SVR General Discussion

More than one though. To provide a meaningful service, even just peak hours Monday - Friday, each box will require two staff per day due to the length of day. In which case are they employed part-time just as signallers or full-time, and do they do other duties when not in the box? Then you've got to cover annual leave and sickness. Who will do that? Someone else employed as another signaller? Or another employee? And if they're covering, that will probably mean they can't do their main job while standing in as signaller.

It works for Network Rail because they're a massive company and will have flexibility in their staffing levels to cover sickness, leave and vacancies, or on-call managers to step up. SVR don't have that luxury. Even part-time, a minimum of 3 staff would be required, two per day plus a spare.

The economics don't stack up. For a start, how many passengers will want to travel from Bewdley? There's isn't a significant amount of parking at the station so it'll have to be people who live in the town, and they'll already be driving to Kidderminster to get the train anyway.

West Mids units that reverse at Kidderminster are booked to do the manoeuvre in 20 minutes. You'd need to allow at least 30 minutes to run to Bewdley and back so that'll need the timetable rewriting, and possibly other units to fill in the gaps.

There's a reason no preserved railway has daily through National Rail services - it doesn't add up. The lines were originally closed for a reason! The staffing costs alone will kill it, let alone all the other complications. Just because the track is there doesn't mean it has to be used.

 

Add in the security risk... are you going to leave stations unstaffed and risk vandalism/theft etc?
You'd need to allow for security, even if you didn't have a booking clerk.

Also, how much revenue do you get? Yes, you might get an eccentric millionaire buying a first class ticket to Edinburgh, but most of that will go on to Avanti etc.

As people noted, the likelihood is that anyone going to Kidderminster will drive, so your likely sales will be for Brum/other work and shopping destinations in the west mids, at which you'll get a revenue share.
Nat min wage is £12.71/hr assume cost to employ is about the same, means 1 staff hour costs £25.42. If you run 8-8 and have one signaller at each end and one security guard at each end, IF you can get those hours with no overlap (and assuming you can get a signaller for min wage, which I doubt) your fixed staff costs are £101.68/hr, or £1220.16/day.

Kiddy-Brum is circa £9 one-way. So lets assume you can charge £12 Bewdley to Brum. Of that £3, you keep approx £1.50. (a guess, but assuming the train company provide trains/fuel/train staff, they will have thier costs to pay). Which means 813 journeys in the day just to pay base staff costs.

Population of Bewdley is about 9000. So that means about 1 in 10 people in Bewdley catching the train every day just to pay absolute base staff costs.

 

There is a lot of negativity on the SLUG issues about why it cannot/should not happen. Come on, see some positivity and be less half glass empty.

 

The announcement suggests "a trial of through services". That does not imply commuter services seven days a week. It could be as little as one return trip on some days when the signal boxes are open for heritage services.

 

What is the positivity? How the potential benefits outweigh the negatives

 

Not negativity, just people being realistic why it can't and won't work. What would be the point in running through to Bewdley? To take people to Bewdley? They can get the SVR services that run there, or take the bus. To take people from Bewdley to Birmingham, etc? You'll need more than a couple of services in the middle of the day to make it worthwhile.

Keep the SVR separate. Swanage has shown trying to run a heritage railway and fitting National Rail services into the mix doesn't work. There have to be compromises in the timetabling for a start. A return ticket from Kiddy to Bewdley is £8.50. Parking at Kiddy is a fiver. Which would you choose if you're going to be heading north from Birmingham? Or do WMT undercut the SVR's prices?

 

Another thought that occurs to me is what it does to SVR pricing.

You could lose revenue by people either not travelling at all on SVR services, or doing one-way on the [national rail].

Then you'll get the "I can travel the line for £x, why should I pay this much extra"
And people trying to use railcards for cheap travel

And how do you keep the different fare-payers apart? Do you have a seperate station for them?
If someone finds a wheeze these days, it will get round the internet and what is smile and "don't do it again" becomes a major headache.

 

Anyway
4930, 13268 and 7714 in use tomorrow due to swapping locos. Diesel wise, tomorrow is D9551 and D821 KR-BH, D821 BH-KR (pre-gala test run) + the DMU (108).
Sunday is 7714, 55009 and the DMU

At the Diesel gala, the 101 DMU should be in use. DMCL 50170 has had new seats and lights fitted as part of recent work (partly funded by the SVRCT).

The Kidderminster platform extension was officially opened on Thursday. This weekend will see it properly used as there are some 8 coach sets in use.

 

I would doubt there's many people in Bewdley who are catching the train at £8.50 return. Do the SVR offer local resident discount?

 

There's far more at Bewdley than the SVR, not everyone uses a car, the SVR only runs a limited number of days a year, the ticketing would depend on the train used, etc. etc...

 

Even if the line is not running heritage services on a particular day, it doesn't automatically mean the line is available - railways use days (and weeks) with no trains to have planned infrastructure maintenance. That all gets more fraught if you are committed to run for someone else with some kind of service level agreement.

Tom

 

This depends on the timetable; if the service allows for a split shift then employee could be used by the railway on other tasks - possibly administrative. It could be that some administrative staff at Kidderminster could be trained to undertake signalling duties when trains are operated rather than have staff permanently placed in the box during the day.

 

WIBN whatiffery of the worst sort. At times like this I really miss our late Hayling Island member.
Pat

 

The post from SLUG has several load bearing 'could's.

 

I just can’t take any organisation called “slug” seriously.

 

They were called SNAIL until they came out of their shell...

 

Ah yes. Looking forward to the TOC claiming delay repay from the Severn Valley, due to the rostered signaller being busy on the phone to Coach Company X about a large booking of afternoon teas for the following weekend, diatery requirements and all....

If the idea of running regular mainline services was to be taken seriously, then so does the fact that such running would need to be run with dedicated staffing levels and upgrades to infrastructure (quite possibly including the installation of GSMR masts and receivers in the relevant signal boxes?), and thus the serious amount of operating costs that come with it.

 

Maybe some of the possible realities need to be thought about. We often talk about such schemes as some TOC (GBR I suppose) running over a heritage line.
With all the issues we have with he likes of the DfT, ORR, NR, TOC's and the unions how likely is it that such a scheme would happen?
I do not see "third party" signalling being acceptable on a daily basis. If the line was taken on I would expect NR to want to integrate the signalling into whatever the signal centre is for that area, plus increase the speed limit.
This would be a "new station" wherever it ran to, so I guess would need to meet all the new disability requirements. I am sure a modern bridge with a couple of lifts in vast towers fits with the Bewdley Heritage feel. If it is an OAO operation needs lots of cameras and or mirrors, plus maybe platform staff for such things as ramps. And a @jonathonag said above do you see the government entrusting the delays to a third party. What happens when there is a PHBT somewhere, doe the SVR need to carry people for free?
The SVR has a connection with the network albeit with a walk between to two Kidderminster stations, and reasonable service and economics must mean it runs most of the day means that thing like the galas will no longer happen in the current form.
Possibility that any SVR loco may need the same sort of mainline certification that the NYMR locos do to go to Whitby.
I do not know if the SVR own the track bed and the stations, if they do then they could kill it dead, other than with a compulsory purchase. If not then it may be more difficult.
All this of course assumes there would be any meaningful ROI on this proposal.
The Wareham trial showed a parallel bus route with free travel via an ENCTS pass is of no interest to the old.
If it was proposed to make this a commuter service where do you put the parking a Bewdley?

These are just my initial thoughts and are not SVR specific.

 

The SVR owns its station site at Kidderminster and the track to Bewdley. If a TOC wants to run over the line it will be on the SVRs terms so it almost certainly won't happen on a regular basis