Jacobite 2024

Not a cynic just a realist with experience.
Of course nothing says you have to sell seats on your train. A few empty trips that are already "sold out" with fresh air would meet the use it or lose it requirement I think.
As I have mentioned before that is how BMed ended up flying a light aircraft to Cardiff and back from Heathrow at night to keep their slot. Their network was basically a tick list of Middle East war zones, and as such it meant that something had kicked off somewhere they had flights to.

 

It is. But so are a range of other charter specific risk analyses that could point in a range of directions. Just think what the wrong hands could do with the risk of trauma to staff from passenger illness or death on charters - and the per trip frequency of them!

There’s a whole thread on that, the TLDR of which is “opinions vary”!

However, and specifically for the Jacobite, we come back to a simple case of there are rules and operators have either to obey them or not operate. Constant game playing is deeply tedious and quite dangerous to the sector.


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I would like to know how the economy of the Fort William area survived prior to the Jacobite operating! Tongue in cheek, but it's a thought.

 

That’s a slightly silly comment. You might as well say “how did the economy of Brighton (*) survive before the coming of the railways?” The answer is “as a small fishing village with about 1% of the current population” but you are never going to go back to that. Economies adapt to meet the circumstances, but as has been seen many times before, sudden removal of a major source of trade is never a good thing in the short term, even if in the long term the economy would adapt to cater for other markets.

(*) Other towns transformed by the coming of the railways are available.

Tom

 

The MS&LR / GCT has a lot to answer for

They created Cleethorpes

 

That's an interesting one. Reg 5 of the 1999 regulations states:
"(1) No person shall operate, and no infrastructure controller shall permit the operation of any rolling stock on a railway if the rolling stock has hinged doors for use by passengers for boarding and alighting from the train (other than doors which have a means of centrally locking them in a closed position)."
and clause 2 states:
"(2) Paragraph (1) shall not apply to rolling stock which at the relevant time is being exclusively operated other than for the carriage of fare paying passengers." (My emphasis.)

I can see popcorn sales reaching new highs if that is WCRC's plan.

 

Ah, the C of E approach - "it's free to get in, but you pay to get out ..."

Tom

 

Once upon a time I was on a railtour train that stopped for some time at a signal. I was looking out of a droplight, as we were allowed to do at that time, and saw a chap in highviz walking towards me along the trackside. When he reached my door and saw me he asked me to unlock the door so he could climb aboard. I did as requested.

 

From experience of running a premises license, that would still get trapped as “charging a fare”.


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I did say "tongue in cheek", but surely your not suggesting that Fort William was a small fishing village prior to the Jacobite! Where i live,the railway played a big part in bringing the shoe trade to the area. Nearby Corby was a small village before the coming of the iron and steel industry, eventually destroyed by Thatcher,but the town still prospers. My sympathies lie with WCRC,who are losing a huge chunk of their buisness while this nonsense continues. FW was a tourist destination long before the steam specials came to town, and I daresay will continue to be so long after they have gone.

 

It will. But many businesses have planned on the Jacobite as an established attraction, and are losing that draw. That's hitting them in the wallet.

As today's press shows, many of those businesses are pretty brassed off that WCRC are not only unable (which might get some sympathy) but unwilling to abide by the law and operate a compliant service.

It's perfectly possible to take issue with ORR's direction, and yet still think that WCRC need to knuckle down and obey the law.

 

At the end of the day smith must fit CDL ,OR shut up shop you can't beat a government department. law is Law

 

I see the morning train is running today, presumably running empty using the stock that was sent up at the weekend.

 

Indeed, on that basis its pretty good of LSL to run some trial ones with diesel motive power which can give WCR an idea of the possible loadings should they wish to go down that route with their existing paths.

 

Not to downplay the impact the loss of the Jacobite would have on any particular businesses, but there'll still be plenty of tourism in Fort William. I expect plenty of people will still go to Glenfinnan as well, they'll just go by car or Scotrail as I did when I visited. With all due respect to Mallaig, not sure it has as much going for it and is more just the end of the line. I remember just going for a quick walk around, eating at the chip shop in the station then getting the train back to FW.

 

Which is precisely the trade that the businesses there will fear losing - and be most affected by.

My experience of Fort William is that it's a great place to tour from, but nothing special as a destination in itself. Mallaig is similar, but smaller and without the choices for touring.

 

I have emailed the ORR email address provided by West Coast on their news page.

While I won't go into detail here, I have made my feelings and thoughts clear, from my work background to experiences travelling by charter train and general use of the railway network in my local area, including after major sporting events and practices observed during renovation periods.

I actually wrote a draft back in January, but the news item has forced my hand in revisiting it and sending onto to the ORR.

 

If I didn’t think it would stiffen WCRC’s resolve, I would be writing to that address with a cc to Carnforth, my MP and the signatory MPs, praising ORR and asking them to hold fast.

And I think that there is a good argument for ORR backing off.


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