West Somerset Railway General Discussion

I understand it is confusing, I struggle sometimes as well but it was the PLC who officially threw £400k into the mix not anybody here. For the record I'm not supporting any particular group, I do however support a one railway, community engaged WSR working together, however that's made up.

 

For those of you who wonder about the NYMR's declared traffic figures, how many railways have a similar "problem" at this time of year? (From the NYMR Volunteers FB page, the queue for the 14.00 ex-Whitby stretchesback to the station entrance and beyond)

 

But.............

When exactly were the board aware, or when should they have been aware of the need for major infrastructure work?

 

Well known for a number of years through a number of reports and much internal WSR discussion so it would not have been a surprise to anybody at any level within the PLC, WSRA, WSSRT, working members, staff, etc. etc. Many had raised the flag in previous years as well.

 

Thanks Andy, I appreciate your response and for you keeping it so brief.

You say that the figure of £400,000 originated from the Plc, but having attended the EGM and having studied the précis of that meeting on the WSR official website I can see no reference to that figure. Maybe you can elaborate.

 

Presumably because they all knew that it was the last steam train out of Whitby today, and if they missed it, the next NYMR train out of Whitby wouldn't leave until after dark and wouldn't get them back to Pickering until nearly 7pm! I've just checked the timetable: the next departure after the 14.00 is the 17.10 diesel.

This goes back to what I said the other day about the Welsh Highland: if you want to fill your trains, don't run many.

Incidentally, I wonder how many of those near the front of the queue are desperate for the toilet, given the lack of facilities at Whitby

 

As below with both the £400k and the PLC making up the £250k balance from a PLC Release. In this case courtesy of the great www.wsr.org.uk site.

An update on the infrastructure fundraising and work plans

© Tim Edmonds
The West Somerset Railway Association and West Somerset Steam Railway Trust's 'Rail Renewal' appeal is now over the £75,000 mark and so 30% of the hoped-for total of £250,000 by 31 December for the next round of infrastructure works, so it could easily achieve a figure close to that target with gift aid by then, but the WSR Plc will be meeting any difference having signed off the £250K spend needed for rails, sleepers and track fittings, plus remedial repairs to bridges, monitoring embankments, formation repairs, drainage and some fencing. The WSR 'family' is actively looking to continue the fund raising, but the Plc has committed monies too, so any greater amounts raised means doing more than the minimum for compliance and so go above and beyond that. WSR Plc Chairman Jon Jones-Pratt is determined that the WSR is in control of ensuring that it does what's needed to operate in the correct manner for 2020.

Jonathan's plan is to make sure the WSR gets back to the higher 20 ton 'Red' axle weight as soon as possible, and the recent independent infrastructure review has been positive in this regard in the sense that it means the WSR is getting very well qualified on the subject and also gaining better understanding and knowledge of the line's infrastructure and needs. The independent infrastructure review was designed to be a 'traffic light system' to highlight high, medium term and longer term priorities for works and has shown that the planned programme is achievable. An estimated figure of £400K is likely to be an annual investment requirement into the infrastructure that will be needed going forward for some time to come however. Jonathan says:

We have had good, independent infrastructure reviews, so I hope to be able to agree fairly soon that we will be back to 'Red' route activity for 2020, along with having all of our temporary speed restrictions’s removed. There is a lot of work taking place in the background and the positive news is that we have a signed off works plan in readiness for November 2019. All of this effort will pay off in dividends as the WSR embraces its journey of recovery and striving for excellence.

He adds:

I was also very proud to be asked to attend a future joint seminar with the Office for Road and Rail (ORR) at which I will have a 30 minute spot at the next Heritage Railway Association meeting, detailing the working relationship between the two of us and how a professional approach was delivered through all our challenges - 12 months on, we now have a very different Railway!

13 October 2019
Details kindly provided by West Somerset Railway Plc

 

I’d suggest that having a thorough understanding of the condition of the infrastructure is pretty much essential for the board to manage the railway. So they should have been aware of the condition, and how that condition was changing, at all times; it shouldn’t have been a surprise.

(From a purely engineering point of view, insufficient locos, insufficient carriages or faulty infrastructure are the three things that will curtail your ability to deliver a service - so you’d expect appropriate performance measures to feature prominently in whichever control mechanisms the board choose to use, for example regular reports, risk registers, KPIs etc).

Of course, knowing the condition of the infrastructure is one thing; having a viable, sustainable plan to manage it another.

Tom

 

I'm still curious how the NYMR is (or appears to be) 50% more popular in passenger figures than any other UK heritage railway. (And yes I do understand that the bottom line is more important than these numbers).

 

Thanks for some clarification of the various figures that had been bandied about. The figure of £500k that I had had in mind was what I thought had been quoted by the PLC as being needed this year and again in each subsequent year, for arrears of maintenance of the infrastructure. If the railway can survive on somewhat less than that, that is obviously good news, but it remains to be seen whether enough cash can be raised and where it is to come from.

 

Try visiting the NYMR on any midweek day throughout the year, and see how full the trains are. Look at their total number of operating days, and then compare this with your own experience of the railways you are involved with. Think about the number of visitors that go to Whitby throughout the year. It is now an all year round destination in one of the most-visited regions of the UK. Visit England's 2018 figures showed that Whitby, along with Scarborough and Filey as a borough, had retained its crown as most visited holiday destination in England, outside of London.

I think that you will find that the 330,ooo + passenger figures are indeed accurate. The NYMR has always taken full advantage of marketing the "Heartbeat Effect" and is currently enjoying considerable free publicity courtesy of the recent TV series (with a third series currently being filmed)

It is probably not quite true to say that the NYMR is 50% more popular than any other UK heritage railway, as the combined passenger figures of the Ffestiniog and Welsh Highland railways must come fairly close.

Andy

 

All heritage railways have to report their passenger numbers to the ORR each year and there is a standard form for this so they should be reported similarly. There will be slight differences due to such things as what is counted as a family ticket and whether members travelling are issued tickets, or not, but they should be broadly comparable.

 

See

"An estimated figure of £400K is likely to be an annual investment requirement into the infrastructure that will be needed going forward for some time to come however."

wsr.org "news" item 13th October 2o19

Sorry, the links didn't work.

Cheers,
Julian

 

That doesn't necessarily equate to £400k needing to be fund raised every year though, perhaps the Plc can budget £150k a year and so has to fund raise the rest? I don't know and am not nearly as on top of the detailed news as others, but that would be one way of explaining the existence of the 2 different figures.

 

The recent posts relating to the WSR PLC board do suggest a most unusual state of affairs for a preserved railway with a very small Board and none of them elected by Shareholders, and also with the Company Secretary being a firm of accountants with other links I have stated previously (and can be cross referenced via Companies House), and with seriously delayed annual accounts.

It may well work out to be ok, but is not a situation I would regard as currently ideal.

Cheers,
Julian

 

I hope none as Network Rail requires the train toilets to be locked out of use over their track so they will have a a long time to wait!

 

If Network Rail require train tickets to be locked out of use, then surely they should be obliged to ensure free toilets are available at or near Whitby station. According to a TripAdviser report, the toilets in the shopping centre cost 40p.

I seem to recall a report recently that Network Rail intend to stop charging for use of their station toilets nationally.

 

Network Rail are moving towards banning the use of toilets that discharge to the track. How train operators respond to that - by fitting retention tanks, locking toilets out of use over NR tracks, removing toilets, whatever - is up to them.

As for Network Rail providing loos, remember that they don't actually run most stations, so the reduction in charges only applies to the dozen or so stations that they do run. Last time I looked, Whitby wasn't on that list!

 

So what about the Northern trains that use that route?

 

couldbe late running today, a down freight of some sort 33 hauled left Williton same time as first up train left Dunster !