Lynton and Barnstaple - Operations and Development

I should say up front that I always enjoy my trips to Woody Bay which I think is very well done.
My point really is that the original L&B is never going to be restored. The best we can hope for is restored sections joined up by new build.
There is lots of talk on here about rebuilding the line, but given that is isn't possible to do that, the only alternative is to construct some form of tourist attraction that takes you from somewhere near Barnstaple too somewhere near Lynton. If that is that case, then this is not within the charitable objectives. These are being currently fulfilled by the Woody Bay operation and could be enhanced by (for example) funding an engineering apprentice at Minehead.
It is therefore no wonder the current trustees don't have any long-term plans and, as I said, it needs a wholesale revamp of the entire organisation and resetting of the objectives to make any difference.
Brunel's approach was that if you were going to change anything, then you need to do it dramatically, not just tinker round the edges. I hope we get some new trustees with far reaching visions who can shake it all up and make the dramatic changes that we need.

 

Oh no, @Lineisclear has a convert! I'm still unconvinced that the charitable objectives are any kind of blocker on any potential expansion. Maybe I'm just a more liberal trustee than John or Ian (although I have said no to things in my short tenure so far on another railway!) but more fundamentally, it's not been raised at all by any current trustees of the L&B as a reason they have not done what members wished. If it were me and I felt it was a constraint, I'd be making that fairly well known, but in all the defensive stuff that's been put out, I don't think it's been mentioned once. It looks much more like a clinging on to power and much less an altruistic 'hands tied by charitable objectives'.

One thing I wouldn't disagree on is that a dramatic change is needed and not just tinkering round the edges. To me though, changing charitable objectives feels at best a distraction as a first step. Better to use the time and effort to come up with a long term plan, get it agreed by the members, then if necessary change the charitable objectives to allow you to deliver it.

 

I very much agree! I've advocated a change in the charitable objectives so they are more in harmony with members' expectations but there's little point unless you have a realistic financial plan that gives you the opportunity to achieve them. I think work has been done on cost estimates in the past. I seem to recall a figure of £2 million or so per mile but no doubt someone in the know will put me right. What does seem certain is that a contested battle over a TWAO envisaging compulsory purchase with the legal costs of a public enquiry would have a multi million price tag. The fundamental question is how would that be funded? It's clearly not going to come from operating surpluses and must be beyond the pockets of most members . Institutional grant funding seems unlikely as the outcome is uncertain. Such funders may fight shy of a speculative outcome where the only sure fire winners would be the lawyers. Organisations like the NLHF have made it clear that the days of funding capital projects like construction are substantially over. They prefer to focus on desirable social outcomes. The dream of recreating the L&B is alive but I sense a reluctance to wake up to the financial implications of what making it real requires. Member and volunteer support is strong, which is great, but can the necessary funds be raised to build what in land ownership terms is a new railway? Unless and until that is clear anything more will remain the stuff of dreams.

 

My understanding is that part of the trackbed toward Barnstaple has now been built on, so unless any trackbed owner between Snapper and Barnstaple is willing to sell their trackbed, I think we need to accept that this part of the line will never reopen in its old format, but that does not stop any one from coming up witha back of a fag packet proposal on how to over come this issue.

 

I think you’re right. My take on what that means is that some really serious strategic work is required and some really serious discussion and collaborative interaction with all interested parties.

As others have observed, a really serious transformation is needed. And that may involve some choices which at the present time are unthinkable, because they cannot be seen in their proper context.

As I said, I don’t know the answer, but I do know how to find it. I am sure others do also, we do just need to get on and do the thinking though.

 

21B said there is a gap in Fundraising I can't agree more I am not sure that the whole subject of fund riaising has been taken seriously enough there have been people out there which have been willing to help out on this, the big issues I have found is that to do the sort of fund raising we need, you are going to have to pay a small team to do it, since I feel that it is just too big for just one person to do

 

Again that feels a little like the wrong way round, given the current issues are not primarily a lack of finance in the first instance, but more a challenge of what is actually feasible.
I'd observe that significant sums of money have been raised for lots of bits and pieces here and there, Snapper Halt, Chelfham, Bratton Fleming etc. All useful if the eventual goal is to restore the whole thing, but that aspiration feels a very, very long way away right now. I fully understand the reasons why that was done, only one opportunity and all that, But at the end of the day the actual railway is no further forward because of that. Some will point to that as a failure of the Trust and a success of Exmoor Associates, Yeo Valley Trust or whatever in doing their own thing. But it strikes me as a failure of the L&B community as a whole. That's not necessarily a criticism, but maybe success, in the way most people have been thinking about it, isn't actually possible.

I think folk need to stop doing their own bits, come together and sort out what is actually feasible to achieve. Personally I find it hard to believe the whole thing is possible, but I know nowhere near enough to make any sort of judgement on what might be. But if one group is busy buying up bits of land that just can't be joined up while the railway sits still, that's not success. Equally if the railway stays as 1 mile when there are feasible options out there not being pursued, that's not success either.

Basically, one way or another, if you're going to get any further than lots of parcels of land and 1 mile of track, you need a proper, realistic, strategy, not just a vision of 1935.

 

@flying scotsman123 I agree with much of what you say. There are two impediments to progress. The lack of a joined up strategy, and the failure to find a way to collaborate effectively across the many organisations which sadly appears to be about personalities.

The reality is that many of the elements required to create a successful railway on a considerably longer length (maybe 5 or 6 times the current length) exist already. To paraphrase a famous comedy sketch: “all the right parts, just not necessarily in the right order”.

In my mind the strategy forming process has to be used to kick off the discussions and collaboration between people and their organisations. We have to find that “best fit” way to bring all the bits together. Then we can fundraise seriously, and given how much has been raised so far without that clarity on how we can advance in quite short order I think, finding the money to build those 5 or 6 miles by the centenary of closure is a realistic goal.

 

Many years ago the L&BR Trust under the existing chairman along with a few other long standing trustee's insisted that Exmoor Associates stay south of Blackmoor Gate, that then moved down to Wistlandpound because the TRUST were working on the big extension between WB and Blackmoor otherwise EA could have been seeking land purchases in the north, you can all draw your own conclusions as to the reasons for this but two or three current trustee's were behind all of this and that is why we are where we are, incidentally the chairman of EA has probably done the deal on more track bed purchases than anyone else involved with this railway and luckily still has the drive and enthusiasm to try and get more

 

As I understand it, EA was set up to acquire stretches of the line as and when possible. Why did the Trust wish to restrict which stretches EA would be allowed to acquire? Does the Trust actually have the right to impose such a restriction?
There evidently are differences of opinion as to how much of the L&B can be restored eventually, but do some of the parties not even share a common objective of restoring as far as possible?

 

I think they have a common objective, but the impression given (and I am a member of both) is that those running the Trust regard the railway as theirs. That has lead to actions to make sure they control things, and there have been examples of throwing the toys out of the pram when they are faced with normal challenges from those with differing views. Despite the allegations made otherwise this appears to have been what has led to them instigating the ejection of two Trustees and the attempt to control who might become one. Mercifully that was clearly seen as unnecessary by a majority of members and they voted to reject the change at the recent EGM.

 

Thank god there were enough people that were smart enough to realize that the third objective at the EGM was a blatant power grab that would take a sledgehammer to the railroad’s future for the next 10-20 years.

It shouldn’t have even been a 51-49 decision to begin with.

 

I assume that you mean the 3rd motion to adopt new Articles. As you rightly point out the motion was passed by 51% to 49% but required 75% to be adopted. I don't think that there was any possibility that it would reach the 75% required. It is generally accepted that the current Articles are not fit for purpose and that these need to be changed.

The AGM is on 11th May at which 4 trustees will be elected. No doubt one of their priorities will be to determine how to replace the Articles.

 

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To be pedantic, a majority of members voted FOR the new articles. 51% is a majority. The vote failed because it needed a 75% majority to be adopted. This is important because it shows that even with such a dreadful power grab, the trustees still could count on more than half of the members supporting them.

 

The vote was actually DEFEATED by 51% to 49% - the majority of voters voted AGAINST the motion. https://www.lynton-rail.co.uk/trust-notices

 

This is getting out of kilter. I was prepared with pen and paper after the meeting when eventually Brom Bromwich reported the results of all three motions to the remaining members chatting in the Town Hall, and wrote them down with a view to putting them on here as someone on here had asked, when I got to my lap top in the hotel - message 12461 on page 624. For motion 3: 596, Against 617, Abstentions 51. To my mathematics that means only 49% voted for the motion and 51% against. It required 75% to pass.

 

Thanks - you are right. It would have been less confusing if the person quoting the figures had said 49-51 - however 75% was required.

 

Setting aside the precise numbers, what was interesting was the dynamic in Lynton Town Hall that day. There were a number of people there who attended because they were confused about what they were receiving. All of them commented afterwards that the proceedings, and specifically the approach of the Board, had led them to move from neutrality to opposing the motions. The comments I heard reflected a mixture of dislike of the approach of the board ("arrogance" was a word often used), and disbelief at the poverty of the cases being made.

It was a matter on which both board and opponents had significant embedded support bases, but where those willing and/or able to attend were heavily weighted (unscientifically, I'd suggest 3:1) to the board's actions.

Interestingly, and as we approach the AGM, importantly for both supporters and opponents of the current Trust board, a key theme was frustration with the board combined with vocal dislike of the "politics". More than the failure of the main EGM motion*, it suggested that tolerance of the current board is nearing it's limit as the demand for a board capable of delivering a railway that members can support** grows.

* - it's worth note that, although the EGM was officially called for the purpose of changing the Articles, Peter Miles stated explicitly during the meeting that the Articles were only tacked on to the motions to dismiss. That was at the very least a Freudian slip, and has obvious and significant implications for anyone's ability to trust official communications.
** - This is not a place for debate about the finer points of trustees' duties; it was common ground amongst all at the EGM that significantly extending the L&B is necessary and desirable. The issues were how, when, and under whose leadership.

 

Having had a closer look at the L & B Blackmoor Company accounts for 2023 I have been sent I am becoming increasingly concerned about the exposure to the Trust of this subsidiary, which has risen to £648,000 at 31 December. These accounts reveal that the secured loan from a private individual to the Blackmoor Company stood at £379,000 at the end of last year, and that £101,333 is repayable by the end of this year, but more significantly the rest - £277,667 - is due by the end of the following year, in 20 months time. There was just over £73,000 in the Blackmoor bank last December when a profit of £8,290 for the 8 months trading in 2023 is shown.

It seems likely that a good proportion of this £379,000 will have to be raised from somewhere to replace it, and the current return on a purchase price of nearly £1.9m does not present a promising state of affairs to do this. If that is not possible, maybe the only route is to put the 6-bedroom house on the market when its tenancy ends (March 2025 ?). Which would deprive the Trust of the opportunity of being able to offer volunteer accommodation at a time when it might be needed to rebuild the line.

The other loan the Blackmoor Company has is from the Trust, originally £250,000, but reduced by the first annual instalment of £25,000 to £225,000 by December 2023. This was done from an allotment of £170,000 shares to the Trust during the year. The subsequent instalments can presumably be dealt with in the same way, increasing the exposure of £648,000 (which was declared to be £350,000 in the missive issued by the Trustees 11 days after the date of the accounts). A further £40,000 shares were allotted in January 2024, but the registration document does not require the allottees to be stated.

The Trust accounts declare that the Blackmoor Company made a loss of £36,808 in 2023, and I am awaiting a response from the Accountant to my query at the beginning of the week as to how this reconciles with the profit shown in the Blackmoor Co. accounts.

 

Zero Miles (sic)

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