West Somerset Railway General Discussion

I beg to differ. After the "6+1" were removed, the WSRA and the 3 previous chairmen got on very well. If you want evidence then look at the agreements that were put in place for the QB, the BL shop and stock, Restorations and the Swindon shed. No sooner had the WSRA handed over a cheque for £180k, the WSRA chairman was instructed to Foxtrot Oscar. Make of that what you will. In hindsight, a cheque for the net amount would have been sensible but that was probably before we were reminded that when it comes to cheating charities, there is some history.

 

But Whitby and Porthmadoc are good tourist honeypots.

 

As is North Somerset/North Devon

 

And both lines run through National Parks, so attract visitors looking for something else to do while they're in the area. West Somerset isn't somewhere that immediately springs to mind when you're planning a "staycation". Though if air travel becomes undesirable (too expensive, 2 weeks quarantine, etc), then maybe West Somerset's fortunes may pick up.

 

An interesting post and some interesting views, welcome to the thread. Your opinion is of course valid as everybody’s is and it raises a key fundamental question: What is the WSR ?

In a post a bit upstream Rodders (Rodney) sort of said a similar thing, in effect you start from the premise that the WSR is a PLC, a commercial public limited company run on a business type basis where the Chairman makes all the decisions and volunteers and people wanting to be involved with the WSR either have to do as they are told and toe the line or go elsewhere.

But is that what the WSR was intended to be ? The WSR’s history is of course complex and it was at first intended to be a commercially run commuter service between Taunton & Minehead run by a PLC who much as its now again become as ‘the boss’. However that business model failed in the same way as BR couldn’t make a commuter line pay its way. So the WSR became a heritage steam railway and it grew into what it was until recently: A heritage railway owned and run by volunteers/members who all put their time and money in, with a core of paid staff, members support charities and support groups and a community resource for people to have access too freely. The people came and the WSR flourished.

However as has been explained in many of the previous 1321 pages the structure has a fatal flaw in it, in that no one group is actually in charge or can set the strategic direction. If the people either don’t like each other or aren’t capable it will and has resulted in an internal war and whilst the battle has raged the WSR has suffered until its reserves were gone.

In your post you put a lot of faith in one person from one part of the WSR, you give him the benefit of the doubt whilst also saying you don’t know the true reasons why he has taken some of the actions he has. That’s OK but on the other hand you don’t put the same faith in any of the other WSR Stakeholders who are saying they are concerned, your view is if they don’t like it they should either “put their money where their mouths are (to support the PLC they have concerns over) or go to another railway”. That’s a great leap of faith given the increasing number of people both internally and externally who are raising concerns. I can only say to you: Is one person (supported of course by a handpicked Board) right and many others wrong ? Should you not at least seek out all the facts before making your own judgement ?

My view is the PLC are not the owners of the WSR, they are one part of the family, they are a means to an end, a way of allowing the WSR to function as a legal entity who should be there to help toward the strategic direction ‘the WSR’ sets for itself through the PDG or something similar. However the structure doesn’t allow that to happen if people don't work together and the war continues.

The PLC has risen to become ‘the boss’ because a couple of co-opted PLC Directors a couple of years ago co-opted another person to the PLC Board. The PLC was then ’cleaned out’ and then a few new people were co-opted to the PLC Board and today the PLC has become the WSR by default because it’s just removed anything that stands in its way or doesn’t agree, people, groups, external partners and now the WSR’s main charity.

I’m not saying co-opting is wrong and I’m not saying this is all the fault of the current PLC Board, far from it, the WSRA and WSSRT Board have also played their parts in this, a number of the old guard have bought the WSR to this point not one person. However the question is what is the WSR ? Is it a commercial PLC run organisation or is it a Membership owned and volunteer lead Community resource that operate heritage trains (steam & diesel) ?

Which do the people of the WSR want, which will they support and which will allow them to come and go freely to volunteer, donate as much or as little as they want in a culture that’s safe and friendly to engage with.

The second part of your post is in my opinion good, it does show some of the challenges the WSR faces even without its current woes. You demonstrate well that going forward the fare box in itself is not enough, the WSR needs Community support, Grant Funding, Community partners and many more volunteers (especially given the current age profile). Will a commercially run PLC enable that ?

The WSR run as a PLC type based commercial operation has failed twice already, once as BR and once as the first WSR. We can all agree it looks like it’s about to fail again going by the PLC’s own statements as a PLC run organisation.

However it has prospered overall for the last 30 years as a membership lead Heritage Railway. Whilst acknowledging it has lost its way due to the wrong people and the wrong structure in the last few years it still did expand rapidly for most of the last 30 years even though it had in effect tied its own hands behind its own back due to a poor structure that relies on having good, focused people all working together well.

Until the WSR knows what is it then perhaps failure is always going to be around the corner, if indeed there is another corner to go around.

 

Are they in the same league though?

Anecdata: I've been to both Whitby and Porthmadog many times, and on most of those trips the streets have been packed with visitors, to the point of there being literal "pedestrian traffic jams" (in Whitby's case even on fully pedestrianised streets). In Whitby you can also see people queuing for an hour or more to get into the best-known cafes! I've been to Minehead and Watchet, on the other hand, and whilst they're far from deserted I'd never say they were bustling.

As I said this is anecdata, but I doubt Minehead is a tourist honeypot in the same league as Porthmadog or Whitby - or, indeed, as Porlock or Lynmouth.

Another thing that always strikes me with the Ffestiniog, incidentally, is the global range of visitors to the line - the impression I get is that no other line can match it for the volume of non-enthusiast visitors from outside the UK. I'm not saying they don't exist (I recall once sharing a compartment on the Severn Valley with a Japanese family) but I don't feel they make up a big proportion of the traffic at other lines.

 

Take a trip to the Lakeside and Haverthwaite and the Ratty for Japanese tourists. The former even has most of the signage in English and Japanese.

 

To a large extent this - irrespective of the personalities and issues involved highlights the problem, a PLC board with no accountability - or supervision from Shareholders/Stakeholders

 

Fair enough - the last time I went up there, I was too young to remember it!

 

The elephant in the room is that the WSR's apparent flourishing state a few years ago masked some fundamental issues: its passenger numbers were declining,and it wasn't spending on essential infrastructure maintenance or investing in the major projects that we see on other lines. For it to succeed as a heritage railway it has to have a business plan that addresses all these issues.

 

Just because the previous management couldn't cut the mustard, doesn't mean the their successors are any good either. This false dualism (if it isn't the one it must be the other) has been perceived as a fallacy since at least the ancient Greeks, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Frogs_Who_Desired_a_King , if not before. It might be added that this is a weakness of the joint-stock company model, that, in the absence of active owner control, they end up being run for the benefit of their senior management, rather than anything specific to railways or the WSR.

Yes, there have been periods where the two organisations have got on very well, but that doesn't stop them being essentially rivals.

 

I would imagine that virtually every heritage railway in the country suffers from similar types of conflict to one degree or another.

Its human nature born out of a passion for the cause. You can learn to live with conflict as long as the end game remains plausible.
The long running conflicts at the WSR are amplified because of the precarious financial position. Conflict is the effect, not the cause.

What we have here might be a simple but unpalatable truth – the railway simply cannot attract the visitors to remain viable.
It’s a toxic mix of the high operating costs to run a 20m railway, the relatively isolated location* and financial demographics.

The number of struggling businesses in Minehead is testament to that.
I can’t help but feel this is becoming a lost cause. And it is not the fault of one or more individuals.
Only a wealthy benefactor willing to turn their huge fortune into a small one is likely to resolve this.

(*on my last visit it took me longer to get from Bridgwater / Taunton to Minehead, than it did to get from Buckinghamshire to the A38.)

 

It seems to me though that - perish the thought, were I the WSRA Chair, doing what they do for the railway, elected by the membership, then looking across to a self appointed PLC board, in effect accountable only to themselves, even were they to be co-operative and willing to work with you it is hardly surprising that tensions would soon start to form

 

And both have worked to become not only successful as a Heritage Line but one that attracts people in sufficient numbers to make it the main reason to visit the area hence develop the local area. A more obvious example is the ELR which was the catalyst for the resurgence of the Irwell Valley as a tourist centre leading to towns such as Ramsbottom changing from a ghost town to a thriving community. The WSR has the added bonus of being a holiday centre with beaches, accommodation and shopping thus the railway offers an opportunity to explore the Somerset hinterland. My last visit to the area was engendered by the railway but once on holiday it gave my wife and family the opportunity to explore the area - and spend money in it.

Methinks the present WSR has forgotten the old JFK maxim - "Ask not what your community can do for you but ask what you can do for your community !"

 

Put in charge by whom? What due diligence was done?

There was a WSRplc AGM in June 2018
JJP was appointed as a Director 13 September 2018, & Acting Chair 24 September 2018. By 14 November he is Chair.
Then there's a clear out of the Directors, to such an extent that by the next accounting period there's only 3 of them.
EGM 10 August 2019, where the only vote is to change the wording around AGMs, so that there can be 18months between AGMs. No vote to confirm the Directors, even though none of the 3 had been voted into position by the shareholders.
There is then the AGM in December 2019, where 4 Directors are confirmed.

So, the Chair had been in place for over a year before facing election/confirmation by shareholders.

Do you really think that putting everything on one person is a good idea?
What if he needs to leave to spend more time running his own businesses, what if he gets ill, or a family member gets ill & he can't devote the time to the WSR, what if he dies?
There's a reason for having a Board, & that Board needs to be strong.

So you don't know the reason behind the Notice to Quit, but it must be a good reason...
That's why the WSR is in such a mess!
You do know that at least one thing that was stated by the plc with regards to Washford was shown to be a lie?

Bickering?
Why is the laying out, & discussion, of facts bickering?
Why is it, as another poster has said, uninformed opinion?

Why is it that whenever something comes from outside the plc that even so much as raises a question about what they've said or done, there's a poster saying that it's all wrong, that everyone should support the plc, yet never ever provides any evidence or facts as to how what has been said is wrong?

 

The WSR PLC has to be run on a business basis it cannot be run on any other basis. The days when it was a hobby company are long gone. Steam trains if not handled in accordance with the rules and regs are dangerous. People can and have been killed around them so yes the company has to be run on a business basis. Show me where there is anything written down that says that the company is a community company? The PLC will have to take the flak should something happen and there is something called Corporate Manslaughter which the PLC directors can be held liable for even if something were to happen on one of the support groups on the railway. If it is found that the PLC allowed something to happen that lead to the death of a volunteer due to negligence or fault in the system then the buck stops with them. That is why the PLC has to be in charge.

In this world that you inhabit how long would it be before the railway couldn't run any trains because of your quote above where no volunteer wants to come because its raining. If you volunteer than you must be committed to the railway. You must turn up when rostered otherwise it affects the service and the railway will get a reputation for people not knowing if when you turn up the trains will be running that day.

It may surprise you to find that I agree that change has to happen but not whilst this unpresented situation is ongoing. I will however state that if you are saying that the PLC board need to go lock stock and barrel then I would suggest that if that if this is the case then it cant be the WSRA or steam trust that take over. I would suggest that a new charity is formed to oversee the change.

 

Note that many of the Japanese tourists come to Windermere for the "Beatrix Potter" experience as she is widely admired in Japan; once in the area they sample many of the delights including the Lakeside & Haverthwaite Railway BUT note also that the railway has tied itself to the Windermere Lake cruising program hence - again - its commitment to the community in which it operates. As I have previously noted - look at the successful heritage lines and note their involvement with the community as they see beyond their immediate operation and appreciate the whole (communal activity) that they are part of and ask how much commitment the WSR is showing to its (West Somerset) community.

 

I'd say one of a package of reasons. NYMR--- Whitby, the town, the beach, the abbey, the Magpie or Trenchers (others available), Goathland, the Park, Robin Hoods Bay. Porthmadoc -- Portmeirion, the beaches, the Park, Caernavon.

 

A couple of points, Rodders. Yes, I agree it really has to be a new charity, membership based. I hope the Plc, WSRA and WSSRT realise it is not their demise but a new beginning for them (hence the cocoon analogy). However I believe the process of change can start right now in parallel with saving the Railway from the effects of coronavirus. This is the time to start the process as a growing number of us can all see too vividly the fragility of the current structure. I call on the three Boards to agree to start the process - at this week's PDG perhaps?

Steve