a chat with people (no surprise he was in a certain seat on 50035 on the Sunday though!)
Have to say there did seem to be some optimism about the place when I visited.

 

I think Mr Barrance is on about Mr Coombes rather than Mr Dunster.

 

I was but Gus seems to be doing a good job so far

 

I can't help thinking there is an element of "only Nixon could go to China" coming on many heritage railways, of which the SVR is one.

It's clear that change has to come, and for many that is likely to be a painful change. A non-exhaustive list might include reducing operating days, reducing timetabled trains, asset disposals, cancelling or indefinitely postponing long-cherished projects, putting on more "family friendly" events at the expense of the core "up and down the line crossing at every station" service patterns that we operators love and slaying any number of other sacred cows. Those changes are likely, between them, to be very painful to a broad range of volunteers and other key stakeholders.

In that light, it is probably more palatable if the management pushing for those changes is someone widely identified as "one of us" than an "outsider". Someone who has done 25 years rising through the ranks of volunteering every weekend and eventually becomes GM or a director - given that they also have the necessary strategic and business skills - can probably carry the rank and file with them in a way that a well-qualified outsider couldn’t do, even if their prescription is essentially identical.

I don't know the personalities involved, but my hunch is that the new GM may end up needing to say and do many of the unpopular things the previous GM attempted, but will carry a legacy of trust that will make those painful choices easier to accept.

Tom