GWSR Broadway Developments

Because Bean Counter only one individual is responsible for both the signed letter in the Share offer making the specific promise of an authentic station AND is responsible as the sole Director in charge of the project for delivering that promise.

Anyway that failure to honour the Prospectus was headed off at the pass and is ancient history. Let it be.

However it is the true history of this project which could have so easily have turned out as the bastard child of CRC and Hall Green stations.

So whilst I honour and revere every member of the BAG Team for this amazing station which will be a source of joy to thousands and a major asset to Broadway, I do not honour those people who would have happily turned out something hideous on the grounds of expediency.

 

Deleted - overtaken by events

 

GWSR's Facebook page is now showing tickets are available for the opening weekend:

Return to Broadway, 30 March to 2 April 2018

On-line ticket sales have opened for the opening weekend, Easter 2018. The tickets available are for each DAY - you can pick your day but not your train.
The timetable for each day will be published later this year.
Tickets can be purchased here: http://ow.ly/B8fe30g9KyF
There is no parking at Broadway Station so visitors will need to make alternative arrangements, it is anticipated that shuttle bus will run between Broadway village the Station.
Further details about the weekend will be published as and when they are available

 

Latest update:
http://broadwayextensionblog.blogspot.co.uk/2017/10/movin-stuff-about-today.html
The final 2 pictures are gorgeous!

 

Thank you

 

It is coming along very well and great progress!

Any ideas what loco will haul the first passenger train back into Broadway next year?

Cheers,
Julian

 

Grange new build no 6880 as 6848 "Toddington Grange" (WIBN).

 

I'd be very surprised if it wasn't one of 2807 or 7903. Nothing else really has the right to. Which one it'll be though I suspect may be a source of competition between the 2 groups!

 

Like offering negative hire fees for the day?

 

Look at my avatar for your possible answer.

 

I don't need to look at your avatar to know which way you lean!

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Track laying entered the platforms today, under a magnificent evening sun.



Almost all of the loop road was laid out with Jarrah sleepers, while the rail laying team (seen middle distance) were three panels behind.

In other news, our chairman has decided to step down, relinquishing also his role as project director. The exact knock on effects of this on Broadway still remain to be seen, although another director has taken on the role of supervising the fit out.

Pressure on the heritage interior continues. The cafe, on the original drawings and even labelled on the Heras fencing throughout the build, has been scrapped. Instead there will be a souvenir shop with a coffee machine. Gone is the atmosphere inside the room, with shelving due to go on the walls and the fireplace redundant. The kitchen will be a store room now. The intended store room, in the centre of the building, will now be a small waiting room. In it is the chimney breast for the dummy chimney, never completed as a full chimney as the space was only intended as a store room in the first place.

The best I have been able to ascertain as a reason is that there are concerns about staffing the cafe.

 

It sounds like there are still battles to be won

 

Hardly surprising - we struggle for catering volunteers as it is. I wonder if another franchise was looked at though, as I would have thought it would be a good site for a café.

Whilst it is a shame, I don't really see the heritage argument; Broadway never had a cafe anyway? I totally get wanting to get the interior right in the waiting room with nice working fireplace etc. but seems a bit irrelevant in the other room whether it's a cafe or a shop - surely one's no more inauthentic than the other?

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The waiting room now so designated is the former store room, a small poky thing in which all you can see is the solid chimney breast of the dummy chimney above.
The original station had neither cafe nor shop of course. As currently proposed, the only heritage room at all would be the booking hall, and even that is under attack.
The cafe as recommended in the interior design criteria would have looked alot like this one (at Pickering station)


Note the fireplace, wainscotting, victorian lighting. Its a nice place to be.

The shop (AFAIK) will be bare, with shelving along the walls. The only working fireplace in the whole building (there were once 5 in the shorter original building) will now be at the back of the shop and become completely redundant. Indeed, the original fireplace in the shop at Toddington was ripped out a few years back.

This is what the shop at Toddington looks like:



Is this Broadway's fate? Is this a good idea? Is this what the public prefers?

 

Thanks for that, I think I understand. It seems particularly mad that the effort has gone into reconstructing a working fireplace for a nice authentic waiting room only for it to be unused and probably have a shelf put over it in the shop.

It would seem relatively easy to at least convince the board to slow down and collect views, given that there's no operational deadline for this. I wish we didn't have to go through this every time something like this happens - has it got anything to do with change of management, or is it partly based on views of the catering department, and management have simply filled in the subsequent void?

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Its not really about authenticity. Breva's pictures of the interiors speak volumes- a refreshment room/ cafe, call it what you will is a convivial meeting point for people. Rather like the Bessemer Arms Sheffield Park it can be a focal point of the station. Decorated and equipped in the right manner, it can create a "Brief Encounter" kind of atmosphere which is obviously very appealing to the visitor.
Compare that to the average souvenir or bookshop which even with the best layout can be a rather soulless place scattered with individuals looking at railway books, and possessed of a rather introverted atmosphere. I believe this decision will deprive the station of its soul and is yet another disastrous piece of attempted project sabotage if that's not putting it too strongly.
FFS, talk about fighting them all the way....

 

Quite simply, Its a bloody appalling decision, Breva.

 

The public probably prefers both. If the public demand is strong enough for a cafeteria facility at Broadway then a cafeteria will happen. I agree that some sort of catering franchise would probably be a good way of ensuring sufficient staffing. The National Railway Museum seems to have recently turned a significant area of the Great Hall into a dining area with fewer railway exhibits (IMHO) so there must be money in it. I don't think we have much to worry about here; public demand for a café will make sure it happens and sufficient lobbying from the GWSR supporters and shareholders should convince the decision makers to think again in this case. If not, then there's always the next AGM to use one's vote. No doubt Breva may well run as a prospective director! (Some seriousness in this statement).