SVR General Discussion

As other railways run them, including those where volunteers have been killed. They are not banned on ORR or HSE grounds. If they didn't want people on the track, they could have changed the way in which photo charters were operated, e.g. move off the p-way to public locations and on stations. There would still be a market for that, for photos without people wondering in the way etc, loco/stock combinations. Allowing driver experiences to continue, which arguably are more dangerous.

That's why I thought it was stupid.

 

So any H&S tooblox talk training isn't worthwhile? Okay, you should tell the HSE that. I would love to hear their response.

 

I think this because historically the NYMR has had issues with overcrowding and is unable to add more capacity. The peak fares acted as a carrot to transfer people onto lighter loaded services. This also provided the justification to raise fares by a bigger than usual margin last year.

The SVR has always been willing to run more services, even if some are very lightly loaded.

 

Dartmouth are running two charters with 4277, one in February priced at £95 and another in March priced at £125, limited to 40 participants. That is a business which is looking at making profit for shareholders and certainly wouldn't do it for a laugh, especially when it's staff will likely have death in service payouts in their t&cs. Not sure why a charter would cost £2,500 to put on? Unless I am much mistaken, the biggest two costs would be the loco steaming fee and it's coal.

 

Look forward to you telling HSE they are a substitute for full competency training in a hazardous work area

 

There are a number of very good replies here, mixed in with several grinding axes - however I think the overall theme is that things need to change - even if we don't yet know how.
The days of hauling around fresh air have got to be over though - this can't have been good practice pre-pandemic and is just financial suicide now.
Lastly, a wise person once said 'plan for the worst, hope for the best' (or were they an accountant?!) - either way those words seem very pertinent right now.

 

A person could do a full PTS for ongoing basis. Nothing stopping that.

 

You might not be sure, but I am, and I was in possession of the facts. Of course it depends how you cost it and is subjective like all accounting. It was meant to be and used as a way to prompt thought about the worth of doing certain activities.

 

The saying 'Knowing the cost of everything but the value of nothing' springs to mind here.

 

1. You’re correct there is no ban. Neither is there an obligation to run them though. Each railway makes it own decision and as I and others have explained at length there are reasons why they might decide not to.
2. They could have changed format, and that might deal with safety worries, but makes no impact on the financial/resources use
3. The risks might be comparable, but the return was obviously judged to be better.

 

You should actually read my posts. All of them on this subject, especially the part about other value that some people chose to take into account and the part about not advocating stopping them. It seems to me you’ve just come on here to have a pop about an issue that upsets you. Fine, just don’t make it personal.

 

It's a thought experiment. But you need to explore all possibilities and consider the consequences, rather than just say "la la la we've always done it this way" - even if the outcome is you decide that that way is actually best after all.

My contention is that with a few exceptions (primarily the very longest lines, where the core product is a single out and back journey), then the value is demonstrably different depending on the service level, but the pricing often isn't.

If I visit an art gallery on a wet Wednesday afternoon, or a busy summer Saturday in tourist season, the same paintings are on display, so arguably the value is the same in terms of what is achievable in a day. That has a self-regulating effect, since there is no disincentive to visiting on a quiet day for those able to do so, and arguably they have a better experience when doing so by being less crowded.

By contrast, on a railway, the trains serve three purposes. There is:

1. The ride itself
2. The element of "show"
3. The flexibility given to get on and off and see intermediate attractions, i.e. the stations other than at each end.

On operationally quiet days, the first of those is unaffected - if you are on one train for the ride, it hardly matters which others are in circulation - but the other two options are demonstrably reduced when the timetable is quiet. I'd argue that therefore for many people there is lower value in attending on quiet days, but typically the same price is charged.

That assumes that the only reason to visit is the journey itself. At which point, we might as well close all the intermediate stations.

On a line like the SVR, or MHR, or Bluebell, if you want people to get out at the intermediate stations to look at what each has to offer, and then continue their journey later, you have to offer a timetable that is sufficiently frequent to make such interrupted journeys viable - even if most visitors do only take a ride equivalent to a single out and back journey.

Tom

 

Get one of those via a toolbox talk do you?
Also could, not has. You previously noted that some of the participants had a (comparable but not applicable) safety qualification, but that everyone is somehow made safe by a safety briefing (nb, not alway the same as a toolbox talk as I am sure you very well know. I get a safety briefing when I go to site, very different to what the operatives get on a toolbox talk).

Yes, safety is a pain in proverbial, but compared with looking down the barrel of a corp manslaughter, or an H&S prosecution, I know which I'd take

 

PTS does not make a photographer safe. Says he who was approx 20 -30 m from killing one stood in the 4ft looking the other way taking a photo in the dark

 

Then quantify the value. It’s often fair to criticise people and organisations for knowing the cost of everything and the value of nowt, but that also requires a willingness to measure the value so it can be assessed against cost.

If a business accounts for the cost of an activity at £2,500 then that is what that will use as the cost of that activity when considering the value of running it.

Ultimately, that accounting policy will make a judgment on how much to load fixed costs onto individual activities, and how much to run them on a purely marginal cost basis (coal, water, steaming fee, crew time if paid). Different businesses will do that in different ways, and all are flawed.

It’s easy to be critical of those judgments if they seem to make an activity look unaffordable. But unpicking them, and then working out what different policy to apply is a significant task. To draw out just one possible impact, it may mean that the day to day operation loses all impact from budgeting for the costs of overhauls, and that burden is placed on the overall business. So, and again depending on a lot of fine detail, more cash in the door but more asset life used.

This is in a sector, and at a railway, where adapting to the need to bear the full cost of assets rather than running down their residual life is probably the major threat to the future. In that context, and despite my general view that getting cash in the door is key, I’m reluctant to be too critical of railways being prudent.


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What value is there to the railway if it doesn’t make money?
Don’t come up with the old excuse that it is good publicity because that’s rubbish.

 

As a casual observer it would seem sensible that any special charter, operation should make some profit for the organisation and those taking part should appreciate that they are making a contribution to the existence of the railway. It will always be a fact of life that the cost will not be the same everywhere for various good reasons, e.g. built in profit margin, non recurring costs, cost of labour etc. In fact if you look at steam driver experience courses which I have been for my sons 21st birthday then there is quite a variation but most are understandable. Just to note you also have to be quick to book a slot so obviously there are still a lot of people prepared to pay for such an expenience.

 

One note on the "running empty trains" we tried cutting a train out of the A service a few years ago, that left a 2 hour gap between trains, meaning if you just missed one at Kidder, you could beat Toddington, Llangollen or Loughborough and on a train before another one appeared at Kidderminster. The result was no one came.
The solution was to reintroduce the third train, reducing the gap to just over an hour. As it was a DMU, that one transported a lot of fresh air, but the other two were often full.
Just cutting the service is rarely the answer