North Yorkshire Moors Railway General Discussion

Apparently a collection of people who are unacquainted with the First Law of Holes ("When in one, stop digging!")

Noel

 

there is Michelin food for £75/lunch within 30 minutes of the NYMR. I struggle to believe many of those patrons wouldn’t go for £110 / £120 with the train ride.

 

Look at the Wensleydale Railway... there seems to be a 'tea train' (of various themed flavours) a couple of times a month and their Wensleydale Fryer which runs once a month is sold out until July! Similarly Embsay seems to do very well with its breakfast, curry, sunday lunch etc.

 

Not sure what the Nymr rolling stock is but we get very good take up at a rack rate of £145 per head with an established evening product. https://kesr.org.uk/pullman-dining/

 

Wow!
Somewhere I still have my ticket from 1975 - £4.50!

Lovely toilet floor btw.

 

Hmmm ...

https://www.nymr.co.uk/spring-north-yorkshire-pullman#Pullman-Robin
https://www.nymr.co.uk/spring-north-yorkshire-pullman#Pullman-Jos
https://www.nymr.co.uk/spring-north-yorkshire-pullman#Pullman-Opal
https://www.nymr.co.uk/spring-north-yorkshire-pullman#Pullman-Garnet

It may be advertised as "Pullman", but it's basically modern carriages with white table cloths - which weren't even ironed for the photos!

The offer looks very tired - even the angles chosen for the photos are hardly flattering. I get you might want to show as much of the interior as possible, but in effect the chosen camera angles have simply served to emphasise the utilitarian steel luggage racks. The moquette I think comes from the "Stagecoach Bus" range. It's not the image most people would have on hearing the word Pullman.

I can have an enjoyable meal for two with drinks and coffee in Zizzi for £50. So what is enticing me to pay four times that amount to dine here? Where's the glamour? Where's the romance?

Tom

 

1980s Network SouthEast moquette doesn't scream luxury to me.



To be fair, 1960s Met Cam Pullmans are never going to be as luxurious as 1920s ones, but it is possible to make them feel a bit nicer with decent fabrics.



To me, the pricing doesn't make a lot of sense. £95 seems expensive at first glance for what is a pretty basic offering, but it allows travel on other services during the day, so essentially includes a £50 day rover.

 

But given the sparse timetable, how much other travel in the day can you fit in?

For most people, the psychology is going to be "£95 for a meal". So that had better look like good value for money.

Tom

 

The NYMR appear to have all but abandoned evening diners with only one between now and the end of June. That's priced at £110/person. The Lunchtime diners are £95/person and run several time/week. The inevitable braised beef, chicken supreme or vegetable Wellington with a choice of three starters and three desserts for both lunch and evening. It's 25 years since I last sampled it so I can't really comment on quality but it's not hugely inspiring to me. I don't know what the loadings are like these days.
As has been mentioned, service coaches are no longer provided on the lunchtime diner services so revenue is missing there. I don't know why and can't think of an operational reason unless it is shortage of coaches. It was a heavy train if made up to 8 coaches (310 tons) though, and limited which locos could be used to cl6 and above which are currently in short supply. Although, having said that, I personally thought the Cl.4 tanks were ideal for the job as they didn't have 40 tons of tender to drag around.

 

https://www.nymr.co.uk/spring-north-yorkshire-pullman#Pullman-Garnet

IIRC, this one, has been restored to the original 1960s as built condition. As such, with the teaks out of action, its probably the most "historic" coach the NYMR is currently operating!

(Still no where near as good as the real pullman Car 79 though!)

 

The rover ticket does allow people to start and end their day in Pickering, which is the preferred start for many. It becomes a long ‘lunch hour, though!

 

Those images do very little to sell the experience- as mentioned the framing of the images really isn't great and the table setting looks as though minimal effort was spent in attempting to dress the scene to make it look special.

We did do the Pullman on the NYMR about 8-10 years ago and the food was very nice- we were seated in Car 79, so the ambience was lovely too. It was being operated from Pickering-Goathland and return top and tailed by 45428 and a 37 for some reason.

Chris

 

It’s £125 on the Bluebell for lunch - but you do get proper 1920s Pullmans, including a wheelchair accessible one if required. (Contrast the NYMR “due to the historic nature of our carriages we can’t accommodate wheelchairs, and we can’t store your wheelchair at our stations either”).

Tom

 

But this year they may well be starting from Pickering anyway

Tom

 

Thats interesting. Last year they added an accessible MK1 to the set. It was one of the reasons quoted by staff as why there wasn't standard seating available, four Pullmans, the accessible MK1 and the 'Jenny' van being the full set. I can't see any mention of that now so I'm guessing that the MK1 has been removed and maybe put on a regular set instead as it didn't get enough loading for Diners...?

 

The Mk1 was needed as a brake vehicle as Car no. 79 is still out of action. Passengers could buy packed lunches and use the carriage, or if you were very polite and asked the guard they'd let you travel if empty seats were available.

 

From https://www.nymr.co.uk/spring-north-yorkshire-pullman

Due to the historic nature of these carriages, we regret that they are not wheelchair accessible. Unfortunately, there is also no storage available for wheelchairs at the station. We apologise for any inconvenience this may cause and appreciate your understanding.
​

Meanwhile, in the words of Jim Bowen, “let’s look at what you could have won”. https://www.bluebell-railway.co.uk/bluebell/pics/car54.html

Tom

 

Checks calendar….. yup, it is 2026, not 1926. Just how much space do you need to store a wheelchair ♿️, don’t most fold up?

 

For a railway so keen on legal frameworks, this attitude to equal access is quite surprising.

Precisely