Llangollen Railway

I am a subscriber. It came to me yesterday.

It's a list. They can edit it at the last minute.

Even so, the majority of railways on that list still have made no announcements!

 

I think you'd be surprised at the difficulties, and I'm sure the editors did try to leave freezing it till the last. But, to turn the question round, what is the relationshpi between the length of a railway and it's opening? I'm immediately aware of two - VoR and WSR - that are a decent length, have a high public profile and which have declared that they won't open for traffic this year; my subjective sense is that the others are minor.

 

The V of R is a case on its own as the carriage stock, or at least the enclosed vehicles has a rather singular internal layout which would make arrangements for social distancing difficult. Compartment stock makes distancing arrangements easier but, better still, if there are no corridors. Not many places can turn out complete trains of non-corridor stock, fewer still more than one set. So longer lines have to decide whether to run lengthy, infrequent, trains over the full distance or shorter, more frequent, ones over part of the route.

As you will be aware I am a great "non-fan" of yer avrage tourist railway rake of Mk.1s. About the only possible positive result of coronavirus 19 has been to ensure that places that do have more interesting stuff actually use it.

 

I agree, they do - though I've also seen options with railways using rakes of Mk1 TSOs and alternative arrangements. However, that doesn't alter my comment about which railways have either stayed silent, or have declared they will sit out 2020.

 

I suspect a big factor is the split between lines that have a large paid staff and those that don't. If you have paid staff and the furlough scheme ends, you have to pay them regardless of what you do, which might tip the balance towards running and at least making some income. All-volunteer lines can potentially afford to take a much more cautious view, as they have lower unavoidable overheads. Of course, it is generally (not quite universally) the fact that it is the bigger, longer, more high-profile lines that also tend to have higher numbers of paid staff.

Tom

 

I was asked to help out a [name redacted] railway periodical recently in a minor way on an item. I'm pretty sure the editorial date they gave was a couple of weeks before publication. If layout would be affected, it was earlier.

COVID's been affecting magazine advertising revenue. I'm speculating, this and furlough may be affecting the number of contract and non-contract hands on deck.

Patrick

 

This was my thinking, but yet the 2 larger railways that have said they won’t open this year, one is entirely paid staff (VoR), and the other must have a good number of them, (WSR).

 

I don't know the VoR at all to comment. On the WSR, they seem to be suffering much more significant issues, but from an immediate operational point of view, the line appears to be severed by an unfinished infrastructure project that essentially prevents anything leaving one end of the line where their main loco depot is.

But we digress ...

Tom

 

Train services from Llangollen to Carrog (no intermediate stops) commence this coming Saturday 1st August.
The weekend service will be dmu. Monday will be class 31 hauled suburban set. Tuesday and Wednesday will be dmu, then Thursday to Sunday 3802 on the suburban set. All journeys must be pre-booked, see railway's website for details.

Bob.

 

31 on a Suburban Set!

Not that I ever knew it but isnt that Kings Cross in the 70's? Although I have happy memories of 31's on the Oxford Fasts out of Paddington

 

Saturday the 8th also features the 31 on the second service.

 

News through today of the proposal to reinstate the line between Rhyl and Corwen. Interesting

 

Do you have a link. It would be interesting to read that.

 

https://www.rhyljournal.co.uk/news/...-rhyl-nbsp-st-asaph-nbsp-nbsp-denbigh-corwen/

 

enormous pie in the very dark sky!!!what about a railway link between liverpool and new york?(under the sea of course!)

 

Who knows? If, I said IF, it goes ahead, it would benefit that area of wales and would no doubt provide a boon to the Llangollen.

 

Not quite as hard as that! It's calling for what it says on the tin, a feasibility study. First and most obvious question, what level of demand is there for public transport along that route which isn't met by existing bus services? No idea myself, but I would be surprised if was a lot. Beyond that anything is feasible if you throw money at it, but from the NLS maps overlay you would probably be looking at new routes past Ruthin and Denbigh rather than following the old route for starters. I suspect any sensible analysis will prove it not going to be cost effective.

TL;DR, yes it's WIBN.

 

I've already mentioned this on another thread. They would like a share of a £500 million pot, but looking at the state of what's left they would probably need the whole pot and more. Access to Corwen old station and Rhyl is o.k., but getting through the likes of Denbigh and Ruthin is a major problem, and somebody has removed a large section of embankment just outside Corwen.

Bob.

 

I believe that the £500m is just for feasibility studies; it isn't designed to fund any scheme (i.e. actually do physical construction), for which additional money would be required. I suspect it is largely the construction equivalent of vapourware - announced by the Government to appear good, but without the need to fund the serious money needed for actual re-instatement. If you were to break down £500m and spread it more or less equally across the country, it would amount to less than £10million available in each county - you aren't going to get much railway built for that.

Tom

 

92212 and tender left Llangollen this afternoon (3rd August 2020)
https://flic.kr/p/2jsH7TK