WSR Diesel Gala - Friday 9th- Sunday 11th June 2017

The Stogumber beer garden was excellent. A pint of Three Daggers slipped down very well while watching the 20's thrash up the hill.

 

Why do you listen to stories? Try harder to find the facts.

By studying the timetable you must have known that class 50s were not booked to run at the gala. The 50s were simply used to haul the class 20s to the railway and that is all. Since engineering work has taken place along the railway gauging has yet to be carried out. This takes time and the railway is at it's busiest at this time of year. A small number of locomotive classes (and HSTs) are unable to run over the route at present because of gauging. The WSR is no different than the main line, it has to abide by the rules. <BJ>

 

well said some people are never satisfied enjoy these galas while you can they will not last for ever

 

Fair enough, but I'm not sure why it would need to haul the Western. The working timetable on the website shows that D1010 was due to double head with D7017 on the 1645 instead and be dropped off at Williton. 26043 was due to haul the 1547 solo.

 

Robin putting 1010 on the front of a train vice 26 when it was booked to be on the front or rear (subject to which of the many variations of wtt seen )of the following train with 7017.
Hoping if the 26/33 pair later is actually top and tail the 26 is on the front this time .

 

Some confusion here. The 14:47 was booked for the class 20s. Did you mean the 15:47?

That is correct. Unfortunately the public timetable differed to that of the railway's own WTT. <BJ>

 

Does anyone know when the 20s and 50s leave WSR please

 

Here’s my video taken at the 2017 WSR Diesel Gala:

 

"Facebook says" Wednesday am. Usual caveats apply

Patrick

 

Nice to see 34098's spirit is alive and well...

 

So true; so often people don't appreciate anything until it has gone.

 

Well if there was one really positive thing to take away from this weekend it's has to be the beer tents at Stogumber, the amount of people getting off there has to be 6 times the normal, I didn't see anybody too drunk getting lairy and swearing, there were a group of "loud"gents in the rear coach last train Saturday but even they didn't seam to upset anyone. So doing the same Rail Ale next year would seam to be the way to go

However the diagramming really does need to be addressed, on Friday the first 2 trains from Lydia were the 33 & 47 and the last two back were the 33 & 47, on Saturday the last 2 back were the 33 & 47 and on Sunday the first 2 out were the 47 & 33 last back was the 47 that just smacks of a mix of laziness and just not being aware of your potential customers, a lady a a crossing point station said the station shop hadn't been very busy because the people just got off one train straight onto another, well yes that makes sense that's what I do at galas, mybee steam guys are Different??
Whoever makes up the diagrams (not the timtable) needs to know what the punters are after instead of what's the easiest thing to do. Also it seams very obvious that in comparison to other galas the lack of a mainline visitor did hit the numbers of punters

All the above are my own opinions, but I really have been to a load of galas and the above is intended to help,not hinder

 

You've got some valid points there which are the sort of feedback that should be sent to the WSR Special Events Planning Team.

One thing I will say is that starting/finishing the visiting engines from Minehead rather than Bishops Lydeard goes some way to addressing disappointment expressed in previous years from a significant number of people who stay in Minehead for the weekend. OK, they may be fewer in number than the daily visitors starting at Bishops Lydeard, but it's another case of not being able to please everyone!

 

That's a very good point but with the 2 (this year) visitors why not start with one each from either end

 

I think it's wrong to regard the home fleet in that way. Most trains are steam worked on non-diesel days, so that any diesel haulage is quite hard to get, and if people come (perhaps a long way) for the diesel gala, they may be just as (or almost as) interested in the home fleet as the guest locos. I would have come to the gala even if only the home fleet was running, but obviously the visitors were the icing on the cake.

I'd say the WSR got it about right.

John

 

John that's one way of looking at it, BUT if you look at the SVR gala, and how successful that was, most of the home loco's didn't even work each day let alone the first trains out of the main station, we and the railway must start to think how potential customers would like to see the timetable arranged, having the 52 as standby Sunday instead of laying up the 33, I find it hard to see how the 33 would have more people on it rather than the 52

 

Expected to be on Wednesday. <BJ>

 

Plan A (in the public TT) 5343 to haul solo. Then it was realised that it was the QB set load 8 - 2 more than the limit for 24/25/26. Owning group didn't want to take 8 either. Plan B was then 5343 & 1010 until Thursday when the 10mph tsr went on the bridge at the foot of Washford bank which also prevented the 26 & 52 running over coupled together. Plan C v1 was then 1010 at the rear and run round at Williton (I.e.stay on the stock on arrival at MD) but modified Sat lunchtime to a more sensible 5343 hauled at the rear (load 10 equivalent) which gave 1010 fans some fine Maybach music. Who'd be a gala organiser having to handle these sorts of last minute issues thrown your way? Fair play to them.

 

A superb gala BTW. Great locos worked hard, excellent visitors, fabulous scenery, good company, good atmosphere, very friendly cheerful staff and no idiots. The 26 was a real star - winding its way up to Crowcombe from Stogumber through the woods on full power and it could have been the Far North line 1980.

 

Yes Peter that's exactly the way it was explained to me, and your right you can never please everyone all the time