Embsay and Bolton Abbey Railway Updates

Yes HE2890 is on hire for the rest of the year, the P3 contract was to May but I beleive Embsay would be happy to keep it

 

I doubt the NYMR would have much work for the P3 this year either. They've got a much more limited service than historically and stretched finances. I suspect they wouldn't be unhappy at losing this one off the hire bill for another year. NELPG seem to have built up a good relationship with the Embsay team and the engine is well suited for the work there. I'd be surprised if they didn't get to keep it for another season.

On a side note its not a bad thing for NELPG to be more broadly based than just at the NYMR. It offers more security of work for their engines and means more people get to see their work as well (as the LNERCA have found with their carriage fleet in recent years).

The Embsay team have done well to foster those relationships.

 

You may be right, but I find it very sad that both the LNERCA and now, increasingly, NELPG are finding that their best interests lie away from the NYMR. It really amplifies the fact that the NYMR has lost sight of its roots as a heritage railway and is quickly becoming a rather bland tourist attraction. It's not for me any more, as I cancelled my membership, together with plans to leave legacy - and, sadly, I think that, increasingly, I'm not alone in that - but but for many of us , we joined (in my case 0ver 50 years ago) to support a heritage railway, not an out-and-out, unashamed, purely tourist attraction.

 

Slightly ironically the P3 would've been perfect for the first 3 months of the NYMR's services as it turned out. Likewise the teak set could've been used. Oh well.

 

But that's thinking like a heritage railway, and offering something better than usual. It was never going to happen!

 

NELPG News 352 reporting loco to remain at YDR until September when it will return to NYMR for Autumn events.

 

Whilst I acknowledge your support as an enthusiast, sadly enthusiast finance is insufficient to keep a heritage railway afloat; a few years ago the Mid-Hants identified that enthusiasts only provided about 10% of its income hence the need to find other sources of income. For many lines in "tourist" areas that often means turning to bus tour operators such as those attracted to Embsay & Bolton Railway among others. This is NOT a simple question of becoming "a bland tourist attraction" but a necessary means of survival. A consequence of this is that some lines have more rolling stock available than required hence able to loan it to other lines with 2 major advantages - (1) it generates additional income for the item owner and (2) it provides the attraction of a new item of rolling stock to attract custom. In that context it would be interesting to know how much extra income was generated at the SVR which recently attracted both "Judy" and "Duke of Gloucester" to a gala which has been reported as (financially) successful. Sadly for the (purist) enthusiast the income required by heritage lines is greater than the enthusiast community generates and the harsh reality of survival requires a wider and more commercial market especially where the larger sums require a greater legal and financial commitment as heritage lines are forced to become businesses with the consequent need to meet financial and legal requirements. That reality has moved on from the original heritage line experience of "playing trains" leading to many providing training and experience for volunteers to join railway companies based on their time spent on heritage lines. In yet another move away from "playing trains" many heritage lines not only provide a supply of trained railwaymen but also earn income from providing facilities for training staff and testing rolling stock.

 

I have to disagree with your analysis. Whilst agreeing that heritage railways need to diversify their offering, it is all too easy for lines like the NYMY to shy away from offering anything but a standardised offering of BR Mk1s and BR/LMS standard locos. Any thought of using earlier, more attractive vehicles, in more premium ways, seems to have gone out of the window, and with the loss of several vehicles from the line - e.g. NER 945, GNR 3087 and probably, in due course, ECJS 189 and Thompson 88339, and possibly the P3 and K1, to mention just a few, the opportunity to offer - and market - an attractive degree of variety is rapidly disappearing. The NYMR was an early entrant in the field of offering training to mainline companies, e.g. with limited adhesion courses, but they have now gone and the opportunity for providing PWay courses has never really been pursued. Big special events, likewise have been largely dropped, and those that have gone ahead have (e.g. the Flying Scotsman visit) have been badly thought through and organised. The upcoming return to Thomas the Tank engine seems to have sacrificed the ability to run the popular through trains to Whitby in favour of the event, which at the time of writing was not booking very well. In other words, at best it is substituting one fore of routine income with a source of more hardly earned speculative, but likely to be similar, substitute. In other words, the NYMR has become dull and predictably less competent and business development ideas and opportunities have become a thing of the past - and I'm afraid that is down to an incompetent management team with an incompetent CEO, who seems devoid of ideas and initiative. The NYMR is, fundamentally a heritage railway and needs to revert to that and exploit that status wholeheartedly, rather than shying away from it.

 

The problem with that argument is that it neglects what has happened at Embsay. Step back from the traction and rolling stock, which I agree is heritage friendly, and you have the realisation of the experience led, booked party model, that you and I are so uncomfortable with.

The reality at Embsay is that services are organised around the coach business that provides most of their income*, and is almost wholly experience based. Based on reports, and my one brief visit, it’s been done well - but is not in any way a heritage railway model you or I would recognise from the past.

It’s working, but I remain unconvinced about the long run sustainability of it - but I also see competent management trying to deliver effectively.

This is not an NYMR thread so I do not comment on what is happening 50 miles east of Mebsay

* - according to some reports, even to the extent of determining capacity at galas.

 

I agree to a point. Whilst the current model doesn't appeal to most on this forum I suspect, it has been used to refill the coffers and provide significant investment in recent years. That better finance and regular work has also enabled them to build relationships with groups like NELPG and LNERCA (and not forgetting 'Stately Trains') who have helped them build a stock list that a lot of railways could only dream of. Yes they still use a lot of MK1's but there is a variety of other stock available and with other engines now making an appearance there has to be more draw there for the enthusiast market. While its undoubtably coach trips and the Polar Express bringing in the current money, I believe they are doing a very good job at building a stock list and enhancing the railway so if and when they choose to, they could run more heritage events or alter the model to bring a more diverse crowd in. It rarely pays long term to be 'all in' for one particular market. I think there is at least a foundation there that they can adapt as they need/want to. I suppose the key is that when those Steam Gala's and other events are run, that we are attending to convince them the market is there and can pay.

 

I largely agree. The one point on which I disagree is that, if the accounts of galas are accurate, the provision for enthusiasts has been poor and the coach traffic has continued to be dominant.

 

I’ve just had a quick look on their website and find some of the headline fares being quoted are quite misleading. For instance this coming weekend there is a Bluey event and train fares are advertised as ‘from £2.12’. That sounds like a real bargain but when I look further the only fare I can find at that price is a dog ticket. The Father’s Day breakfast isn’t much better with ‘fares from £21.20’ but that is a children’s fare; Dad (& Mum) have to pay a good bit more.
Financially the railway is doing very well; I’ve heard annual turnover is c£5m and that’s with only a few staff, unlike another Yorkshire line, but the volunteers I’m in touch with are less than enthused by the way the line currently is. One recently said that he goes and does a few turns as he doesn’t want to loose his competence but won’t do anything else.

 

That's been my experiece too. For many years I attended the steam galas, even when the line was much shorter than these days. I'm not criticising the line for encouraging coach tours on a regular basis and they need the revenue, but they do seem to have lost sight of what the average enthusiast visitor, or even the more numerous family visitor will have come for.

Groups should receive every facility of course, but there does seem to be a tendency towards disregarding what might be called traditional custom.

It seems foolish to both types of visitor to overwhelm a gala day by combining it with multiple coach tour patrons. On a couple of visits recently on non-gala days it has been clear that casual visitors are, at best, an afterthought. A return to services for all customers is essential to maximise returns and, with apologies for a NYMR digression it a lesson that railway is now learning the hard way.

 

That part is a fair point where I suspect somebody looking at the money has got used to making sure the event pays before it goes ahead, and therefore taking big bookings before the day and losing access to particular coaches for everybody else. I suspect there is also the need to commit to dates for the coach companies long before consideration for anything else has taken place. But I think that the 'Gala's' currently are just steps in testing a market/event probably at the requests of volunteers. If there was evidence that capacity was stretched or exceeded at any point it would force a re-evaluation. I think (though stand to be corrected) that last year was the first for quite a while.

All said, I know its been mentioned before but I do find the website a challenge. A lot of the events listed in the press release don't get a mention on the website at all and even when you find the 'steam gala' page it has no mention of dates or availability of tickets. If I can buy tickets to Fawlty Towers in October why can't I get any for the Gala in June?

 

Heritage railways, as I keep trying to convince people - unsuccessfully, apparently - are not, fundamentally, businesses. Yes, they have business-like aspects - in that income has to exceed expenses, they have employees and assets, etc - but they are no more basically businesses, than churches are (which also have business-like aspects - they also have to have their income exceed expenses, etc - as I learned as a child, when my father took charge of bailing out the finances of our church).

Most any heritage railway that thinks it's just a business has lost its 'soul' - and will eventually lose its Earthly manifestation too.

Noel

 

In addition to what I have previously written, I think there are some glaring mistakes in @FredKerr's last post. Whilst it is true that the NYMR, like most heritage railways benefits mostly from non-enthusiasts filling the fare box, it still runs at a loss on fare income, and what helps to keep it afloat is enthusiast income from gala weekends and the like. Even so the paid management have phased out several such events and replaced them with events aimed at young children - who, whilst being prospective volunteer recruits, are not currently in possession of lots of free cash!

The reality is that the NYMR, like most heritage railways, is heavily supported by volunteers and supports, by way of cash donations and free labour, and even more so by way of donations. For example, I believe that 80135's boiler overhaul/rebuild is being paid for largely by a legacy - contrast this with the rate f donations being received for the 75029 appeal. The sooner that Trust and Plc boards and paid management realise this and start to act in a way that encourages the railway's supporters rather than @Lineisclear's (remember him?) approach of regarding them as a hungry cash sink hole, the sooner the railway will start to show signs of revival. Ask NELPG, who have managed over the years to keep four (or more!) locomotives running with a workforce consisting mainly of volunteers and contrast its performance with that of the NYMR.

 

Surely you are comparing apples and oranges here. NELPG own 4 (or more) locomotives actively hiring them out to heritage lines - any heritage line including Embsay which currently has 2392 on hire - hence it has many opportunities to earn income. NYMR on the other hand is fixed in location and cannot do anything else other than operate train services to a timetable; even gala events still need to operate to a timetable. Whilst the structure of events varies between dining services, charter operations (including photo charters), murder mysteries, Halloween and Polar events it is for the management to select the options which the local market will support. IMHO the railway should be looking to organise events with local bus tours to provide bus transport to Pickering, train trip to Whitby with a short period in town then train return to Pickering and bus journey home; perhaps provide the option of detraining at Goathland to tour the village, or at Levisham for a walk around the valley or a rover ticket to simply sample the railway. I do not know enough about the local opportunities available to management to market the railway but if NYMR members are concerned then it is up to them to take the necessary action to correct the errors that appear to be happening. Perhaps looking at the recent history of the Llangollen Railway might provide some answers to both sides of the perceived problem.

 

I suggest reading the NYMR thread carefully - it will give an idea of the context for some of the posts here.

 

What constitutes a heritage railway? I'd argue it is its general ambiance, comprised of buildings, locomotives and rolling stock, signalling, scenery etc., and the manner in which passengers arrive there, whether by car or coach (other means of transport are available!) or even the type of service it provides is secondary to those. I do not, therefore, decry the efforts of the E&BSR to build their business by creating reasons and opportunities to travel. I do, however decry the efforts of an incompetent management team at another, unmentionable, railway not to far away to try anything remotely different from what has been going on since the early 80s. Adapt to survive! ought to be the war cry - but isn't!

 

I largely agree, but think that the type of service is an important part of the wider whole.