West Somerset Railway General Discussion

Great idea!

But who would play the Wilfred Bramble ‘dirty old man’ part...?

Robin

 

The voice of sanity

 

It might work as a Special Event for one weekend a year, but that's about it.

 

@Victor ?

 

It was actually Wilfrid Brambell - and my recollection is that in "A Hard Day's Night", there were lot of comments about how clean he was.

 

Well, I am more thinking of it as a way of filling up the loco hauled diesel services rather than as a special event as such - but a 60's event with a Beatles tribute band sounds great.

@Robin Moira White will have to be the crowd of screaming admirers

 

As a general assumption about the same time. As has been said BR standards are much easier to prep with modern features like rocking grates etc. Having to bale the fire grate out and clean the smokebox in the morning takes a while. Longer if there is a lot of clinker. We don't bale the fire out the night before in order to reduce the thermal shock on the boiler. So we dig it out in the morning before we light up. By the same token we don't push the pressure around too fast after lighting up either. It's reasonable to assume that the driver and fireman need 3.5 hours to complete the task pretty much independent of loco size. (There will be time to both read the notices and have a brew in that time. Also to do a little bit of cleaning.)
Factor in as well that people like to see the locomotive so allow a good 30 mins between coupling up to the train and getting the "right away".

 

Not really. My experience is you can do the driver’s prep on a BR Standard in about an hour, but a small inside cylinder 0-6-0 will take about two. But in neither case is it the limiting factor - it’s raising steam. We allow 3 hours for prep, but that is tight; it would be better all round if you had four, but then the day gets tight for hours at the other end. Doing it slower saves forcing the boiler more than necessary; plus it allows time to attend to minor niggles.

The other point to bear in mind if you have a mixture of locos is that even if were possible to prep some of them quicker, you probably don’t know which locos will be rostered in which days when you do your crew diagrams / roster, which could be months in advance. So you have to base your crew diagrams on the longest to prep / dispose, not the shortest.

Tom

 

The previous Head of Commercial and I (as Community Engagement Manager at the time) had this planned for 2019 with a 60’s dance on MD Platform and involvement with Minehead Town, we had also gained funding for the dance and weekend event which would have covered the marketing for the event as well so no cost to the WSR.

This was one of a number of events which we were bouncing off the back of the 1940’s Weekend format, working with Minehead and Watchet town’s who were keen to be involved as an annual event and brought the funding with them. With the redundancy of the Head of Commercial and my ‘removal’ from the WSR I would expect the General Manager (who was very keen on the idea) and the new Community Engagement Manager to have this already planned and to have picked up the funding so expect some announcement on it for 2019 once they sort out the line being opened in full again and the dust settles.

 

Could they repaint it green while it's there please? Sorry - not a fan of LT liveried panniers even if it is authentic! Good machine to help out in the current situations though.

 

I would imagine that a repaint of a hired pannier is not top of the railway's priority list at the moment

Jon

 

I don't think you are right on that one Barrie. At the Coombs meetings I advocated the use of the 25% discount as a reward for WSRA membership and for the abolition of free journeys. I do not believe we would want people to be members just because of the freebies, surely?

I suggest the decline in membership, mine included, is down to other factors.

 

As the price of coal increases beyond normal inflation as we are now being lead to believe every standard gauge line in the country will be taking a long hard look at the size of motive power being employed what ever the origin of its route.

 

Good marketing ideas - something that has been distinctly lacking up unto now and something which needs to change!

 

Could we run a special train from Minehead to Watchet on the evening of August 17 for the finale of the Watchet Summertime festival with live music on the Esplanade followed by the Watchet Summertime Firework Display. No better way to get there, delivers you right to the action and an easy journey home afterwards ...…..
Perhaps it's already planned?
https://www.facebook.com/events/1197603617082164/

 

Or, more to the point back to BL ....................

E-mail the railway, I did & got a very positive response for my idea.

 

At one stage - they may still do it, the East Somerset Railway had a 'lighter up' so the crews hours were reduced.

 

Deleted- duplicate of earlier comment

 

Unwritten rule No. 17 is 'them that suggests it does it.'