North Yorkshire Moors Railway General Discussion

Would changing trains at Grosmont be remotely attractive to passengers, whatever the traction mix? As apparently Whitby trains are close to full, one has to assume that is what the market wants as its preferred destination.

 

I wouldn’t disagree with the first part of your post that a heritage railway has to appeal to:
- Happen to be passing through and spot a sign
- Couples dining
- Family Day out
- Bad weather fall back plan
- Enthusiast visit with enthusiast friends
- Volunteer
And personally I think the NYMR achieves this in spades.

The railway can appear Whitby centric at times but that is due to passenger demand, of where they (the passenger) want to travel to and from. But equally passengers use the railway for its heritage as well as a means of accessing the North York Moors National Park. Re the DMU I look forward to Daisy’s re entry into service on internal services, and meanwhile the railway will be using the Autocar on Sundays. However, they clearly lack capacity to operate Whitby services, even if Network Rail would permit their use (DMU, how much did it cost the Sawange DMU cost to be made compliant and I expect the Autocar would be a flat no).

Most Whitby bound trains carry some 300 passengers during the peak season, with a 7-coach train running at capacity. During the 2023 and 2024 one or two services per week involved changing trains at Grosmont for operational reasons (a necessary set swop) , and I can assure you this was not an ideal situation either for the passengers or staff involved, particularly if in the pouring rain or for those passengers necessarily using the easy access coach. At least for 2025 I understand there are no planned set swops.

 

Indeed, I was tempted to say "steady on" about the Bluebell making a profit!

I do think that seen as a group (rather than each entity in isolation) it is clearly holding its own financially. I also think that it is true that across the three big areas of engineering spend, the track is improving in quality with a big track renewal programme; the loco position is broadly holding its own, and the carriage and (heritage) wagon fleet is improving.

There are many things I wish I could change about the railway, but at a visceral level, there are many positives.

Tom

 

That depends entirely on the deal. A smaller hire fee and maintenance is quite common.

 

Whilst in North Yorkshire:
Reduced carriage fleet availability due to a rough shunt in 2024 depleting a fleet already in its knees with the teak rake being OOS largely due to issues caused by the state of the track .
Increased TSRs as two winters of minimal track maintenance despite the issue above .
Reduced loco availability ,with more locos going out of ticket and the railway relying on the generosity of Pete Best.

 

Please tell me if I'm wrong but I believe that the the LNERCA restored the coaches and provided them to the NYMR to use at minimal cost provided they looked after them. However, the NYMR baulked at maintaining the teak carriage bodies as they had little expertise in the field of maintaining timber coaches. The LNERCA therefore agreed to look after the bodies whilst the NYMR looked after the ironwork and the small hire fee pair to the LNERCA reflects that situation. It seems a reasonable compromise to me provided it is honoured by both parties. The NYMR is continuing top pay the hire fee because it can't really not do so without the LNERCA's agreement. Maintaining the mappears to be something that they can put off, though.

 

Changing trains at Grosmont just isn't sensible as has bee ndiscussed before. It is bad enough with just one set of passengers detrainnig and getting on the other train but when you have a trainload of passengers going in the other direction it becomes a nightmare. Just imagine 300 getting off and going to the waiting train whilst 300 are already on the patform to board the arriving train.

 

I suspect there’s a practical issue as well. Does overhaul of wooden bodied stock sit safely alongside overhaul of Mark1’s with heavy metal work/welding etc?

 

God forbid you ever get a Maunsell or Bulleid with a wooden body frame covered in sheet steel

(For the avoidance of doubt - other workshops seem to be able to restore and maintain wooden and steel carriages in the same workshop, without apparent constraints).

Tom

 

The ‘too difficult’ pile just grows. How do Kidderminster do it? Doesn’t seem to be beyond the wit of man…

 

Snap

 

Also worth bearing in mind the amount of wood on Mk1s still anyway! It's not unusual at Winchcombe to see welding going on at one end of the coach while the carpenters have already finished their bit at the other end and are advancing along the coach.

 

In a word. Yes. There can be just as much welding in a Gresley as there can be in a mk1 overhaul. Yes, they require more specialist carpentry skills but we have no issue at the SVR going from a Mk1 overhaul to overhauling a Gresley or, as we currently are finishing a GWR carriage which has a new steel skin on a new wooden frame.

 

We at Kidderminster do it through sheer bl**dy stubborness. Largest standard gauge running fleet, currently at 59 carriages, we have at least 15 red carded carriages in the carriage shed. 26 mk1s, 9 gresleys, 11 LMS and 24 odd GWR carriages, all different constructions and all require different levels of maintainence and slightly different overhauls. Within the 11 LMS carriages, we have 4 different body construction from all timber, all steel, steel frame with timber inserts, mostly steel with a small amount of timber frame. In our bodywork dept, there are currently 3 paid staff with a small team of volunteers at both Bewdley and Kidderminster to manage and complete bodywork overhauls with another 3 in the mechanical dept and 3 in the running repair/ ops team.

 

There's a GW saloon in the NYMR's own fleet, which they seem to have been able to maintain in the same workshops as the Mk 1s.

Yes, but the SVR (not sure about other lines) seems to have a percentage of staff in its paid workforce with previous volunteer experience and the dfdi mentality - I don't think the NYMR has nowadays, and maybe that's the difference.

 

Sounds like you’re looking for excuses

 

One small point in a long post, but a Mk 1 is heritage stock, travelling in one is a heritage experience. The design is 70 years old, I'm in my 4th decade of being a rail traveller, I have never experienced one on the national network (or a Mk 2 for that matter). I think what makes a coach 'acceptable' to the majority of the travelling public is it being clean, well maintained and something obviously different to what they could experience outside of the railway.

The issue in 2025 with trying to create a North Eastern themed fleet is that there are no more North Eastern assets to acquire. Unless you start emptying museums or explain to the SVR they need to give up their teaks because they're using them in the wrong part of the country. The LNERCA have a strong collection, but not enough to sustain a full running fleet for the NYMR.

I think like most on NP, I would naturally chose pre-Mk 1 stock given the choice, but my wife would be less likely to understand paying extra for that experience. Despite that, I don't begrudge the GCR for doing what they do and not having rakes of pre-BR stock available. They show quite well I think that you can rely on Mk 1s and still create a museum feel.

The madness here to me seems to be paying to have any full rake on hand, and choosing to lay them aside because of work required to one vehicle.

 

I appreciate and agree with most of what you say, but imho it doesn't mean that we should laud Mk 1s as something they are not - which is scarce and different - similar examples can be found the length and breadth of the country. What we should be doing is "bigging up" the earlier stock as important and relatively rare survivors of an earlier era to experience and appreciate - isn't that what a heritage railway should really be about?