Lynton and Barnstaple - Operations and Development

>>>> In answer to thoughts about the original station, there is no intention to demolish the pub at all. The original building is still there, but it now has a large single story addition at the front. The future railway route will skirt around this.....

Just to play the archetypal Devil's Advocate for a moment....

• There used to be an extension on the front (and end?) of Chelfham station. That has now been demolished and the building is back very much as it was pre-closure.
• There used to be an extension on the front and end of Bratton Fleming station. Part of those has been demolished and the rest will go at some later date, after which the building will be returned to its pre-closure form when the railway eventually arrives.

So....why should Blackmoor be treated any differently?

Two possible counter-arguments:-

• neither CM nor BF AFAIK had any intrusion onto the actual trackbed alignment, so it is relatively simple to clear the platforms and use them again
• both CM and BF are quite small buildings with simple internal layouts, whereas BR is larger and more complex.

 

I recommend the B3227 for that experience - you'll get the overlay of A361, and also the sense of what the old railway was like.

More seriously, @ross highlights that the pub's been there longer than the railway. "Authenticity" is a balancing act, and the proposed alignment at OSI does this well given the other changes at Blackmoor Gate since 1935. That contrasts with CFL, where the changes were new, impeded restoration beyond CFL, and served no clear purpose in aiding the restoration of the railway as a whole.

I can think of a number of locations where modern changes detract rather more from the authentic state of the railway. Given mention of the A361, my thoughts start with Bishops Lydeard...

 

Then why spend so much money buying it?
Why buy it at all?

What you are saying is that the L&BRT has spent nearly £2,000,000 (against a membership of nearly 2,000) buying something they don't want, don't need and can't use

 

Indeed In fact, when we were working on the signalling design for Blackmoor for Phase 2A a few years ago, one of my key objectives was to try to make it NOT anything like Bishops Lydeard if at all possible ! A bit tricky tho', given the absence of any formal layout plan or Operational Requirements....:-(

 

I did not say that anywhere.
You are putting words in my mouth

 

FFS- "What you are, in effect, saying is that the L&BRT has spent nearly £2,000,000 (against a membership of nearly 2,000) buying something they don't want, don't need and can't use
Happy now? Still not O level English composition

 

For the second time, there is no evidence on here that the posters want the pub to fail, but as has already been said the Blackmoor Co's £8,000 profit per annum means it is not capable of servicing it's debts. The only way it can pay £160,000 to the private lender and the £25,000 annual repayment of the loan to the Trust both due some time in 2025 is for at least a partial cash injection (at least, as far as the £160,000 is concerned) and the only source is surely the Trust. Which being a charity and parent of the Blackmoor trading subsidiary it is not supposed to do. See a fuller explanation in posting 14947 on page 748 and 14964.

 

"don't want, don't need and can't use" ? Surely the answer is "trackbed" and "parking". The map at https://www.google.com/maps/d/viewe...ll=51.17100332198963,-3.9332889014238903&z=17 shows how much of the pub land will be needed for the proposed rail yards and facilities. In due course, no doubt, the railbed land can be legally separated from the pub land, which can then be left as a stand-alone commercial operation to be either kept as a profit earner or sold off, depending on circumstances.
I agree that the price seems a little excessive, and the financial arrangement is not ideal, but you have to allow something for opportunity cost : if the pub and its land had been sold to an outside party what would be the chance, or cost, of the railway purchasing the necessary track bed in the future ?

 

Surely we have to allow for the art of the "do able" ? To demolish an expensive asset and then rebuild a copy of the original would be a pointless waste of our very limited resources. It is impossible, for a number of reasons, to produce an exact reinstatement of the whole line but, by making sensible adjustments here and there, it will be possible to have something close to the original : a narrow gauge steam railway, with unique engines and rolling stock, threading its way across the North Devon countryside. Better that than nothing at all.

 

I'm puzzled by what is meant by 'rail yards' in this context. Under Phase 2A plans the proposed loco and C&W works at Blackmoor were to be built at Rowley Moor Farm, on land already owned by the Trust. IIRC there was never any proposal to recreate the former goods yard at BR precisely because it needed land then occupied by the pub. Now admittedly, especially in light of the recent removal of certain planning constraints, it would seem reasonable to assume that any embryonic railway on the BR to WD section would initially at least have its loco and storage facilities south of the road, until such time as (a) it can afford to built the new bridge and (b) it becomes a viable proposition to seek planning permission at RMF from ENPA.

 

Quite so. How many more times must we stress this point before some commentators cease to peddle such a ridiculous and inaccurate point of view ???

 

I was misled by the green lines on the map. Nonetheless, as you observe, "any embryonic railway on the BR to WD section would initially at least have its loco and storage facilities south of the road", so some extra land would be required.

 

Quite true, of course.

However, in the hope that some sense and logic would be applied, the development of any 'second front' at BR-WD would have to be tailored around the capacity of the site to accommodate it. Of course, if in due course the Trust had the resources to pursue the bridge and Rowley Moor Farm depot, and a proper interaction with ENPA, then the development of RMF at an earlier rather than a later stage would be of benefit not only to the BF-WD operation but also the future potential to extend northwards.

 

What have you in mind for stopping the OSHI project from where it is now? Closing the pub would remove even the small net income that it is generating and would seriously annoy many locals. The only possibility that might make any sense would be to re-sell the pub as a going concern while keeping all the parts of the site required for the eventual restoration of the railway. That would generate cash to pay off the loans and put some back in the bank; but it would depend on finding a buyer and on being able to divide the site in such a way as to allow operation of the railway station and continued operation of the pub including car parking.

 

Imagine trying to find a buyer who wants to run a pub but have no land , no car park in thier ownership , accommodation attached to his pub thet he doesn't own .

It would be better to just keep the pub as it is , in the ownership of the railway making a profit that it currently is even after all the investment being put into it .

 

I don’t know what the right answer is, as there are no good answers. But the project was the purchase, and it is the decision making there that I am uncomfortable with.

IF you also accept that this operating profit is only possible because the pub is being subsidised by investors.

 

Just finding a buyer for a pub in the current climate would be hard enough if indeed there was pressing need to sell I suspect.

Looking at the number that are closed, have recently closed or are up for sale near us in Yorkshire- I can’t imagine the situation is vastly different elsewhere in the UK.

Chris

 

The bit that I say 'don't need and can't use' about is the pub premises itself. On that map, the pub itself, which, remember, was not for sale, is absolutely not part of the proposed right-of-way for the new railway.
It took a financial blugeon to persuade the owner to give up his business.
The land for the ROW is about 1 acre. And an acre of North Devon is typically worth about £10,000 unless it has development rights.
One would have thought that, given that a steam railway is unlikely to harm the pub trade and could very easily increase it, that 1 acre of land could have been purchased as a holding separate from the pub, house, car park etc. Even if it had cost £100,000 I would not criticise the deal- its each member giving £50.and to secure a station site next to the A39, I think many of us would. And that might have left some money in the pot to start doing something constructive.
I used to negotiate difficult land acquisitions, tenancies and access rights for my living. I was pretty successful at it, but success comes from diplomacy and understanding, not by bullying.
What has been achieved by paying so much for OSHI is to set a precedent which will proved enormously costly going forward.

 

It would depend on finding a buyer stupid enough to invest nearly two million pounds in a marginal, precarious business that yields about 0.4% on capital. Most people who have two million pounds of their own are not stupid, and would look for better, more secure investment opportunities. At the very least, they would get an expert valuation of the business they were proposing to buy.