West Somerset Railway General Discussion

I believe the erstwhile Project Development Group was invented to find ways of bridging 'gaps' between various members of the Railway family and thereby present coherent and considered plans for future projects to be initiated, if not managed. I welcome news of the PDG's long overdue reactivation and hope it will go on to produce actual results in the future. The involvement of local authorities was thought to be a way of identifying funding to assist the enabling of various project developments.

'Project Dunster' seems to me to be a perfect example of something PDG could pick up and run with, thereby proving PDG's worth.

Barrie

 

The 'one railway' cause keeps arising but this thread suggests that as fast as one schism is cured (or band-aided) another seems to arise. Will the WSR 'family' never be at peace with each other?
During the WSRA recent troubles the objectives of the WSRA, as required by the Charity Commission, were quoted on NP. They seemed to mention a wide area covering the SW of England, with no specific mention of West Somerset. Has that been changed?

 

P.S. 'Project Dunster Goods' even has the same initials. Clearly meant to be!

 

From our Association's revised Articles, as adopted 30th September 2017:

The objects of the Association are to promote education in the heritage of the railway from Taunton to Minehead by restoring, preserving and displaying railway locomotives, carriages, wagons and other artefacts (including documents, drawings, photographs, recordings and films) of historical interest and the buildings connected therewith.

 

Sort of 'yes and no'.

They cannot simply hand over cash towards running costs without a reason. However, they could fund items which are 'running costs' (as opposed to say 'capital') with well thought out reasoning and probably suitable paperwork.

A prime example may be part or fully funding an Education Officer type. The person in question may well have a range of responsibilities of both education and indeed non-education nature but, subject to a suitable agreement between WSRA and WSRplc, the post could be funded by the WSRA if they wished. This is an example and not a suggestion!

Nearer to the Dunster proposal is the WSRA providing funding to both create (capital) and run (running costs) what is proposed, perhaps even fund a periodic (monthly maybe?) 'Goods Train Day', when a suitable loco operates a demonstration goods to Dunster and spends time shunting etc.

At its most extreme, you may be able to make a case for the WSRA subsidising the WSRplc doing something in a heritage manner that could be done more cheaply in a 'modern' manner - again, either Capital or Running costs.

Again, vision and imagination is what is needed, not the all too common heritage railway 'can't do' attitude!

Steven

 

The WSR 'family' is not at 'war' with each other.

Although I've only been involved since 1976, the WSR set-up has never worked well. The Plc runs the railway. It is a standalone commercial company which is not answerable in any way to other WSR-based organisations. Come to that, the WSRA (or WSSRT) is also not answerable to other WSR-based organisations. There is not really a family. That said, almost everyone involved over the years has worked truly hard to make it all work, together, and there have been some mighty successes. But the underlying structure does not help. Sure, the WSRA can help the Plc with projects that meet the WSRA's objectives. There's never been any doubt about that. But the railway as a whole needs much, much more than that. I know many people believe a wholesale restructuring is not required but I believe it is the only way to sort out decades of difficulties, past and future.

The objectives now undergoing amendment now mention the WSR rather than SW railways, I understand.

BTW Someone asked earlier if there was an overall WSR plan. There isn't. That's rather telling, methinks.

Steve

 

Thank you for the clarification.

 

I have just caught up. You are of course, and no doubt you knew that when you posted, absolutely correct !! There is no such thing.

I proffered to the Membership at the WSRA 2015 AGM (held September 2016) a simple combined business/strategic plan for the WSRA. It concentrated on two imperatives ie to grow the Membership and to inaugurate carefully considered and realistic fund raising initiatives. The Plan was prepared with Plc involvement and approval and more importantly emphasised the need for the two bodies to work together.

( yes there were only two pages but: in the early 1990s for my sins I was MD of a group of specialist process engineering Companies with annual t/o in excess of £100 million sterling. I was tasked, an instruction from the Chair of the large holding Company, with producing a combined business plan, two years budget and five years strategic plan, running to no more than eight pages. It required a phenomenal amout of work. I was at the time reminded of the, perhaps apocryphal, story that the great GBS once wrote "I am sorry this letter is so long, there was insufficient time to write a shorter one.")

As I stood down as a Trustee and Vice Chair at that 2015 meeting (I had always regarded and stated that my incumbency was to be a short one, ie post the ex 6 reign to help put the ship back on a sensible course) I recognise that I could be accused of dumping on my successors. However my observations since and involvement with one WSRA Committee lead me to note that the WSRA is now actively fund raising eg the establishment of the loco fund which is in aid of one Plc loco and 2 WSRA locos, extending much thought as to how and what will bring in new Members and, although apparently peripheral , indicative of serious intent has produced, with the appropriate approvals, revised articles. There is no doubt, the WSRA's raison d'etre is to support the BL-MD Railway.

Why was this combined Business/Strategic plan not integrated with the Plc plans you may well ask Tom.

At the time the Plc had a c.110 page strategic plan ( all "Mother hood and Apple Pie") and a 37 page Business Plan devoid of numbers !

The Plc has seen many changes since then including a new Business Development Director. At long last the vision of a reasoned, enthusiastic and above all pragmatic planning and implementation process across the whole Railway becomes a realistic intent. Including, with the help of interested parties, I have no doubt ultimately the production of a WSR strategic plan

Michael Rowe

 

Some railways manage it more successfully http://svrtrust.org.uk/

 

The reason there is no overall plan is that the is no umbrella body. The PDG might have a role but it seems to have lapsed or become defunct. Whatever some ill informed outsiders, not including you, may say since the removal of the toxic 6 +1 were removed relations between the WSR PlC and the WSRA, WSSRT, DEPG and the. various Friends groups has improved dramatically. It may not be perfect but that will probably never be possible. As Petronius said

“We trained hard—but it seemed that every time we were beginning to form up into teams we were reorganized. I was to learn later in life that we tend to meet any new situation by reorganizing, and what a wonderful method it can be for creating the illusion of progress while actually producing confusion, inefficiency and demoralisation”. This is still true.

 

Gerry Feinnes once said: "When you reorganise, you bleed"
And that is the perennial curse of the times; not just ours, it seems!

 

I would have thought that but clearly it hasn’t been required.

 

Yep. Except there is a de facto "umbrella" body. The Plc. Since the mid-1970s the Plc has adopted that role. The strategic plan for our railway has always been devised and implemented by the Plc.

The PDG is a great thing. Quite a few respondees, including me, to the draft Plc plan (back in 2013?) suggested a similar body and I was delighted to see the idea come to fruitition. I believe the PDG will reconvene soon. It has several roles - information-sharing, advisory, transparency and so on - but it has no executive powers, I understand. I can't see the PDG owning an overall plan that each family member would obey. So each member remains free to do things that may or may not be beneficial to other family members or indeed the 'railway'. As things stand, the PDG must remain and help glue the pieces together.

You are quite right - the relations between the family members is greatly improved (at least it looks that way from here) and that is a very good thing.

I remain convinced we need to explore the benefits of major re-organisation. To dismiss it would suggest an acceptance that there's little wrong with the present set-up. And after a lifetime of re-organisations thrust on me through my professional career, I am painfully aware that Mr Petronius (or Mr E Wise or whoever is was what wrote it) had a point. But a bad thing needs fixing, eventually.

So, I do envisage a properly-constituted "umbrella" body which can manage the overall strategy for the Minehead Branch with its commercial wing running the railway itself. There are others who support this kind of vision. Mine is not a lone voice.

Steve

 

Can I ask in your other role when the Quantock Bell will be using the Pullman coach and will it be a premium to eat in it?

 

I have some doubts, and the recent discussion about the Dunster goods yard only magnifies them. Post #8504 quoted the objectives of the WSRA adopted just six weeks ago, and they are to educate people about the heritage of the line. Robin's proposal for Dunster is perfectly aligned with those objectives, but several seem to be arguing that this proposal is just a distraction from the stuff that really matters: continuing to run a safe and sustainable steam railway.

The recent argument about the new signs is another symptom of this confusion. To some the new signs are a betrayal of what the railway exists for. Others couldn't understand what all the fuss was about; a sign is just a sign after all - do they do the job?

There seem to be two camps: those who see the PLC's job as running trains and the association's role as supporting them in this, with heritage as an optional extra when there's the time and money to waste. In the other corner, those who believe that the railway's heritage is its raison d'etre.

Until there's agreement on a single overall vision and strategy for the railway, these disagreements will keep on coming. I don't know whether it'll take an umbrella body to produce it, but the current structure doesn't seem to be able to.

 

Bill

I'm sure you appreciate that discussions on forums such as this become much more interesting and compelling to read if there are some perceived significant differences in view between all the parties referred to. It is well known that good news doesn't sell many newspapers.

The reality of daily transactions on the West Somerset Railway is rather different. Yesterday afternoon the respective Chairmen of the PLC and the WSRA met in a very amicable, and fairly routine meeting (with some others) about various matters. Today I have spoken on the phone to some PLC Heads of Department, officers of the Association and of the Steam Trust. This is what we do, day in day out. Once deliberations about topics reach a certain level of certainty we will publicize anything of interest, but we would be failing in our duty if every individual conversation were recorded here! We would also be spending most of our time penning comments. Rest assured that there are going to be interesting developments in the public domain in the next couple of months - some were alluded to in the recent PLC Stakeholders Meeting.

We also acknowledge the need for an overall strategy document, in addition to individual plans for the various organisations. It's fairly high on the list. Finally, we find it interesting to read suggestions and comments here, so keep them coming...

Frank Courtney
PLC Director (Business Development)

 

Thank you Frank, that's encouraging to hear. I'm waiting in anticipation.

 

You are giving far too much credence to the degree of differences between individuals on this forum and hypothesising that in the real everyday world of the WSR the differences are the same. Whilst there will always be differences to suggest they are as large as you do just is not so. Frank’s post illustrates that perfectly. We all have, or should have, the vision that the WSR will prosper for the future.

 

Bill spoke for me, and still does.

My view from outside during the "troubles" was that they were partly the product of the railway's organisation structure, and nothing has caused me to change my view. While I have been known to quote Gerard Fiennes on reorganisation from time to time, reorganisation is sometimes necessary.

The forces driving the plc and other associations are different, and that is reflected in the sense of priorities. The central role of the plc does seem to drive a particular view of priorities, which differs from that of some supporters. The ability of the PDG to function as an umbrella or unifying group is limited, and the recent period of dormancy does not suggest that it is central to the wider "WSR family".

I do believe a well designed organisation can enable more to be achieved from the same basic resources, and that a charitably based structure is probably optimal for railway preservation. Whether that is an IOWSR model (one organisation), or a Bluebell/GCR/NYMR style structure, is a judgement call. I also believe that discussions on this thread, whether about signs, Dunster station, paid/volunteer staff ratios or the condition of the lineside, illustrate how the gap between organisations leaves space in which problems can fester and grow.

Frank's post illustrates the vital role of personal relationships, and how these must be at the heart of how the railway develops and progresses. But the last few years also illustrate how those personal relationships need to be nurtured, and how that nurture needs the right structures to be in place.

 

Aren't there enough charities on the WSR ?