WSR Spring Gala 2009

No offence caused whatsover - I have no objection to seeing engines running tender first and accept that for tank engines in particular it's quite authentic. But I think most would agree that the front view makes much better photos. The A4, a beast which is clearly built for speed looks especially silly running backwards but I understand that it was too large for the turntable.

 

Of course you can't eradicate tender-first running and it is also true that there was a lot of tender-first running on the west-country branch lines particularly so on holiday Saturdays. This was for the same reason that the WHR has for not turning engines always. But, that wasn't the complaint. The complaint was that all the engines from both ends of the line were running tender-first all morning on Saturday morning. So why was there no attempt to mix them up?

I take the point about tank engines and agree I with you. But ... tender engines look better when running chimney first. Sorry to be so emphatic but that must be a true-ism. Photographers prefer to take their photos, or in my case video, with the engine running chimney first because that gives the better picture.

Now the WSR has its turntable it can mix up its departures from Minehead. Please can this be done in future?

I'm sorry if this matter has detracted in any way from the appreciation of the gala. I really did enjoy the gala and I've already booked the B&B for the next one.

All the best

 

Speaking for myeslf I would sooner they all be pointing the same way, that way at least you can get 1 good photo an hour and also you do not have to try and be in two places at once. Saturday was a typical example that was also made worse by the eweather, two hours sat in perfect sunlight everything tender first then at last we have something pointing the right way and you guessed it, dull at best or worse. I Know not much you can do about the weather, but facing is another issue. Hopefully when the Triangle is fully operational and I gather the turn table will be able to turn more, we will see less tender first. On saturday night I got to my B&B wondering why I had travelled so far and said to myself not again untill they get it fixed (traingle ect). But Sunday was another day, and by the time I left last night I was more than happy with the weekends work, and on reflection my thought were a little harsh on the saturday.

My only other thought on facing wouyld be to have them all facing one way on one week/day and the other the next depending on the length of the gala, Again the Traingle and turntable may be required, along with always having an engine spare at both ends, on of , one on, to allow turning and watering.

Well off to take penny here walk and then I will start work on weekend, over all despite the weather a greate Gala once again WSR.

 

Contributing photographers with a lineside pass, I hope. :smt001

When you're riding on the trains, it's often better to have the locos tender-first, as you get to hear much more of the noise from the "business end". I certainly enjoyed my trips up Washford bank in the first window behind a tender-first Eddystone.

I usually only go to one day of a gala, but I enjoyed myself so much this time around that I ended up going to three: both Sundays and the Friday. There were slight delays, but nothing as bad as Saturday's...guess you were just unlucky there. Everything was running perfectly to time on Friday until 3850 failed with spring problems, and the timetable was arranged well, so I found it was easy to hop on and off in time to catch the engines I wanted. The weather was stunning throughout, and there was a plentiful supply of food at all stations, particularly Williton, where many bacon baps were consumed! The catering vans seemed to be doing well, but I preferred my money to go to the railway rather than a third party, so I stuck to the train/station buffets (where the staff were always friendly, despite being under a lot of pressure at times!). There were a wide variety of stalls at many of the stations, including Blue Anchor, which was a first, I think?

It was good to see 9351 working on the King's diagram on the final Sunday as well...she is a beautiful little loco; powerful, sure-footed, and always photogenic, with a good bark. I heard someone whinging about how much he hated 9351 "because it's not real", but that's his loss. Collett nearly built the small-boilered mogul class, and it's a shame he didn't, as 9351 is a fine performer. As West Somerset Wizard said, the WSR makes history as well as recreating it.

Best WSR gala since the S&D one. =D>

 

The timetable seemed to be out of sync from 10.55 at BL, the weather near Roebuck Farm was not good when Royal Scot ran through to BL, cold and a shower. But I don't recall any other rain until after Bittern left BL and Kinlet Hall was shunted off to the bay platform. I didn't even notice the two red diesels behind Bittern. :smt013 Too busy trying to photograph the A4.

My main grouse was the return to Bristol, X Country via Westbury and Castle Cary running 40 mins late at BTM. I would have liked to have seen more smokebox on runs, but on the whole it was a good day out.

 

Returning briefly to the subject of incoming railtours during WSR galas, what do others think about this? I wonder whether the railway makes a significant amount of money out of them to offset the downside of the disruption caused if they run late?

Personally I would not choose to be a passenger on such a tour since you only get to spend about 4 hours at the gala at the most whereas to get maximum enjoyment I always arrive early and leave late, thus getting about 9 hours there. I wonder how many of the passengers are genuine enthusiasts and how many are people just looking for a day out?

I fully support the idea of incoming railtours to the WSR but not during gala weekends.

 

Sorry if I appear to be hopping on the band wagon, but then again what can you learn and improve on from 100s of Great Gala?

I was there saturday/sunday and tbh Saturday was a big dissapointment. In my mind there are 2 types of people who come to galas, those who come to experience the trains and those who come to experience the railway. Thos who came for the trains had a great choice with a Black5, Royal Scot, Bulleid, Hall etc. However those who came for the railway didnt have much to do. Why come to Minehead when all there was to see was a set of Mk3 parked in the platform and a loco being turned 360 degrees ? OK seeing the first engine turned was alright as I hadn't seen the t/t in use before, but it did loose its novelty after a while. Watching 9351 run up and down the shed yard was nice but once the Mainline came in we couldn't view the shed so the runpasts stopped and what were we left with ? An engine running round every so often. Exciting...

Also the Souvenir Guide. Now in my mind a souvenir guide is exactly that, a souvenir that is worth keeping after the event. Not the WSR I'm afraid. It was basic and didn't say too much about the Spring Gala of 2009 at the West Somerset Railway. Yes it had the diagrams and a brief history of the locos but is it something I'm going to keep to remember this gala for? Doubtful. The NYMR produced a great brochure last year for the LNER Festival and charged the same price of £2.50. I've still got my copy as it told me more of the gala, gave me a brief history of the LNER, informed me who Nigel Gresley was and gave a reason for the gala. There was a bit on the line itself too and it provided a good read. Plus it was in A4 size and so the writing was a lot bigger, and there was some very nice pictures of the locos / railway.

Not knocking the WSR efforts, just hopefully giving some constructive feedback. There was some very good things at this gala. The timetable notifications was good explaining all the difficulties you'd had. The 13.10 off Minehead on sunday with 9351 is a run that will live long in the memory, definately the best run I've travelled behind up Washford and Stogumber. Your staff too were a credit to you as always and we had an enjoyable conversation with the Guard on the above train (sorry can't remember his name).

 

I'm not involved with the timetable, being a humble fireman, but the work involved in putting this together is phenominal, er, a lot, & especially Sat's timetable is very intensive for the line as it is,so any little disruption , like a stonking great special ,dos'nt help at all.
The turntable is not used on a daily basis, but when the triangle is in who knows? To avoid time problems you could have all your loco's chimney first at the start of the day, possibly sent down coupled together at the end of the previous day, then you would have a 'pool' of chimney first loco's so those arriving from MH would have time to turn & join the 'pool'. Just my idea.
Dont forget the first weekend was good as well! I hope all who came enjoyed it, I certainly did!
A big thanks to the SEPT team for getting the loco's =D>

 

You should have seen the rough black & white ones the WSR used to have! The full-colour glossy guide is a massive improvement over those, plus is "bag sized", so isn't too unwieldy when you're trying to refer to the working timetables. A4 would be far too big. A big plus was the supplement produced to cover for the loco failures...a lot of railways just wouldn't bother.

There are plenty of books/DVDs available with the history/photographs of the WSR/GWR and if you want a lasting souvenir, then there are always new ones released after the event. The sheer number of linesiders always means there are hundreds of Fotopic/Flickr sites with new pictures, and YouTube for videos, plus of course, your own shots (I consider my photos and memories to be my souvenir...they remind me a lot more of the day than any production by someone else). The guide gives enough of an introduction to "normals", plus the essential WTTs...maybe "pocket guide" would be a better name. £2.50 is a bit much for what it is, I agree, but I'd rather have the price lowered than the guide beefed-up. A similar guide from the GWSR only cost me £1, plus it was on thicker card, although there were several pages of adverts which probably paid for it.

 

Although i didn't go, i can understand the various frustrations of photographers to be sitting there in sunshine with everything going past being tender first, and as didn't see the timetable can't really comment, but would like to think that there must of been chimney first's at some point in sunshine?!

And as for the above comment, i believe it depends on the line, for example a line like the Great Central, then yes i'd agree i'm happy with everything to be chimney first out of louborough, but yet on the West Somerset when there are climbs in both directions, and this is my opinion but I think it's good for loco's to be facing different directions as it adds a little more variety.

 

the Black Five on the first Saturday at Leigh Wood.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ch5zG9yqxtk

 

Our videos of the Gala are now up.

http://www.veoh.com/group/fireboxchaser

FC

 

I had a great gala not least firing 6695 on her last trip to BL with the Riviera set. For a first trip firing the whole line from MH it was interesting. I would like to do it again but with a bunker full of coal and not the dust that we had due to running the coal down prior to loading for SDR. Thanks also to Ben and Andy for the ride on Kinlet Hall. I enjoyed the small amount of time I had on the shovel on her and would like to spend more time firing her. Nigel was sad he did not get the opportunity. Thanks to all the crews and staff at WSR for making us feel very welcome. It with a certain amount of sadness that we leave WSR. However we hope to be back soon. =D> =D> \/ \/

Ann

PS if anyone has taken a photo of 6695 at the gala please could they let me know.

 

Had two fab days down at the WSR over the past two weekends, a very good gala indeed.

I rode on the first Saturday, another fab breakfast on the record breaking 0825 BL-MD with 45231 pounding away at the front! Only thing I would of said was 57 people pushed the QB team to their very limits. Me and the group I was with started our trip at BL and only had tea and coffee until we were running down Washford bank when our toast came. Main course was still being served as the train stopped at Minehead (luckily we had ate all of ours up). I think that the QB should only cater for so many and that you have to start at either Minehead/Bishops Lydeard to prevent the service being rushed. I'm sure some others will agree with me on that.

Apart from the breakfast incident, the weather was the best that I have ever had at the WSR and this made the day fly with haulage behind 45231, 34046, 5553 and 60019, covering 2 round trips exactly and the BL-NF shuttle once. 45231 up Crowcombe Bank! \/ Two days later (after a long shower) I still had coaldust in my hair.

At Williton I felt that things could of been shunted differently. 7821 with her cab a about a foot away from 6024's bufferbeam meant a good picture couldn't be obtained. This annoyed me and probably some others. Same with 7820's frames right in front of 4561. The van at Williton served superb pasties though and I'm glad that I ordered one.

Then yesterday (the final day) I linesided. Again blessed with great weather I got some very good shots, espically of 6100 flying along Ker Moor during late Afternoon with about 20 photographers, all standing in a line across the field so that no one was in anyone's way. Well done to the WSR for running on time (or very close), used to having 30-60min delays on galas.

Can the WTT next time please have the 'proper' one with Sets and LE movements. [-o<

Roll on the Autumn Steam Gala!

 

Considering the amount of space left at Wiliton I don't think they could do much about it.

 

Hi,

Some stats to chew on.

LOCOS FACING BL - 73
LOCOS FACING MD - 58

Total chimney first (C) - 68
Total tender first (T) - 63

6695 C - 7 T - 6
45231 C - 10 T - 8
34028 C - 10 T - 8
34046 C - 9 T - 9
6100 C - 4 T - 4
60019 C - 10 T - 11
4936 C - 7 T - 7
3850 C - 2 T - 2 FAILED FRIDAY BROKEN SPRING REPLACED BY 9351
9351 C - 5 T - 5
88 C - 7 T - 7
5553 - C - 3 T - 1

TURNINGS - some turnings were to maximise chimney first running, some were to position locos correctly for subsequent diagrams and some were just to amuse.

6695 - 2
45231 - 6
34028 - 3
34046 - 5
6100 - 0
60019 - 0
4936 - 4
3850 - 0
9351 - 3
88 - 5
5553 - 1

DOUBLE -HEADERS - Locos in brackets were the original diagrams and some double headers * were, in part, positional moves for later events in order to maximise loco usage. The (inadvertant) 60019/4936 combination may well have been a first/last in the history of Britain's railways!

4936/6695*; 34046/34028; 6695/3850*; 6695/4936; 5553/4936; 5553/88*; 5553/6695; 60019/34046*;
4936/60019*(34046); 45231/34046 (34028); 6100/45231; 34028/45231*; 45231/34046; 45231/34046.

TRIPLE-HEADERS 5553/6695/9351 (3850).

Thanks for coming and a big bow to the Sun Gods who owed us one after last year. Next year's SSG will see the triangle complete.
Keith

 

A pic of 6695 at Woolston on 29th March.

 

There was a "proper" version on A4 sheets which I saw in the hands of a couple of people. I suspect that this had been issued only to WSR staff though.

It's a little difficult to judge what level of detail should be provided. I find the comprehensive booklet that the Severn Valley do which includes loco crews and guard's duties and shunting movements very interesting but at their recent gala I heard someone complaining that he didn't like having to pay £5 for it when all he wanted was the train times and loco allocations. Just shows you can't please all the people all the time!

I think the new style programmes at the West Somerset are a definite improvement. The problem is that they obviously have to go to print a while before the event and therefore it always likely that things will change - hence the need for the supplement.

 

Thanks for all the comments on tender first runnig and phto opportunities. It's interesting that different people have different perspectives, needs and wants from a Gala. Well done to everybody who helped out and everybody who turned up. I am sure the SEPT team will be taking account of the comments made as they plan future events. You will notice from the other thread on this forum that they are already working on the 2010 gala. Well done chaps - great job. =D>

 

If I wanted a detailed history of the WSR and to learn all about its existance, what used to run on it etc then yes I would buy a book / DVD on the line. These though are aimed at those who have an interest. Refering back to the NYMR, they gave a brief introduction to the line history etc which was enough for a general visitor. If they wanted to learn more then all that was required was a visit to one of the shops were more detailed items were available.

That's all I'm suggesting, just a page maybe 2 at max giving background info to the line itself and then another couple of pages with a bit more info giving a reason for the gala. It was intended for this gala to provide memories of the Big 4. Well who outside of the enthusiast community knows what the Big 4 is / was ? Next year a Standards gala is being considered. In the Guide surely it should say what the importance is of the Standards and what role they played. Don't write a book, but give enough background information to show the reason for the event.