SVR General Discussion

I don't deny that - but that doesn't mean that the P2 doesn't have more pulling power.

 

I guess the issue is that if the amount to overhaul the loco is in the region of what is suggested, then you need to be confident that they can generate really significant backing.

If you get a hundred people to put in £5 a month and do the rounds of galas selling T-shirts and pots of jam, then after five years when you have raised £50k you have simultaneously done really well and also been completely useless in the context of what is needed.

I'm the last person to dissuade people from fund raising, but if you are a company with many calls on funding (rather than a single-issue fund such as an independent loco owner) then you need to avoid a situation where you are supporting a dozen or more fundraising groups, each of which individually falls well short of what they need to raise to be useful.

Tom

 

Tom, I don’t disagree with any of what you’ve posted.
What I’m saying is someone with a love and passion for the SVR approached the previous GM about setting up something similar to 4930 regarding 600, and was told ‘NO’ and didn’t give a clear reason why, please let’s bear in mind this is someone who described the majority of her staff to some as ‘well meaning amateurs’

I believe the same person is prepared to ask the current and interim GM at some point about doing something similar and it being at no cost to the railway.

I could be mistaken and have the totally wrong end of the stick, and we all know 600 needs a fair old bit of work to it, but what is wrong with having an independent group with a slow burn approach to gradually collecting funds to putting something back into action?

Im also looking forward to my ticket to travel behind 4150… 25 years after helping wire brush its frames at Bewdley btw.

 

Really pleased to hear that some of you are establishing a campaign to raise funds for Gordon's restoration. I look forward to seeing it launched and will make a financial contribution accordingly. Thanks for putting yourselves forward on this one. It is far better than the usual comments such as, "what they should do is......".

 

As an aside, but perhaps of interest, the NYMR restoration of Dame Vera Lynn looks to be working towards oil firing rather than coal, and utilising a more modern "green" fuel oil. Perhaps at least worth some liason down the line.

46118

 

The business case for DVL, the article states, is so the NYMR have a viable steam loco during high fire risk periods or if coal becomes hard to come by. It could also use a bio fuel to assist the railway decarbonise. DVL was at some point oil fired, so switching between oil and coal is technically straightforward for this loco, so it is ideally suited.
As I said above, the case for DVL is quite clear, whether a similar one could be made for Gordon I don't know, I am unaware of the similarities or differences between the engines.
Ultimately, I think the case for Gordon's restoration is poor otherwise, emotional attachment isn't always the best driver for restoration, there are plenty more suitable locos ahead of it. That shouldn't preclude supporters making a case or fundraising though. If 5 to 600k could be raised by a supporters group that could change things dramatically.

 

I think that potentially the problem is - where is the money coming from? Putting together a slow burn group to start building a pot of funds is great, but only if its "new money".
If all that's achieved is diverting giving which would otherwise go to other projects on the railway, then it actually does more harm than good.
Probably what would happen would be a balance - some new money, some diverted (and some diverted from other railways of course), but I can see why the railway might not want to be running too many appeals at once.

 

Sadly I think that some engines we have seen in steam will not again be seen in steam. Actually many of them. Overhaul queues as has been observed, of a length that means most engines will wait around 30years between overhauls. Many will spend a lot of that time uncovered.

I can understand the previous GM saying “no”. Does the SVR need another appeal. One which might well never raise enough to pay for the overhaul, but saddle the railway with another reserved fund and another appeal.

 

21B is spot on. What ought to drive the fundraising initiatives is a railway's long term locomotive policy based on a mixture of operational requirements, running and overhaul costs. That may well mean some locomotives are more suitable than others so they keep getting recycled while others never join the mythical overhaul queue. Priorities may change, as has happened with DVL 3672 because of its potential oil firing advantages.
However, the overhaul programme shouldn't be driven by so called independent initiatives ( which typically aren't really because they piggy back on the railway and may well be intended to influence its overhaul priorities). Sadly sentiment isn't enough and in the current economic climate hard business decisions will dictate what gets rebuilt and what may never steam again.

 

The trouble with your argument is that it is based on short-termism. If the DVL support group hadn't been quietly raising funds for years beforehand there would not have been the opportunity to change priorities as we have seen with DVL. It's the same with legacies. You might want people to leave them for the railway to spend however it chooses but people have their own ideas of what is a worthy cause and what is not and may well specify what it is to be used for. It's better to have the money available than not, so the sensible approach would be to have at least some projects that people feel they want to back. It can work, in the NYMR's case the 80135 appeal has attracted some serious support, for example, I believe.

 

In the case of the DVL support group it had the approval and encouragement of the NYMR including promotion in the member's magazine etc. hence my observation about not being wholly independent. Sometimes if money has strings attached that seeks to change the spending priorities of the railway it may, paradoxically be best to say "thanks but no thanks" especially if it's partial funding. As a broad principle decisions about spending priorities should be made by those responsible for running the railway not by those involved in fundraising.

 

Is this the clearest explanation yet of why railways with large paid staff loose their way? The reality is that what are now Heritage Railways closed because they had no commercial viability but groups of highly motivated and selfless individuals revived them through sentiment and hard work. Sometimes they managed to resurrect appropriate original assets, others obtained whatever they could. Some became large local employers whilst others have remained predominantly volunteer led with service levels matched to volunteer availability. As the movement reaches a point where few of its customers (passengers and volunteers) remember everyday steam does it actually have any idea of its long time purpose or the willingness of customers (passengers, volunteers and grant funders) to support it? The various threads on here provide ample evidence that all of the current approaches have there weaknesses but also show smaller groups with wide engagement of their members achieving great things whilst other larger schemes spend much time on internal squabbles. We often hear comments like "too large to fail" but if I was placing bets I would suggest that many of the larger lines will shrink or disappear, possibly of great benefit to the movement overall as assets are dispersed, whilst smaller lines closer to the original successful operations survive.

 

No, I don't think you can draw that conclusion. The principle applies whether the the railway is a small 100% volunteer operation or as large one with paid staff because any heritage asset, whether its' a locomotive, carriage or building is simultaneously a future liability. Heritage railway management , whoever does it, must involve maintaining a prudent and sustainable level of liability. All I'm suggesting is that decisions about what to raise funds for should not saddle those running the railway with costs and liabilities that they do not accept that it's right for the railway to take on. If those raising or donating funds set priorities that distort the effective financial management of the railway they are potentially undermining the proper role and responsibility of the railway's directors and trustees, paid or volunteer.
I share your concern about the viability of the sector but not the linkage between size and squabbles. They seem to crop up regardless of size. Where I really take issue is with the assumption that, if there are corporate failures in the sector, the assets will be dispersed to other players. Some perhaps, but liquidators aren't driven by any considerations of heritage or preservation. If the best interests of creditors are sale for scrap that is the more likely outcome.

 

In the years ahead Heritage Railways face many challenges, some of which are beginning to be seen in different ways at different places. There is no “right way”. Some very large lines look set to continue well into the future, and others do not. It is the same with small lines as well.

Small railways don’t need many people to continue and often don’t need much in the way of fundraising or ticket fares. This is an obvious strength, but it takes only a few key people to leave and not be replaced and the organisation can quickly be in trouble. Of course providing the finances don’t disintegrate it might also be easier to rescue as well.

Whatever the size though, the same factors are necessary: good financial planning; a steady volunteer pool. With these providing the external shocks are not too great all should be well.

maintaining good financial planning is easier if the organisation is kept “simple”. That is to say the structure is organised and makes sense and the people in that structure achieve what is required and can be effectively managed because it is clear who does what.

The structure is also simplified if there are not too many special interest groups, support structures and other interlocking groups of the many forms found. Each one is a managerial burden no matter how successful they are, and those that aren’t can be a real pain.

As an outsider to both the SVR and the NYMR, but privileged to have seen behind the scenes of both the former has always struck me for the complexity of organisation.

 

Some good news from the Great Western (SVR) Association AGM last weekend. The GWR carriages fitted with 'snap locks' were withdrawn from use earlier this year over safety concerns. It was reported at the AGM that modifications to the locks have been approved and fitted, and the intention is to use the GWR set on the Enchanted Express services out of Bridgnorth this winter. (As I understand it, the fix is based on a work around devised by the GWR themselves and involves installing a modified tongue fitted with a spring, so when the door is closed it will remain shut even if the snap lock is not turned back to the closed position).

 

Excursion brake 650 had the modification during the ASG. The new door lock doesn't act quite as highlighted from my experience. The main advantage of the modification is that doors can't sit flush with the coach body unless it is actually shut by hand. Thus it is more obvious that the door is not shut from a distance.
Edit: The doors don't slam shut (which some people think they have been modified to). To shut the door, the handle still has to be turned, now to fully open to allow the door to close and then turned to actually shut the door. If the door is pushed to it will just rest with the door held ajar.

 

The operation of the lock is thus.

The modified tongue fitted to the locks has a different angle to the back face which acts upon the spring at a different angle. This angle makes the leading edge of the tongue sit at about 1 o'clock, outside the lock body. The doors will not slam shut. Any attempt at slamming them will more than likely break the adjacent window.

To shut the door. The handle must be turned to 90 degrees, 12 o'clock, to have the tongue act on the spring and clear the receiver plate. The spring will then act on the tongue pushing it back to 1 o'clock. The handle must be then turn the full 90 degrees to horizontal/ 3 o'clock. The reverse applies to opening the door.

The tongue of the lock will always sit at 1 o'clock and prevent the door from fully shutting, which then traincrew and station staff will attend. What this acheives is a safety catch type operation. If a member of traincrew/ station staff do happen to miss a door that is shut but the handle is not at 3 o'clock/ horizontal, the door cannot swing open in section unless tampered with.

The locks fitted to 9055, 9654, 9653, 6913 and soon 3930 follow the original design of the GWR semi slam lock which was trialled in the 20s on 130 carriages but station staff didnt like them and the GWR went back to the original design.
The locks fitted to our post 38 and Hawksworth stock are a modification along the same lines but in a much smaller case, which required alot more thought and testing.

We are now moving on to modify the 2 observation carriages and then we will pause, as we have done all the GWR carriages that are available for traffic.

We will be running an 7 car set off Bridgnorth for the Enchanted Express. Which will be a good test of how the locks are working and how passengers and staff get on with them.

 

There seems to be some tracklaying near the old sugar sidings. Does anyone know what is planned?

 

There are long term plans for a wagon storage shed at Foley park. The current tracklaying is utilising panels which have been stored at the stourport triangle for some time.