Swanage Railway General Discussion

You make my point - Bournemouth-Weymouth is now operated using the standard SWR EMU fleet, shared across the main line routes.

 

In normal circumstances, there are weekday 442 diagrams that include trains between Poole and Waterloo; I use one of them to get to work when I’m early turn.

 

Guess as more of the 4 seat (across) 442 EMUs trains start working, they will release the 5 smaller seats (across) Desiros else where on the SWR network?

 

I stand to be corrected, but I think the main intention was to use the 442’s on the Pompey Direct. I believe the diagrams down to Poole are to allow for maintenance to be done at Bournemouth Depot.

 

Sacrilege, which part of Wessex is Southsea in?
The best EMU's designed for the Waterloo Weymouth line and they get moved to the Pompey direct.

 

Thanks
The Desiro EMU will a comfortable train to travel to Wareham for the connection to Swanage when all is working again.
Have not yet been on a refurbuished 442.

 

They spent 10 years on the Brighton line, where the seating was changed to something much less attractive. And they worked the Pompey direct from quite early on.

 

Perhaps they will remove the seats and send them to China to bring back face masks. Should be back by about Christmas I would think.

 

1994 they started out of Pompey. The quality of the ride and the interiors deteriorated after that. As traincrew we were disappointed to find graffiti in our cabs and guards vans.

 

Looks like Eastleigh has done a good job on the 442 EMUs (as well as the SR railcars).
Lets hope the 442s stay in good order so they will not get the "Plastic Pigs" nickname again.

 

Along with a fellow guard at Bournemouth we produced 442 Squadron tie pins, with a smiley pink pig as background. I went on to produce 159 squadron ones as well.
Sold those that did not sell to the NSE society.

 

Have they ever thought about having a platform at Bournemouth west now the train centre which would keep swanage trains out of the way and allow mainline trains passed. It would be an easy way of linking to Bournemouth with no new track

 

Swanage is running to Wareham from their traction depot at Corfe. Who has ever mentioned Swanrail running to Bournemouth let alone overnight stabling round the West?

 

It's great that you're really concerned about the Swanage Railway's future. Must be very frustrating being in lock down at home, but multi-million pound pie-in-the-sky ideas are not really helpful or practicable.
Bournemouth West depot sidings are shunted regularly by SWR so would have no capacity to cope with passenger services. They are also not up to ORR regular passenger-carrying standards. The cost of Network Rail installing a platform would be somewhat astronomical if past station installations are to go by. The depot site has no really easy public access points nor are there any bus services nearby so far as I'm aware.
Whereas, Bournemouth station has a large bus station next to it. Platform 4 has adequate signalling to keep terminating services from the West, such as might be from Swanage some time in the future, out of the way of other services.
Am somewhat worried as to where these 'flights of fancy' might escalate, I fear, with possibly many more weeks of lock-down to go!

 

I wouldn't worry too much as he was spouting similar fanciful drivel before the lockdown.
Ray.

 

Why extend to Bournemouth? Wareham is ideal for double ended trains such as DMUs. A bay platform would be great though unlikely. Pathing problems would be eased if the sidings could be brought back into use though this would require closure of the foot crossing and dormant signalling to be commissioned. If at a later date it was thought desirable to run any steam hauled trains the sidings at Poole could provide a run round facility clear of the mainline. With one train a week SWR's summertime Saturday service between Corfe and Poole proved that a path could be made available.

 

There are quite a few SWR stations with direct Desiro EMU trains to Wareham where the interchange with the SR DMU railcars to Norton and Corfe is feasable when the lockdown finishes. Under the 2020 plans if they get going, to get to Swanage will require a change to a steam train, but should make a good day out.

Been interesting to see the weekly London Windsor service do well. Hopefully the 31806 or 31874. (with a 33 as backup) will be able to make a trip to Poole or Bournemouth for special steam powed direct day trips?
As discussed earlier the mk1 coaches will initally need some manually door locking procedure as central locking may not be financally viable?

 

The SR will have enough on its plate with recovering from the lock down, and attracting custom should be its first goal, anything other than the DMU shuttle is best placed and funded with an outside operator , the problem with Bournemouth is you can not turn the locomotive, and even running tender first, will be a problem as a 45 mph train mixing with 100 mph scheduled services is going to be problematic, you might even have to consider running beyond Bournemouth to turn, so regular paths is I would say a no hoper, but a tour from say Swanage, using a mainline approved engine and stock out of the high season possibly could be an option, but the risk will have to be in the hands of the likes of Steam Dreams, or West Coast my personal best all round idea, would be for Steam dreams to have a Wessex explorer mini tour, late afternoon, run to weymouth, with one of Carnforths 8p's with the U, or N, coming on at Weymouth to haul the train back to Swanage, overnight accommodation in Swanage, morning , tour to Salisbury, then back to Swanage with the 8p again overnight accommodation, Sunday, return to London, double headed 8P + N, or U, As far as Southampton, pilot detaches, tour engine runs round to rear, and heads for London via Andover + Basingstoke. , Pilot returns back to Swanage, after turning on Eastleigh triangle.

 

Shall we concentrate on the matter in hand, and not get too carried away?

1. Get through the present Coronavirus situation. Donate money to the Swanage Railway and hope it can survive.
2. Enjoy riding on the Norden to Swanage line once reopened.
3. Hope the Swanage Railway can achieve it’s stated objective of running DMUs to Wareham (probably not until at least 2021 now)
4. The railway can consolidate, take stock and complete outstanding projects i.e carriage shed, 4TC set, the T3, M7 overhaul, N class overhaul, Salisbury water tower, Old Oak Common turntable etc.
5. Perhaps then they might consider occasional limited steam runs slightly further afield on the mainline.

 

+1 Well said that man.