48624

Another Lovely weekend gone by, and still she stands cold in the shed, a few people came to see her, but not many....
Spent a whole day sorting nuts and bolts into order as there was nowt else to do !
Weird thing is that Heritage Rail has 8624 listed as main engine in service ! how many people must wonder why she isn't running ?

 

Better get that green and yellow paint out then mate

 

Roll on June when the engine will probably doing 4 days a week at the CVR!

 

Aye it will be good nothing worse than engines not being used

 

Is it right that the new editor of Peak Rail's magazine has quit already because he doesn't agree with the management over its failure to use the 8F?

Lordy

 

Is the 8F support coach also leaving the railway? - i've great memories of the late Reg Cartwright / Vince Kay swapping stories and arguing about the rights and wrongs of Thatcherism (usually wrongs in Vince's view!) I'm not sure what they would make of the current situation.

 

I've been directed here by a fellow Peak Rail member. As the said ex-Editor, please allow me to point you in the direction of my resignation statement, dated 20th March 2010:

"The following is an adapted version of a letter sent to the Board of Directors of the Peak Railway Association. Verbatim copying and distribution of the text below is permitted in any medium, provided that this notice remains intact.

As you may know, in late 2008 I volunteered to take over the
Editorship of The Peak Express, the official magazine of the Peak
Railway Association, when Andy Coward indicated his desire to move on
from the post earlier that year. I successfully prepared issue 24 and
was nearly all the way through preparing issue 25 when I received a
letter from Roger Horne, the Secretary of the Peak Railway
Association. I have responded to Roger's letter with the exception of
one point, which I feel deserves a fuller response, addressed both to
the entire Board of Directors of the Peak Railway Association and to
Peak Rail supporters in general. This point was whether I felt my
postings to the unofficial Peak Rail Gossip Yahoo group, criticising
Peak Rail's management, left me with a conflict of interest as I was
producing the official magazine as well.

When I joined Peak Rail with the embryonic Renown Repulse Restoration
Group in 2002, it was implied that a few things were necessary to fall
into place in order to facilitate big steps forward in Peak Rail's
development. For example, finishing the engine shed at Rowsley to
attract steam locomotives to be based on Peak Rail. In summary: "jam
tomorrow".

In May 2009, a large, 8F-shaped quantity of jam was delivered to Peak
Rail when 48624 returned to traffic. A sensible business would have
seized upon this magnificent opportunity to expand their enterprise,
to develop new and profitable services and reinvest the profits in
further growing their commercial operations. Instead, we were treated
to a succession of reasons from Peak Rail management as to why 48624
could not be used. A letter to The Peak Express was received asking
why 48624 was not used on footplate experience courses in order to
earn money - a letter which the management of Peak Rail PLC declined
to answer publicly. The failure to recognise this money-making
opportunity or to answer the letter in question, openly and honestly,
destroys my faith in the business acumen of the management of Peak
Rail PLC (likewise the evasive answer to Ian Horton's letter in the
same issue of The Peak Express). I have zero confidence that even
modest projects such as the Matlock or Rowsley (A6) extensions can now
be delivered by the current PLC management. The management's recent
conduct totally demolishes the "jam tomorrow" theory of Peak Rail
expansion; the Emperor truly has no clothes. I had written an
Editorial for the still-born issue 25 before I realised this in my own
mind, which explains its optimistic tone.

More importantly, the actions of Peak Rail management in driving 48624
away from the railway destroys one of the fundamental reasons for
compiling the magazine. If The Peak Express is to promote Peak Rail
as its official magazine, Peak Rail needs to have something worth
promoting. 48624 was such a thing: even as a self-confessed steam
agnostic I enjoyed printing photographs showing the lines, engineering
and power of this fine machine. The impending departure of 48624
reduces The Peak Express to "there's a photograph of Royal Pioneer"
and "there's another photograph of Royal Pioneer" (always assuming
that reports are inaccurate and Royal Pioneer is not on the verge of
failing a boiler inspection - and with no immediate replacement in
sight). The only way I could feel to continue would be to "wallow in
nostalgia" (I was planning to work on a series of "Tales From Old
Rowsley Shed" articles, in conjunction with the Rowsley Association)
and to write satirical comment on the current state of Peak Rail (a la
Private Eye). I doubt the management of Peak Rail would accept this
latter approach. The management also wishes to censor my own personal
thoughts and opinions by asking me to delete the text from my
Editorial in the original version of issue 25, that a 1940s weekend
special train conveying re-enactors who have been parading around
Matlock could be hauled to Rowsley by 48624. It suggests most
strongly that they would like to erase from history the presence of
this locomotive on Peak Rail, thus devaluing the memories, opinions
and aspirations of all Peak Rail supporters.

Roger Horne's letter asks if I consider my posting to the Peak Rail
Gossip Yahoo group, and the critical nature of some of those postings,
to be compatible with the post of Editor of The Peak Express. I have
no intention of retracting my postings which were (mostly) made in
constructive mode with emphasis on how Peak Rail could do things
better and make more money. I shall continue to criticise the
management of Peak Rail where I feel it is appropriate, however for
now I feel I have said enough on the Yahoo group. In order to
preserve this future freedom, I hereby tender my resignation as the
Editor of The Peak Express, effective immediately. I grant the Peak
Railway Association a non-exclusive right to reuse the work I have
done on issue 25 towards preparing a version for publication, with the
proviso that the entire text of my editorial on pages 6 and 7 is
removed and that my name is also removed from the publication as the
editorial contact and Editor of issue 25. I reserve the right to
republish, in whole or in part, the completed draft of issue 25 that I
produced, in either print or electronic form but with the strapline
"The official magazine of the Peak Railway Association" removed or
altered to clearly convey the unofficial nature of this publication
act.

I shall continue to be associated with Peak Rail via the activities of
the Group that originally brought me here, namely the Renown Repulse
Restoration Group. However, even if Peak Rail fully recognised my
journalistic independence and allowed me to edit The Peak Express in
my own personal style (which, I admit, can be extremely dry and
mistaken for sarcasm at times) I find that the business incompetence
of Peak Rail management and the refusal to accept not just my own
constructive suggestions for new Peak Rail ventures, but those of
others as well (e.g. the debate on the old Google group abut making
the last turn of the day diesel-hauled), leaves me no option but to
terminate my official association with the railway. I do this with
some sadness for I had already thought of several ideas for issue 26
and I had, on the whole, enjoyed compiling issue 25. I cannot however
continue to associate myself with a management that tramples on
freedom of speech for its workers (the closure of the Google group
being the most egregious example of this) and which interferes with my
journalistic integrity by insisting upon seeing proofs of the magazine
before it is published - a restriction not placed upon my
predecessors.

To avoid any possible future inference that I resigned out of "mental
confusion" or "inability to handle the job" I have formally requested
that this letter be included in its entirety in the Minutes of the
next Meeting of the Board of the Peak Railway Association. I also
grant anyone permission to reprint this letter in its entirety. I
resign for very specific reasons which are set out above and I feel it
only fair that my views are recorded as accurately as possible.

Yours sincerely,




Dr. Dominic Jackson
Former Editor, The Peak Express"

 

Thats very sad Dominic.

If it is any consolation to you , Peak Rail is not the only Railway to suffer from this syndrome as it appears that the board wants to stay in power at any cost. In other words sod the Railway and the volunteers, either do it my way or not at all appears to be the attitude.

Now where have I heard this one before?

Regards
Chris

 

D430, I sympathise greatly with you. It sounds like you've had hell trying to make a group of maniacs see sense. You are of course completely right about 48624 and there's no reason at all it couldn't have seen use on footplate experience outings. You're obviously very intelligent so I hope you take your journalistic talents to another railway or group who will appreciate and listen to you. Shame on Peak Rail.

 

Speaking of funny looking 8F's, Toddingtons website makes interesting viewing this morning!.

 

It is a sad fact of life that Heritage Railways tend to have boards made up of people who are inexperienced in business,who suddenly become able to dictate spending, policy etc. sometimes with disastrous results. These people get voted on by members who think 'He's a nice guy, i'll vote for him' , without considering that person's ability to do the job. Then there is the guy who is only there to see what he can get out of it for himself to the detriment of others on that railway. Finally there is the dictator type , who wants to impose his way of doing things such as what runs , what isn't wanted on the railway etc. & uses subtle intimidation to achieve this.
There is no place in preservation for these people.

Bob.

 

So true....so very true

 

Actually it is not too far from the truth, to all intents & purposes, a single chimney County boiler.

 

But that doesn't make it one. But its too late for the only Doncaster 8f isn't it.

 

The coach will remain at Rowsley as long as we are welcome there as it is still our intention to be based on Peak Rail.

I think all those that knew Reg and Vince will know exactly how they would feel about the current situation, but lets be frank, There were never any rights about Thatcherism!

 

does that mean they're going to paint 48264 brunswick green next?

 

I was thinking Iraq state railways green!

 

But certainly not blue by the sounds of it

 

Re: Editor's resignation - Another sad day in the never ending soap opera that is Peak Rail. I've been a member since 1976, and have worked there on and off until the early '90's, when the never-ending power struggles and lack of any kind of continuity or cohesive planning finally got the better of me, and many others along the way. Each year I still renew, but each time I find it harder to justify. What a waste.

 

I've only recently started reading this thread - please forgive my laziness in not ferreting back through previous stuff to, perhaps, answer my question - but what, in summary, is the objection that Peak Rail seem to have to using 48624. As a casual visitor to the railway I assumed that it's celebrated return to service would have been a Godsend and I'm completely mystified what reasons could be given for ignoring the clear opportunities for revenue improvement that such a loco offers, on a plate.

With regard to the various comments about boards and management I would offer this - many of the comments that are made regarding individual motivation and objectives are certainly not without merit - but do not necessarily interpret apparently stupid actions as being done without thought or proper, decent, motives. I know from experience ( I've been a manager for more years than I care to remember) that when one is new to decision making in a managerial capacity it can be difficult to get a proper reality check on things. Everyone else can see that one should do A rather than B or C - but because the decision is yours to make, and not theirs, you look harder at B and C to make sure you are not overlooking something that you should have seen, and as a consequence tend to reduce the clarity of difference between A and the others - in summary, once it's your decision it ain't always quite so easy to do the obviously right thing. The ease with which you do the right thing comes with experience and time, and having a load of potential vultures just waiting for you to falter just does not help - so, if you can, be supportive of the board. However,in the end, if a decision is just dead wrong - it's dead wrong and thats that, and the best situation is that all can agree so and move on, gracefully, and hopefully in the right direction.

Successful management is not easy.There is not a failsafe formula for success - if it were no company would ever have any problems - and I well remember a study that was published ( a long time ago admittedly) about the IQ or the Captains of Industry and it found that intelligence was no guarantee of success, in fact quite a number of the more successful managers were not actually all that bright, measured in academic terms.

If the management are not up to the job the real culprits are the people that put them there.

The internet, in general, and forums like this are great when used in the right way - however a major issue is that anyone, and I mean ANYONE, can make a statement of "fact" in an authoritative way without any real basis whatsoever. I'm sure we've all seen, in various threads, people talking absolute and utter tosh - in all good faith I'm sure - but absolutely wrong nonetheless, and we should not take everything that people put forward as fact as being the rock solid truth.We should also be mindful that people do make simple, obvious, mistakes and we should not be surprised or affronted by this. For example there are some interesting posts concerning 6023 and the comparison between single and double blastpipe kings and castles. It is very clear that, in the various posts, people are not precise in their use of the word "Power". To some tractive effort = power. In a scientific/engineering sense this is not correct. Power is rate of doing work - which is much more likely to be related to the rate at which the boiler can create steam or the rate at which the cylinders can use it than the physical dimensions of the cylinders, wheels and motion which give rise to the tractive effort calculations at a given boiler pressure. I daren't say that in that thread though - I'd fear I'd get lynched by the people that "know" better !