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Toddington update - Chcken Curve slip

Discussion in 'Heritage Railways & Centres in the UK' started by audlin, Jan 16, 2011.

  1. Belgrade

    Belgrade New Member

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    Yep, agreed. Home page looks nice and inviting, so well done - a professional-looking presentation. Fingers crossed that does the trick for you all at GWSR.
    Cheers,
    Steve
     
  2. SteveG

    SteveG New Member

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    Thanks for the kind words about the homepage.

    I've just added an update on the Gotherington works to the site. Plenty of pics and some encouraging news.

    Steve
    GWSR webmaster
     
  3. RASDV

    RASDV Member

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    Good to see that progress is being made. The article makes reference to a June opening date to Cheltenham, if this is the case how will the steam service from Winchcombe to Cheltenham operate between April and June? Or is this just the date that the contractors will move off site but trains can be running before then?
     
  4. Belgrade

    Belgrade New Member

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    From one Steve to another; I've looked on the website and can't find any way of making regular direct debit payments to GWSR. Is this possible? If not maybe it should be. As I live outside the country, it would be good to be able to do everything regarding membership and payments online, but the only online option I can find is to make a one-off donation. Food for thought maybe?
    Steve
     
  5. SteveG

    SteveG New Member

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    The June reference is a typo on Darren's part and has been coreected now.

    Moves are afoot to make a regular payments form available online for people to download. We are moving further down the road of making things available online. If I had my way it would all be done online but there are people who, shall we say, need some hand holding in the move towards the brave new world. We will get there trust me but some of the cogs behind the scenes move quicker than others.

    Steve
     
  6. Gav106

    Gav106 Well-Known Member

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    Things are looking bleak now, the railway is now selling off the goods shed at broadway to pay for the damage.
     
  7. Duty Druid

    Duty Druid Resident of Nat Pres

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    J H C ! isn't this a bit like throwing the baby out with the bath water.

    I know things are bad - but surely selling off assets isn't the answer - better to get the public support - bums on seats to bring in the necessary revenue & ramp up the dilemma in the railway press than sell off assets in a fire sale.

    Surely getting the message out around all the other railways & sticking out info/donation forms/buckets etc on running days/galas would be much more helpful & effective, ie get their help & support just as everybody rallied round during the SVR's hour of need.
     
  8. davidarnold

    davidarnold Member

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    To a caravan club no less. Following on this logic to its absurd conclusion. Caravans weigh less than steam engines, so why not make the whole railway a linear caravan park, no need to repair Chichen Curve then!

    It is staggering that people who think like this can have found there way onto the Board of a HERITAGE Railway,
     
  9. toplight

    toplight Well-Known Member

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    I am not really clear why the railway is facing such a financial crisis so quickly, I realise the loss of revenue compared to normal and the need to pay contractors to repair the damage but is there a need to repair so quickly ? They don't have to pay any staff wages as the railway is entirely run by volunteers and as far as I am aware there are no debts to pay.

    Could they just not operate as a smaller scale railway for the next year or two say between Winchcombe and Cheltenham Racecourse when this part is repaired and then repair the Chicken curve section as and when funds permit say over the next few years, therefore, spreading the repair costs over say 3 or more seasons ? Even with only the Winchcome to Cheltenham section this would still be much longer than many other railways.

    They should speed up opening to Laverton, this will be a new section of line to travel over and will tempt many enthusiasts (me included) to make that trip to Toddington to travel over the new section.

    Maybe the C and W department could overhaul some coaches/wagons on a contract basis for other railways to bring in some funds ?
     
  10. Kinghambranch

    Kinghambranch Well-Known Member

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    Is it though? There is no official announcement from the railway itself (at least not yet), only a statement from the Broadway Station Group Blogger. It must be difficult to have to contemplate such things but the GWSR is having to look at all options. The goods shed at Broadway is currently rented out to the local caravan club (its unlikely that it would have survived if this had not happened). Whilst it would be most unfortunate to have to sell it, the GWSR needs the money to keep the rest of the line running. There is an alternative of course. Keep donating!
     
  11. Gav106

    Gav106 Well-Known Member

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    this is what someone on there has said. Not sure who he is as im not involved with the gwsr. im just a supporter.

    Unfortunately certain additional facts need to be added to clarify the position that was clearly put to heads of department last week, at which the Broadway Group were represented.
    Its not a done deal, the caravan club have rented, looked after the building for a number of years improved the building largely at their cost, for their own use and given an area over for a small display of railway materials, which are not directly accessible on the level with the railway or visible from the railway the opposite side of the main road.
    They have undertaken most of the work to make keep the building as it is at present.
    The Caravan club support the railway and indeed a great many of their customers also support the railway and will soon have it on their doorstep rather than having to drive to Toddington.......however that will only be if the railway survives.
    They have no intention to remove it, so visually Broadway will still look the same and infact they want to improve the building further, and do things that we can't afford or fund.
    Surely if we were to consider selling a little silver to use your words, to realise a pot of Gold in the station buildings and the railways survival, it should be considered if indeed a suitable offer is forthcomming?
    No one has suggested that the building will disappear or be radically altered?
    Darren Fairley
    23 February 2011 12:52
     
  12. davidarnold

    davidarnold Member

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    Darren. Once you have sold the building you have no control over it. If a new Board at the caravan club takes over who want to knock it down and build something hideous, or sell it to Tescos, you will be powerless to prevent it.

    You will eventually restore your railway, you have done it once and you will do it again. If you sell the Goods Shed you will NEVER restore it, and future visitors to Broadway, will have the dubious pleasure of travelling past the eventual eyesore that results. A monument to the present Boards lack of nerve and foresight.
     
  13. Christopher125

    Christopher125 Part of the furniture

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    Tesco's? Dont be daft. Even if someone else did buy it, i find it highly unlikely that planning permission for anything not in-keeping with the railway or the area would be approved anyway and by limiting the sale of land around it the railway could make any alterations into a property or business highly unnatractive.

    I'd also like to take issue with the idea that once its sold thats it - you are aware that a building can be re-sold back to its original owner? Something that would be a lot easier if the railways finances are in a healthy state because of a willingness to make difficult decisions, instead of crippled by members not living in the real world.

    Chris
     
  14. davidarnold

    davidarnold Member

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    Ah your trust in the planning authorities is touching. In every local paper in the land you care to pick up there will be a protest against some hideous developement or other, and to no avail beause most go ahead. The reason, money or influence, or a bit of both, that is the real world.
     
  15. Christopher125

    Christopher125 Part of the furniture

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    Perhaps, but then i was only reading the other day about a housing development finally including the restoration of a station building (Bleinhem & Woodstock) after being refused countless times due to its planned demolition.

    If you can overlook all the modern sheds and workshops, car parks, two less-than-pretty signalboxes, sidings full of unrestored rolling stock, lengthy sections of CWL on concrete sleepers, single track on a double track formation, a large fleet of often innappropriate diesels and a 2ft guage railway using foreign loco's for the sake of a commercially successful railway... then im sure you can cope with the selling of a goods shed to people who already have restored and looked after it, respectfully and sympathetically, to enable said railway to survive into the future.

    Lets be honest, all heritage railways have to compromise on their historical accuracy on a regular basis - but rarely IMO is it done for such good reasons as this.

    Chris
     
  16. Kinghambranch

    Kinghambranch Well-Known Member

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    There is some truth in your comment regarding planners and their seeming double standards but before we all jump on the "outrage bus" please remember that this is Broadway we are talking about here, one of the most picturesque places in the Cotswolds, where planning is very stringent. (The GWR would never get away with a brick built goods shed there now!) It is perhaps most unfortunate that the GWSR had not already reached here and was operating from here by now as it would have lessened the trauma of 2 significant embankment landslips. However, we are where we are and the GWSR is presumably going through every option (just like the MOD RAF Planners when it looks at the Red Arrows and the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight every year and says, can we chop them? No, let's chop the entire Harrier Force instead because Libya will never kick off - But I digress!) Even when the GWSR arrives at Broadway, the Goods Shed would still probably be used by the local Caravan Club as they have altered it internally for their use and the GWSR has no current plans to use it themselves. However, I do agree that the situation today may not be the same as that tomorrow and there might come a time when the GWSR looks longingly at the Goods shed and says "why did our predecessors sell it, the muppets?" I guess the answer to this dilemma is so obvious that its barely worth uttering but I will: empty your wallets into the GWSR coffers so that Chicken Curve can be repaired properly just like Gotherington embankment has been (track will be relayed very shortly on the latter according to the GWSR website but there is still work to do).
     
  17. davidarnold

    davidarnold Member

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    But many of these things are temporary. The CWL will be used in the extension, there have to be unrestored carriages bedore there are restored carriages. Diesels can be changed, even workshops reclad in more sympathetic materials in the long run as at the Bluebell or Midhants.

    But a 100 year old , original GWR Building? Once that is gone it is gone.
     
  18. Sheff

    Sheff Resident of Nat Pres

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    Well we've tried that on here, and the response so far has frankly been little short of pathetic. So if the goods shed is sold, then the majority of the Nat Pres membership can share some of the guilt. I trust the anyone whinging on here will have made a donation for that entitlement?
     
  19. Chelt Rail

    Chelt Rail New Member

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    Some brilliant progress evident here@
    http://nigel-black.fotopic.net/c1927662.html

    Please note this is the first slip, at Gotherington, between Winchcombe and Cheltenham. This thread is about the second slip, between Winchcombe and Toddington, and that one is still a major headache. However, this shows that the railway is still alive and able to sort out its problems, and donating money to the railway is certainly not a waste of time. The GWSR is still going, and I'm sure will be putting on a good show this coming season.

    Chelt Rail
     
  20. Kinghambranch

    Kinghambranch Well-Known Member

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    Excellent news Chelt Rail, thanks for the update and link regarding the Gotherington embankment repair with the running line now reinstated. I know there's lots still to do before trains run from Cheltenham to Winchcombe but it illustrates what can be done if we support the Railway now!
     

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