Swanage Railway General Discussion

Very little has been said about the price of the fare from Wareham to Swanage,but I believe had the trials ran this year the price of a return was going to be £18.This is almost double the price of a return on the bus from Wareham to Swanage.How much would be added onto a SWR ticket coming from say Poole is unknown but I don't think a lot would be knocked off.
If the line was still open now as part of the national network a day return from Swanage to Wareham would be £7.50p which is the same price as a Wareham to Bournemouth return.The mileage is the same and back in the 80s at the station I worked in after a fare rise the fares were entered into a massive fare manual.Although the Swanage line was closed we still entered the fare.
I will leave it for people to think that a future service could run at that kind of fare.

 

In my view £23 for a Wareham to Swanage DMU return trip would be a non-starter. Tricky one.

Potentially there needs to be differentiation between steam and diesel fares to bring this £23 down, after all I expect the DMU service to be cheaper to provide than steam?

 

Less difference than you might think to provide, because the traction cost is only a part of the overall cost of providing a railway. The contribution from each fare to infrastructure maintenance, S&T, general business costs etc are identical regardless of the traction. The "upper body" maintenance cost (body work, doors and locks, trimming etc) of a three car DMU is broadly comparable to 3 loco-hauled carriages. It is only really the motive power part that varies, but that is a minority of the total cost of providing rail service.

In other words, running a DMU service may be cheaper than a steam service with equivalent seats, but not necessarily massively cheaper.

Tom

 

On the assumption that if the trial had run this year the fares would have been Swanage <> Corfe Castle / Norden £16 Adult Return, Swanage <> Wareham £18 Adult Return.

The financial benefit of operating to / from Wareham is

Every NEW* adult passenger would have contributed £18 Adult Return

Every EXISTING** adult passenger would have contributed £2 Adult Return

*A new passenger is one who has decided to travel on the Swanage railway between Wareham and Swanage because they can travel to / from Wareham (ie solely because the Wareham extension is operating).

** An existing passenger is one who would have travelled to / from Corfe Castle or Norden but have decided to travel to / from Wareham because the Wareham extension is operating.

The numbers of passengers both absolute and of which type are crucial.

There is a very real danger that if wareham simply encourages passengers who would have travelled to / from CC or Norden to travel from Wareham instead that the additional revenue will not cover the additional operating costs.

 

But the main point is for daytippers/ Cyclists/ hikers coming by train from other towns to Norden, Corfe or further taking the steam train to Swanage, so the extra fare added onto the SWR fare via Wareham is more important?

 

Differentiating between Steam and Diesel is I think very challenging because SR already operates (on some days) mixed traction between Swanage and Corfe Castle / Norden and there is no fare differentiation.

I think it would add complexity and cause huge confusion not to say customer dissatisfaction.

 

Think I read on this forum, if it were not for COVID, the restart of the Wareham service for the main 2020 season would have been a DMU shuttle from Wareham to Norden and Corfe, then passengers having to change for a fully steam service Norden to Swanage (always assuming there are enough serviceable steam locos).
If still the case for 2022 then there should not be any confusion daytime during the main season, although the DMU might run some through evening services.
There is also the possible use of 31806 for occasional services from Wareham.

Hopefully SR and SWR, with the updated business case, can come to some agreement for joint fares and offers where the Wareham DMU service will be viable?.

 

"Joint" or "Through" fares keep on being bandied about. The implication being that each party will reduce their part of the fare so that the total fare from say Bournemouth or Dorchester to Swanage is lower (than adding the two stand alone fares together) and thus more attractive to the travelling public.

That would be so, but then that the part of the through fare received by SR will be less than they would have received for a stand alone Wareham <> Swanage Return or even possibly Norden <> Swanage Return.

The danger then exists that whilst passenger numbers travelling on the mainline to Wareham and onwards to Swanage is good the actual net revenue accruing is low and will not in aggregate cover its operating costs.

 

I was looking at the Severn Valley Railway multiple as part of the shareholder travel issue, and in 2021 it’s nine times (Freedom of the Line £25, ‘one adult’ Loyalty Pass £225). That multiple has risen over time as they gained experience of usage. Five does look low to me, but I don’t know how other railways compare?

Patrick


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Good job I got mine when I did!

 

Have Swanage ever considered making a DMU driving experience available ? Other heritage railways seem to do this quite successfully. Given the stock needs to run to keep it in good shape, seems a good way to bring people in, raise awareness and interest and bring in a little more review. Leverage the asset, as it were.

 

I may be misunderstanding your point totally but you seem to be implying that SWR (which actually means all TOC's) offer a through fare. My contract law knowledge is limited to the training I had at work but that to me implies that the SR would need to fall under the requirements of the NRCoT with all that entails. It would also may it likely that they would also become part (by default?) of the DR scheme. So hypothetically an SR delay could mean the railway having to "cough up" more in DR for say a ticket from Waterloo than the portion they get from the fare. Somehow I would not see SWR or any other TOC indemnify them against such claims and taking the hit themselves.
There is of course no compaible heritage to look at regarding fares, but the last time I looked (before Covid) the NYMR fare from Whitby to Grosmont (very often a diesel operation it seems) was considerably more than the Northern fare for the same journey. So just because the mileage is the same as Dorcvh Sth not sure you can assume the same fare from Wareham.
Plus of course there needs to be a through fare the other way as well or Dorset Council tax payers are supporting a railway just for visitors to "get a deal". That leads to issues if you do not buy a ticket before travel in an instance where there was no TTI or booking office open at Swanage Station. A look at the fares pages of Rail UK would show that many TOC's and their agents such as TIL pay scant regard to the requirements of the NRCoT and prefer the route of a threat of legal action or a potential criminal record.
I have no idea what the SR are planning to charge or what the fare should be but through fares to me seem a potential minefield.

 

Thinking back and it may have been when SWR ran it's own trains to Corfe on Saturdays when they had through fare offers.

 

Yes it was was the T&C's and any DR issues were totally down to them.

 

Swanage Railway will have to have DR (Delay Repay) CHP (Complaints Handling Policy) ATP (Assisted Travel Policy) for passengers travelling to / from Wareham.

Theoretically the policies only apply to those passengers travelling to / from Wareham but SR may need to consider the implications of having effectively two policies (one applying to mainline passengers and one to non mainline passengers) when there could be passengers from both groups on the same train.

There also has to be an independent body to which Wareham passengers can complain if they are dissatisfied with the response from SR to the original complaint. A fee is automatically levied on the TOC if a complaint is received by the independent body.

The danger to SR is that if they have "a very challenging day operationally" then the costs they could be very considerable indeed.

Customer facing staff will need to be well trained to try and minimise any financial consequences of disruption.,

 

Although good practice for any heritage railway, especially running events like lights and dining trains where ticket prices are high, along with passengers high expectations.

 

Most if not all HRs will have policies relating to Complaints Handling, Delays and Assisting Passengers though these will tend to be more guidelines with responses according to the circumstances. The policies which have to be implemented for the granting of an Op Licence are much more thorough and have to be published including details of how to complain etc on timetable leaflets and timetable posters. There are also strict timescales for responses etc. These timescales may prove challenging if the report of a volunteer member of staff is required given that some may volunteer infrequently. Staff will need to be alert to any circumstances which may give rise to a complaint and ensure they take contemporaneous notes etc etc.
These are big boys rules and whilst there may be some allowances for a heritage railway such as Swanage the basic requirements hold true.
This may seem harsh but heritage railways should be under no illusions as to the views of the regulatory bodies in respect of compliance.

 

When you have a connection to the mainline railway, timekeeping suddenly comes into sharp focus. You have to be sensitive to the fact that you may well be carrying passengers on your heritage service who have tickets on the mainline dependent on taking a specific service, so being late for a connection can be really significant in reputation terms.

That is the case when you just have a platform-to-platform interchange: I can only imagine how much more important it becomes when you are actually physically traversing the national network, even if for only a mile or so. And meanwhile, the other end of your operation is a long straggly single line with limited passing places ...

Tom

 

Not only do lambs come early in Dorset (being born in Autumn rather than Spring) but so does Christmas.
The station tonight whilst en route to a quiz night in aid of the local National Coastwatch Station.

 

Too right. Delay minutes rack up at an astonishing rate. No idea about the current rate, but I heard £20/minute when I was working. Those minutes, by the way, are not how late you are running, but how many delay minutes are caused to everyone else on the Network (which can be extensive).
Cautionary tale 1: A Freightliner had a wagon problem which caused it to stand in the triangle at Reading for some hours. My car train from Cowley eventually ran via Guildford, amongst the consequential delays were 2 minutes to a GWR train at Shalford - FLIM copped the lot.
Cautionary tale 2: A train of rock salt was sent by DB to Rugby from Southampton West Docks in unfit wagons (another story). Result of the salt b*gg**ing up the signalling was 36 hours of Temporary Block Working for all Up Passenger trains, all freight diverted away from the Up Main line, and a Delay Penalty capped at £1 million.
Extreme intestinal fortitude is called for down Swanage way, I feel.
Pat