Llangollen Railway

https://www.dailypost.co.uk/news/north-wales-news/bid-save-llangollen-railway-assets-20205778
"Cowgills said Michael Booth at LSH has been appointed to market the railway and its assets and all bids must be in by close of business on Monday 22 March 2021.'
No news on who may have bid?

 

The Llangollen railway Trust have stated their intention to bid for some assets. I’m sure there are several others bidders who are keeping their cards closer to their chest, and who in any case would have had to sign non diclosure agreements to receive the asset list.

I doubt we will know any more until low loaders start turning up at Llangollen.

 

From what I understand that 12 includes a GUV and one which is substantially converted to a function coach, so only 10 ‘normal’ passenger carrying MK1s.

Another twist seems to be that one of the former directors (owner of a certain small pannier tank) has claimed ownership for 4 for these MK1s. This means the administrator is finding it even harder to find sufficient value in the assets, so apparently are looking closely at any assets where ownership is not crystal clear.

 

Anyone know the going rate for a reasonable good MK1 these days.

 

I think I saw one advertised for £35k a couple of years ago, so probably that sort of ball park.

10 coming on to the market at once might lower the value, depending what level of demand there is.

 

I'd assume that demand for corridor stock is higher at the moment so they would fetch a higher price.

 

Not sure that's an assumption I'd make.
Purchases would probably be done with the long term in mind rather than short term for the next 3 months of covid.

And even if you did want them for the reduced covid service, railways have done a fantastic job with screens.

 

Agreed. It might be the case for non corridor compartment stock (e.g BR surburbans) if any of that came on the market in good condition. They make it easy to completely separate family groups with no on train mixing.

However with corridor compartment stock people still mix on the train, with compartments to separate them when they sit down. A similar effect can be achieved with screens in open stock.

There is no suggestion the Llangollen surburbans are for sale.

 

Sounds like things could get messy then.

 

The owner of a loco formerly at LR and elsewhere had a brass owner's plate rivetted to the engine. It would save a lot of hassle in cases like this.
Ray.

 

Its sucj a long time ago that I had forgotten, but At one point there was a court case over work carried out on a engine under contact at a particular site where one of our carriages was stored which, it had gone badly, risked everything on sire being seized, so we had to apply an ownership plate to our carriage petty pronto. It is probably a good idea to git them to any privately owned stock, just in case! .

 

A good idea and it would certainly make an administrator think twice about selling it. However sticking a plate on saying ‘I own this’ isn’t really proof of anything is it. How would one go about actually proving ownership of a loco or carriage? Invoice for purchase perhaps?

 

Presumably a copy of the paperwork agreement for the vehicle in question to be stored/used at the railway in question would confirm that it doesn't belong to the railway and is there under an agreement.

 

Assuming there is an official agreement for whatever it is to be on the railway! Not always the case, especially for things brought in in the earlier days of a railway.

 

It does at least act as an alarm that the administrators/receivers are obliged to check, as part of their due diligence, though, and most groups or individuals will be able to produce proof of ownership on request. It is rarely possible or advisable to attach the actual proof to the item!

 

Indeed and it’s obvious I wasn’t suggesting that proof of ownership should be attached to the item. I was merely raising the question about how ownership of railway vehicles can be proved in these circumstances. It’s not like there is a central nationwide register of who owns what. I guess it’s down to the owner to show the paperwork trail to prove they have purchased it.

 

I would expect any railway to have a register of ownership of all privately-owned items, be they stock, equipment or artefacts on its property, not least for insurance purposes

Jon