Railway Blogs

As a long distance(Canada) supporter of several heritage lines I do enjoy the daily blog style info provided by such sites as Steaming to Broadway, EVR. etc
Some of our more established lines, including my favourite, Swanage Railway, are falling down in this information age by failing to update their websites. As I recently pointed out to the SR
their "latest news" is nearly a month old. I know some Railways are building youth movements..what better way to involve these tech savvy youngsters than to get them blogging!!

 

I agree blogging info and regular updates is a great way to keep enthusiasts in touch with what's going on. The only trouble is finding someone to actually write the posts.

From the groups I've looked at the Great Central is the best with a weekly "e"-newsletter sent out every week with at least three pages, with each segment - events, news, loco shed report etc all being written by the individuals concerned then sent to one person who compiles it and sends it out to those on the mailing list. Hence a very detailed report of the goings on is produced by a lot of people each putting in a relatively modest amount of effort.

 

Have to agree with oliversbest , I to am a long distance supporter , again from Canada and look forward to updated info on a regular basis . Have to agree that EVR do a great job - its bookmarked on my computer , and yes others could get on the bandwagon as well -- we also support UK railways , including sending Canadian $,s to worthy causes ....
Cheers Richard

 

The coordinating job of publishing regular updates to a blog is an ideal job for supporters who live far from their favourite railway. To those, like me, who live far from "their" railway, why not get tapping that keyboard, make contact with key people, keep pestering, get the material and put it all together in a blog. Depending on your contributors it may or may not be an easy job. But it can be done - not by "someone" but by you. You'd be providing great support for your railway and for your fellow enthusiasts.

Steve

 

Speaking as someone who works at the Swanage Railway (and pleased to hear its your favourite..!) having a blog is something that we have discussed on a number of occasions recently, and there may well be some moves towards it very shortly. The issue that we have, as identified, is having someone with the time and skills to do so.

Our website is run by a volunteer, who does a very good job with the information he is given. Others do try to assist in disseminating information as much as possible (for example, I have a Twitter account and post on here as much as time allows), but it is one of those areas that I know we could always improve.

 

One of the big advantages of blogs is that more than one person can write on them.

Each person can publish their stuff immediately (if they are confident with their writing), or it can go through a central 'editor' for final checking before going live. This speeds up the publishing process and allows each department to have their own writing style.

A few trial posts with different contributors would quickly show them how it works, and then the blog editor could just have a supervisory role.

Richard