Modern traction, stuff like Sprinters, Pacers, Voyagers. In future will people want to preserve them

Except that Voyagers are cramped with no leg room and windows that don't even line up with the seats. I can't imagine anyone would willingly travel on one without the protection of a good book or free wifi ..

People keep making the assumption that at some point, people will inevitably become nostalgic for what they remember from when they were younger, but I think nostalgia is very selective at best, and has only a fleeting relationship with actual memories. My view is that there will still be market for travel behind steam long after the last person who can ever remember a steam engine in pre-preservation service has died, but that doesn't mean that there will inherently be demand for any vehicle once it reaches a certain age. The passenger experience in a Voyager is awful, and no amount of discussion of the benefits off a multi-engine design will get people harking back to the glory days of standing room only on the 8:15 ex Southampton to relive their daily commute.

Tom

 

Two points - needs must - do people travel on a 117 or a 101 out of some nostalgia? I am sure some do but I am also sure that they appeal to railways because they were available. Much like mk1s, mk2s etc, they were bought because they were going and could be used.

We see new lines etc being proposed, others expanding and there is a limited and aging amount of rolling stock available.

Also, they are dda compliant - disabled toilets and access, which is an issue for railways. I’d image you could reconfigure the seats as well. Means the loss of authenticity but hey ho.

Not my choice but if the choice were a second hand voyager or no service. I’d take the voyager.

Second point, I can remember people saying the same things when the first generation diesels started to be withdrawn. Who’d pay to ride behind a 47? For whatever reason people do. I am pretty sure a VEP-CIG-CEP railtour would do ok.

Steam will no doubt pull in the punters and that will always be true, however, in terms of stock that will be available to railways in say 20 years time, Voyagers will be there and they can and will do a job on a preserved railway just like first gem dmus have been for many years.

Is it my preference? No. Do I think people will rock up from the other side of the country for one? Who knows. Can they do a job? Yes they can and for that reason some will probably make it into preservation.

 

However, the 1st generation units have the forward views, affordably sized engines, and simple technology. The Voyagers have none of the above. Even on the terms you present, I suspect they will be at the back of the queue in favour of significantly less complex beasts. Ditto Mk3 and Mk4 carriages when they come spare.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

All of which is true but in 25 years time how many first gen dmus will be available for preserved railways. My view is that just like a lot of railways took mk1s and industrial locos to get/keep going in the early days so railways in the future will be faced with similar issues as the pool of first gen stock dries up.

As a side note I don’t think the 3h is known for a stunning ride, views or space but a lot seem to have been preserved because they were available and going.

Who knows, maybe in 30 years time a bi-mode iep will be the unit of choice for preserved lines. Alongside the recreation of an intermodal freight -think about the discussions about what colour to paint the boxes.

 

There is nostalgia for 1st generation DMUs - 'ordinary' passengers know (or perhaps realise) more than many enthusiasts rather snootily think! People can 'remember going to work/the seaside/granny's on one of these' - even if the enthusiast might be thinking 'not round here you didn't'! The experience evokes memories and that is a major part of our business, even if they may be what you want to remember as much as accurate memories!

2nd generation units are much more universal (although oddly, the likes of Pacers have never been (inflicted on) used near London - funny that, isn't it!) than pre-grouping and even some 1st generation stock, so will be more widely remembered.

The main market will always be for steam, but there will be a demand for 'newer' types, just nothing like as great - as is really the case for 'modern traction' already.

It will be much harder to maintain (although Deltics and Class 50s aren't exactly simple!) but the other factor may well be that the ownership model (and experience at home at in mainland Europe) shows that it may be less available for preservation. A lot of French and German stock has headed East, or to North Africa, on withdrawal, as have some British diesels and especially electrics. Leasing Companies will lease stock wherever there is a market - remember, some of the the earliest Pacers have ended up in Iran!

Steven

 

Considering most preserved lines have jointed rail I imagine the ability to get whiplash and ringing in your ears will be the most authentic thing about using Pacers.

 

In regards to to idea about the pres line Intermodal, if you take into account how many of the 70/80's era wagons have managed to avoid the scrapers that may be difficult in the extreme, pres line just go on about siding space being taken up, no use etc etc when it comes to EMU's so there's not much hope of that changing, it's a shame that in 15 or so years there will be a massive hole in the story of our railways and nobody seams that bothered as it isn't steam

 

Interesting point, a lot of Mark 2 coaches have been sold to New Zealand and they might have been more suitable for preserved lines. I think one of the difficulties of preserving any modern stock might be getting a railway to accept you bring it there. In the early days of preservation groups and individuals could often bring something in with little more than a quick nod as railways were just getting going and there was less control. Now because of shortage of siding space railways are being more strict about it and unless you can convince them of the benefits they can turn around and just say no.

It is very risky for anyone owning locos/rolling stock on a railway as the railway can easily turn nasty and try and force people out and there have been multiple examples of that.

 

Well that's this headline explained then ...
https://www.meed.com/iran-issues-bonds-to-finance-rail-electrification/
.... meanwhile, we're still fannying around arguing the toss over whether Abertawe (Swansea to us Saes) ought to be sparked up, or if the sea is miraculously suddenly going to stop flooding Dawlish Warren ... meaning the preffered option for Plymouth Truro and Penzance passengers is to continue doing s●d all ..... or aguing the ins and outs of HS2 to the point where a major contractor goes belly-up (OK, that's not the only reason, but it sure as hell won't have helped!) .... the list goes on and on and on ....

.... and, yes .... I am in a particularly grouchy mood today!

 

Very few - but the common preservation model of using scrap stock until it collapses, then replacing it, is becoming less and less viable. And if large money is going to need spending, I suggest that spending it on steam compatible stock repairs rather than "new" Voyagers etc. is more efficient in the long term.

 

Is it that common, other than on very small lines? How many heritage railways that started before the late 1980s use anything younger than Mk1s etc.? I think the most common model is repairing rolling stock ad finitum - there's no reason to think that should stop any time soon, even if they all are Grandad's axes in the end.

 

I'm 30, my formative years were spent traveling on the North Wales Coast behind 37s, in a rakes of scruffy mk1/mk2 coaches, and of a rough collection of 101s in a wide selection of geographically inappropriate liveries.
There were also 158s, HSTs and other such stuff running about, but it was only the 37s and the 101s for which I have a nostalgic soft spot. Possibly it was clambering into one over a door tread proudly proclaiming that Met-Cam had built them the best part of 50 years ago that gave them the appeal, perhaps it was the knowledge that their days (even then) were numbered (if someone had said that there would still be 37s hauling timetabled passenger trains 20 years later, I'd would have laughed at them). Possibly it was that they were so much pleasanter to travel on than their more modern replacements.

I think at least some of the appeal of the 37's to a small boy was the sheer noise and acceleration which they would achieve with an enthusiastic driver and a light load. I've never worked the numbers out, but I can remember a driver opening a 37 right up on three coaches coming out of an unscheduled stop at Connahs Quay, and it being difficult to stay stood up in the aisle, in a whole experience would now be unimaginable on the modern railway. It was an unscheduled stop arranged by control to collect a couple of stranded passengers(from a late running Wrexham train) - me and my mum. The 37's driver was doing line speed on the approach until the last possible moment (We'd only been told the driver might stop if he had time, and when we saw the train approach, I'd concluded it wasn't going to), did a full brake application and plonked the train stationary in the platform with with a squeal of brakes. Being slam door stock, we were onboard in seconds, and the train was already moving before we'd fully shut the door - the train was back at line speed in less time that it would take now in the era of driver performance logging to have got a DMU into the platform and the doors open... (and they held the connecting Bleanau Ffestiniog bound 101 for us at Llanduno Junction - this was back in the era when the railway system still cared about it's passengers - fat chance of that happening now). It's that sort of thing of which memories and nostalgia are made.

Again, my fondness for 37's possibly comes in part from standing on the footbridge at Bangor as the train we'd caught there left for Holyhead - drivers were often quite sporting, particularly if they spotted an enthusiastic kid, and would give them a great handful of throttle and noise as they went underneath. Opening all the windows in the coach behind the loco (if it was pretty empty) before going through the Conway bridge often sounded rather good too!

Maybe I'm wrong, but I rubbed shoulders with the later generation stuff (including cabbing a 150 from Bleanau to Betws-y-coed early one morning, aged about 12) and it just never appealed in the same way. Maybe I'm wrong, and a younger generation of small boys will think of the dying days of the 158s in the same way - but somehow I doubt it.

 

Point well made - how many of the millions who visit National Trust properties have any recollection of living or working in one? The same will be true regarding steam locomotives in service.

 

That used to happen when Mk1's were readily available ready to run from BR - when that supply dried up, lines took to repairing those they'd got - and Mk1's became worth serious money.

 

And look now at the costs of sustaining railways, let alone extending them, as the major overhauls fall due.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

Tbh the nt presents a very selective view of British history which is very divorced from the usual experience. But this is another story for another thread

I am quite sure that someone who travelled in a pre-grouping workman’s train would be bemused at someone getting excited about the idea of travelling in a four wheeled van because for them it was horrible, uncomfy and dirty. Much like travelling in a voyager...

The decision to preserve a voyager will not be made by me but by someone who is probably a child or their teens now who is growing up travelling on them and for whom they are a feature of every day life. It’ll be gm who needs a fuel efficient train for low season etc etc just like it was someone who needed some coaches and loco who went for a couple of second hand mk1s and an industrial.

It’ll always be need and availability that will drive what does or does not get preserved

 

Voyager, fuel efficient? Really?


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

I am not sure how many railways will be running them with all engines on at 125 mph and lugging the tilting gear around. My assumption is that they are going to consume less fuel pottering around at 25 mph on 2 engines. (I am aware that the figures are not great for them - I don't know how they compare to first gen locos so am happy to be corrected, my assumption was that they are more efficient).

My point which seems to have been lost is that whether they survive will depend on the situation when they are withdrawn. 117s survive because they were withdrawn late, 120s don't because they were withdrawn early. It'll be driven by whether heritage railways at that time have a need for rolling stock and the attitude of people who are still in school at the moment who will make the next generation of preservationists. I can see a number of cold blooded reasons why a gm would choose to get one if it were going. As for the romantics - who on earth would try to rationalise the emotions of people who get invested in inanimate objects.

I can't see the big attraction of a third or fourth hand 31 or 37 and some ex-VT mk2s that haven't been repainted, however, as I have said, they meet a need and are available so they get bought and they get put into use, just like 20 years back we had second hand mk1s, industrials and so on and so forth. It is the way it always has been and it is the way it always will be.

Sadly I don't have a time machine to zip forward 35 years to go and witness the 2000s weekend at the recently extended SVR and to check out how many pacers, sprinters, voyagers and 185s have been preserved.

 

But still something that is fixed formation, all or nothing, highly complex and incompatible with a vacuum braked railway, and engines massively larger than a 1st generation unit.

On historical grounds, some modern units should be preserved. I just happen to think that they will be few and far between, and preserved for their own intrinsic value rather than as off season capacity boosters.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

I can see the odd 142 and 150 being preserved for heritage line use, but not much else.