Lynton and Barnstaple - Operations and Development

If it's affecting you then giving yourself space is a wise idea. I would pm you but can't. By all means do so to me.

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Sorry to hear @gwralatea - but as @35B and others note, at least EA/YVT are doing sensible things and are straight with their shareholders, neighbours and friends - who knew that could work?

 

My understanding of the OSHI purchase was they would not sell the trackbed without the pub. I got that bit of news direct from Mr Cowling some time ago.

 

I believe that to be the case, I am not sure, but I think one of them belongs to the ex OSHI owners daughter.

 

We have all been here before. I do hate it when other's feel so frustrated that they need to give it all up just because of all of this, but the L&BR has had its ups and downs and to be honest to have carried on untill now so why stop now the project will get better that I am sure about, just how that will happen I don't know right now anything could happen, we could get a lottery winner become very interested in this project which could then change how we operate.

All I know is that we need to have a fresh start with a new management team that can turn this project around, which may mean that some of those members currently working for or at Woody Bay may just decide to walk away from the project itself if they can't get on with the new management team.

If you want, look at it like this just how many years have you been a member? and I bet there has been some grim times in all that time, but Rome was not built in a day and the same will apply to the L&BR as well.

 

So then it becomes a CP issue as and when: what it isn't is a rationale for paying an unsustainably high price - you've got to know the limit and walk away. If you lead with a blank cheque, expect the price to be very high indeed.

 

Blackmoor gate station was a significant stop on the l&b. As we all know, built in the unique (?) Swiss style. If we are trying to recreate the L&B, then having a railway which somehow creeps round the back of BG to some new build station in a totally different style, just doesn't cut the mustard. For me, the only solution is to restore the station back to what it was prior to 1935 and have trains running through the old platform. So I am glad that we have bought the entire site. That gives us the chance to demolish the modern OSHI extension and put the station back as it was. Maybe that is the plan.
I also recoil when I read about battery trains, extensions to the zoo, Paracombe diversions or whatever, playing fast and loose with the original layouts. We are either rebuilding the railway as it was or we might as well not bother. Of course, I do realise that we can't expect the reservoir to be drained, but that is a much bigger kettle of fish than an extension on BG. We must stick to the principle that we are rebuilding the railway, not just building a new line between Barnstaple and Lynton that just happens to fit where it touches. It won't be easy or cheap, but neither are diversions.
Ian C

 

Not according to all that the membership have been told previously, particularly as the changes to the alignments and levels in recent years make the new platforms and loop location more practical. But I would agree that at least trying in the long term to make the old station building look as much like it used to be would be nice

 

Practical, but not desirable.
Given that the old platforms haven't changed their elevation or alignment, nor has the track coming from the north or indeed to the south, what had changed then? Has perhaps the road elevation changed?
Ian C

 

I had gained the impression that changes to the road junction layout, levels, road widening had made following the original railway alignment impossible. I had also gained the impression that the proposed new station was to be very much in the style of the original. I may be completely wrong.
I do think it would be ideal to have the original station returned to its original purpose, but I would simply wait until the existing owners sought to sell, or the business was otherwise in a less strong state, rather than trying to persuade someone to part with something they didn't want to sell. However, whilst the purchase may indeed offer 'the chance to demolish the modern OSHI extension and put the station back as it was', that can only be achieved when debts are paid, mortgages settled etc. Unless @lynbarn 's hoped for lottery winner comes true, that could only happen by either the trust deciding to throw away the very large sum paid for the premises, or the business itself operating profitably for the next 20 years to redeem its capital investment. Again, I am no bank manager, but a business that can repay £100,000pa+interest over its operating costs is not one that a sane businessman would close down. Golden eggs and all that.

 

You'll also have to knock down the house which intrudes on the old alignment.

 

Perhaps the attached screenshots may assist (from the excellent NLS georeferenced maps website). The aerial photo is modern & the map historic, and a combination is included. One can clearly see that the pub occupies the former trackbed & that the old station building is buried within more modern extensions. Additionally, as Tobbes says the 6 bed house also lies partly on the old trackbed.Given that LBBC has bought OSHI on the basis of it being an ongoing operation, & the Trust has purchased a separate strip for a new trackbed it would seem very unlikely that the station will be resurrected in its original situation.

Perhaps if those in control deigned to share their thoughts so much 'rumour' & speculation might be avoided.....

Yours sincerely

A Mushroom

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It may just be me, but did anyone else spot the reference to the reservoir being a "kettle of fish" and start thinking about a cooked breakfast?...

Steve B

 

Links to these georeferenced maps for all the key L&B locations are available on the L&B archived website, https://www.lynton-rail.org.uk/page/route-mapped well worth a look (well, I think so, anyway!)

 

I am with @ikcdab that the line needs to be rebuilt. The purity of that objective should be preserved as far as possible and deviation from it needs to be fully and openly justified. For me there is a practical consideration not just aesthetic. Building something that is “somewhat close” to the original line, is very different to “rebuilding the line as closely as possible”. The former creates a pint of contention because what is being built? A theme park or a serious historic study? The latter is clearly a serious matter and therefore rather more justifiable. A theme park in the national park is “really??” A re-creation is putting something back AND (potentially) offering new and sustainable transport options for visitors that don’t exist now.

There is no clarity of thought. No strategy that makes sense and no openness. This project is doomed unless the management changes.

 

In the case of OSHI, I would draw a distinction between articulation of the strategy and the specific approach. There is a successful pub on the site, which has taken over the original station. It is practical to reinstate the railway around the pub, and thereby deliver the primary objective - reinstatement of the railway as it was - without demolition causing other issues for the local area. That is very different from a "theme park" recreation which would be justifiably resisted by many.

Other heritage railways have also had to work around the constraints imposed by disposal of land and buildings; I don't see the L&B doing anything different at Blackmoor Gate.

 

I take your point, but it is 2023 - not 1935, or even 1898. The world is a very different place, and things can never be as they were. The most iconic original artefacts - the carriages - are not now as they were built. To meet modern regulations, they have had to be fitted with communication cords - never included in the original. Smoking is no longer allowed - even in the smoking compartments, and the acetylene lighting has long gone. Some compromises must be made, and whilst they must be kept to a minimum, and included as sympathetically as possible, they are inevitable. We cannot afford to make "the perfect the enemy of the good", That way, we will definitely end up with nothing.

 

The Ffestiniog has a major deviation from what was its route before closure, and that in turn was different from the original route. I haven't heard any complaints about that. A minor deviation at Blackmore Gate appears to be unavoidable because of changes to the roads. The investment in the Inn may or may turn out to be a good one, but demolishing it to restore the original station would certainly be a lot worse.

 

Attached is the landscaping plan for Blackmoor from the Planning Permission on the NDDC portal. The new station will be to the West of the original.

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Several have made very good points about the difficulty of putting the railway back exactly as it was, and that we should not let perfect be the enemy of good.

I agree with these points. My point is though that putting the railway back as was is a clarity of purpose that has practical and external attractions.

If it were me I would have a policy that stated that the objective was to put the line back as it was….so far as as is possible. Everywhere that it is not possible being carefully explained and planned to be as sympathetic as possible to the original. The guiding thought being “how would the original builders have overcome this and what would the solution likely have looked like”. This would be openly shared.

Now, it may be that the trust has a similar objective, but I think the way they go about things skips the open part for sure, and as a result, how can we know that the quality of thinking behind any decision is sound? For an organisation reliant on a massive amount of donations, this is unlikely to create the trust and belief needed for success.

In the case of OSHI, I think the concerning thing is that the trust has spent an unbelievable amount of money acquiring an asset of dubious business value in order not to use the asset itself for the original purpose, but to have it and establish a subsidiary.The reasoning is not on the surface obviously sound as I can think at least three other potential strategies (I don’t of course know if those were considered and rejected for reasons not available to me).

I worry very much, that the pursuit of this particular asset has been and will continue to be a distraction from the main purpose. I also worry that it is not the only distraction and that the trust is simply not able to focus on what really matters.