2008 Passenger Figures

I suspect many Railways will have had their 2008 Passenger figures out by now. We have a preliminary figure at the NYMR of 315,000, which is about 2.5% or 8,000 passengers down on last year. The reduction appears to be more weather than "Credit-Crunch" related, with falls in numbers at the early (and snowy) Easter and during the very wet August and good results towards the end of the season, the Santas and Christmas week.

Steven Hogg
NYMR

 

I believe the GCR at Quorn & Woodhouse station alone were something around 60% up on tickets compared to the previous year, so I suppose it's safe to say that in 2008 we had a massive increase in passengers.

 

That's a bit of a bold statement. I have no doubt that passenger figures may be up on the GCR due mainly to Tornado (and and Oliver Cromwell), but what about other stations - have they also seen such a massive increase? Could it simply be that the nature of events during 2008 have meant that more people bought their tickets at Quorn than other stations? The fact that the GCR have just made two members of staff redundant suggests that things may not be quite as rosy as that one figure suggests.

 

Passenger figures for the West Somerset were released a while ago, the 2008 number being 203996, the second-highest ever.

The estimate for the Severn Valley, as per the Autumn "SVR News" was 232,000, but an accurate figure will no doubt be released soon. The SVR was only open full-line from the 21st March, however the 232,000 figure should be seen in the context of under 140,000 passengers for 2007, due to the partial closure of the line from June 2007.

I guess what is more important is actual total revenue, and how that fits into the "income and expenditure" situation on each heritage line.

46118

 

I haven't got the figures for the Glos Warks to hand but believe we were about 3,000 down on last year with approx 68,000 passengers. This is almost the exact difference between running the two Thomas weekends in 2007 compared to the two Paddington Bear weekends in 2008. The poor weather at the Cotswold Festival of Steam in May didn't help numbers then either. Encouragingly though numbers on normal operating days throughout the year were well up on last year and Santa Specials broke all records \/

 

Figures at Loughborough, Rothley and Leicester were also up on ticket sales and revenue for Quarter 2, 3 and 4. Quarter 1 was just down at all stations. The staff were made redundant to ensure the company stays in a good financial position, it doesn't mean the company is on it's last legs, it's a precaution to secure jobs, and ensure the railway isn't spending money where it doesn't need to.

 

While it doesn't mean the company is on it's last legs, it does mean the company can't afford to keep the staff members that it's had to let go. If a company was still earning similar or more income as it was in previous years, there would be no need to get rid of staff. I was made redundant from Comet back in August, not because the company didn't want to spend money where it wasn't needed, but because they couldn't afford to keep the extra staff. As soon as i left i noticed a decline in tidiness of the store/displays as there wasn't anyone else around to do it.... so i would say they needed someone to do the tasks that i did. And no doubt the GCR would still need the people it's had to let go. Which indeed shows some preserved railways are struggling at the moment, regardless of passenger figures?

 

Well, there are reasons why they are redundant and whilst I'm aware of most of them it's not appropriate to air them in public.

 

I didn't ask for the reasons of why they were made redundant... all i said was the GCR may have still needed the people it had to let go.

 

No, it didn't need them, it's working better without them.

 

unfortunately its not about the job you do, in this economy it's solely about the income you generate.
If you earn less revenue for the company, then out you go..

doesnt matter if your a manager or a cleaner, if your potential revenue figures arent higher than the guy next to you.. out you go.