Swanage railway struggling?

[phil-b259]

1 hour ago, 009 micro modeller said:

It potentially works better for people coming from much further afield (where the car journey might be particularly long or inconvenient), although I suspect there isn’t really an equivalent in Swanage to the day trip traffic from London (by rail) through East Grinstead to the Bluebell.

I would say that a significant proportion of people (possibly as much as 50% or more)  starting their trips on the Bluebell at East Grinstead did not get there by national rail! Although there is no car parking at the Bluebell station (meaning folk have to fork out for either the National Rail or local council car parks) it is significantly closer to London / the M25 than Sheffield Park (I’m discounting Horsted as even though it has a car park it is accessed by windy country lanes).

 

Given the high cost of rail for large groups compared to the perceived cost of the same number of folk doing a car journey (which is basically fuel and car parking) most ‘main line  interchanges’ are not as well used as you think on a day to day basis…

 

Edited November 15, 2023 by phil-b259

[009 micro modeller]

5 hours ago, phil-b259 said:

I would say that a significant proportion of people (possibly as much as 50% or more)  starting their trips on the Bluebell at East Grinstead did not get there by national rail! Although there is no car parking at the Bluebell station (meaning folk have to fork out for either the National Rail or local council car parks) it is significantly closer to London / the M25 than Sheffield Park (I’m discounting Horsted as even though it has a car park it is accessed by windy country lanes).

 

Given the high cost of rail for large groups compared to the perceived cost of the same number of folk doing a car journey (which is basically fuel and car parking) most ‘main line  interchanges’ are not as well used as you think on a day to day basis…

 

Yes, I was thinking more though of people living in London who might not own or regularly use a car. I’m not sure Swanage has an equivalent group who would use a through Wareham service.

[john new]

9 hours ago, Northmoor said:

A car-load of people who are going to spend at least £50 on the train fares then probably another £10-20 on refreshments and gifts are less likely to worry about the cost of parking in Swanage.  A bit like encouraging them to arrive via the train to Wareham; it's a saving to individuals, probably marginal for couples, but if you have three or more in the car, coming by train instead is going to be significantly more expensive.

As someone living in Dorset who rides the Swanage Rly from time to time parking at Norden makes perfect sense rather than driving into Swanage to get the train back. If you look at the history of the revived route input from the County Council to ease traffic south of Corfe was a key factor. The geography and related road network of Purbeck makes that the common sense thing to do. If you contrast that with the NYMR which I have been a regular at since the 1970s the road network around Grosmont is far less vehicle friendly and for day trip people coming from the south and west Pickering is the sensible start point for a day out. Car parking there has expanded due to demand. Two seaside steam lines, vastly different situations regarding how people can access them.

 

The Wareham link - did it once when it was the 4TC set in use but to ride the 4TC. Is it practical for locals? Not really. Like so many Beeching era closures if you don’t want to drive in then from the Bournemouth and Poole conurbation the bus does it better. From the north and west the recent experimental train services were limited or use the half hourly Weymouth services. For me that is bus - train - 2nd train - and was then a 3rd train on the Swanage as the link didn’t go beyond Corfe. Even more complex for anyone coming down the Bristol line. The link as a through connection (as it last ran) only really of much use for long distance customers travelling from the east. 
 

Looking at the business case for the extra mileage it makes far more sense to me for the NYMR to do it than it does for the Swanage Railway. Much higher costs to off set with extra passengers and related revenue, not sure that income stream is there for a Wareham link even if Swanage can sort out their own DMU. 

[Railpassion]

On the NYMR, most journeys begin at Pickering for Whitby. A seven coach train can be filled at 0920 on a weekday morning even in early season. 

It's a full day out 0920 to 1840 or later.

A substantial journey. Whitby is a long way from anywhere. 

 

The Northern trains at Whitby are 5 a day, at roughly 4-hour intervals from Middlesbrough and beyond. These are often packed with day trippers for the 90 minute journey. 

It's not really comparable with Swanage which is a very pleasant short line and should never have closed as a branch line. 

The dedication of all at Swanage to restoring a railway is admirable. They've done an impressive job. 

If they could open a bay at Wareham they could run a self-contained service rather like Bodmin. I presume this was explored and was too difficult. 

 

 

 

[MarkC]

6 minutes ago, Railpassion said:

Whitby is a long way from anywhere. 

 

This is a cold, hard fact. The roads to Whitby from Teesside, Pickering and Scarborough are twisting, single carriageway and usually very busy, but still, it has to be said, quicker than any of the rail links of today or the past. This, of course, is one of the many factors that led to the closure of 3 out of 4 routes into Whitby; the Esk Valley only really being saved because of transport issues for schoolchildren during the winter, when snow & ice made road access to the outlying villages dangerous or impossible.

 

The road situation is unlikely to change either - what's there works, after a fashion, & if you think about it, why have traffic arriving via dual carriageway, only to get caught up in congestion in the town? Yes, you could build more Park & Ride car parks, but that would cause issues in itself. Locations, cost etc etc.

 

Mark

[phil-b259]

46 minutes ago, Railpassion said:

. 

If they could open a bay at Wareham they could run a self-contained service rather like Bodmin. I presume this was explored and was too difficult. 

 

 

The Swanage branch joins the main line a good half a mile west of Wateham station itself and the track between the junction and station has only ever accommodated a 2 track formation between the two with both tracks required for national rail services.

 

As a consequence any Swanage Railway train wanting to access Wareham has to fully comply with national rail regulations including central door locking of the carriages, AWS + TPWS + have the full OTMDR package on the locos, all staff passed out as competent in the national rail rule book and each piece of rolling stock be mainline registered.

 

(Note The NYMR has an exemption with respect to OTDMR due to the sparse national rail service reducing the risks of a serious incident occurring but has to comply with the rest of the requirements)

 

Then there is the little matter of paying Network Rail huge sums of money to alter the signalling at Wareham to put the bay back in…. 
 

Much the same issues are the reason why the West Somerset has never serious entertained the idea of running into Taunton even though it is physically linked to the national rail network….

Edited November 15, 2023 by phil-b259

[stewartingram]

I'm not sure the Norden bus is really a viable option, the car must win every time. I don't know what bus they use, but even if it is a d/d, thats only 70 seats to fill it. And only apparently once an hour. Useful but only up to a point.

[Jeremy Cumberland]

53 minutes ago, Railpassion said:

Whitby is a long way from anywhere. 

But if you are staying in the area, as many visitors to the NYMR are, then Whitby is one of the most important centres. Most of my rides on the NYMR have been from Whitby when I've been staying in the area for other reasons, such as being on a walking holiday. I'd never consider a ride on the NYMR as a day out from home.

 

I don't think opening to Whitby has increased the number of journey options. For most of the year there are only two return departures from Whitby, and I think this was probably the same when you needed to change at Grosmont (although the timing is probably better - as I recall, the "early" departure used to be before 09:00 from Whitby and involved quite a wait at Grosmont), but the visibility of steam trains in Whitby and not needing to change makes the line far more attractive to most visitors.

 

For what its worth, I've never been on the Swanage Railway. This would have been in day out territory when I lived down south - and I made several visits to Purbeck, including Swanage and Corfe Castle - but going for a ride on the railway was never an attractive proposition by public transport. Although it was no harder to get to than, say, Corfe Castle, it didn't really offer enough in itself for a day out, and it took up too much time if the idea was to visit somewhere else as well. I used to look forward to the Wareham extension opening, but it has come too late for me. However, even if I still lived in southern England, I can't say that the prospect of a diesel service thrills me, and not running on Sundays seems absurd if you want to capture the day tripper market travelling by rail, but I assume there is a reason for it.

[009 micro modeller]

21 hours ago, Jeremy Cumberland said:

For most of the year there are only two return departures from Whitby, and I think this was probably the same when you needed to change at Grosmont (although the timing is probably better - as I recall, the "early" departure used to be before 09:00 from Whitby and involved quite a wait at Grosmont), but the visibility of steam trains in Whitby and not needing to change makes the line far more attractive to most visitors.

When you say ‘when you needed to change at Grosmont’ do you mean between NYMR and National Rail before the heritage trains ran to Whitby at all, or when they did but they were separate from the Grosmont to Pickering ones? I think they did operate separately for a short period but can’t remember.

 

I was just having a look at the NYMR timetable for the season just finished:

 

I found the gold/silver/bronze terminology a bit confusing because in terms of Whitby services silver is not necessarily ‘better’ than bronze (as you might expect silver to be) but it looks as though they have a reasonable number of through Pickering to Whitby and return services on gold and bronze days. I note that the National Rail journey planner for tomorrow shows normal services leaving Whitby for Grosmont at 08:44, 11:59 and 15:57 (arriving at Grosmont 17 minutes later). There are two later trains at 19:42 and 22:23 as well. Obviously out of season for the NYMR (and on a weekday) and timetables for both heritage and National Rail trains might have changed over the past few years, but it suggests that it wouldn’t have been very easy to do Pickering to Whitby and return as a day out before the NYMR went to Whitby.

 

Also just to add to the not having to change point - having worked in a heritage visitor attraction I’d suggest the waiting around created by a change isn’t ideal for visitors, especially families (though there are things to look at and do at Grosmont). And if you redesign the timetable to remove the wait time it could lead to stress around catching the connection (not ideal during a leisure activity). So the through NYMR service to Whitby is definitely better from that point of view.

Edited November 16, 2023 by 009 micro modeller

[Jeremy Cumberland]

1 minute ago, 009 micro modeller said:

When you say ‘when you needed to change at Grosmont’ do you mean between NYMR and National Rail before the heritage trains ran to Whitby at all, or when they did but they were separate from the Grosmont to Pickering ones? I think they did operate separately for a short period but can’t remember.

Before the NYMR ran to Whitby at all.

 

 

3 minutes ago, 009 micro modeller said:

And if you redesign the timetable to remove the wait time it could lead to stress around catching the connection (not ideal during a leisure activity).

This was my immediate thought when I imagined the Swanage Railway trying to attract people wanting to go from Swanage to south coast destinations beyond Wareham - will I be able to get back? At least with the bus you know there's one every hour, and the last one's not till gone 11 pm.

[009 micro modeller]

4 hours ago, Jeremy Cumberland said:

This was my immediate thought when I imagined the Swanage Railway trying to attract people wanting to go from Swanage to south coast destinations beyond Wareham - will I be able to get back? At least with the bus you know there's one every hour, and the last one's not till gone 11 pm.

I don’t know if it’s more likely to be used by people from (or staying in) Swanage travelling to and from other destinations via Wareham or by people from elsewhere using the rail link at Wareham to get to the railway and Swanage itself. The wait time is a possible issue with any bus or National Rail train connection at a heritage railway (at Keighley or Cholsey, for instance) but they don’t have to actually share the same track and platforms with the service they’re connecting to, as at Wareham. I’m not sure how relevant the NYMR comparison is though from a visitor experience point of view because, in a way, for passengers it’s rather incidental that their train runs on Network Rail lines between Grosmont and Whitby, and it doesn’t do so to allow them to connect to National Rail services, instead forming a sort of alternative to these on the shared section. And in a lot of ways Swanage is more comparable to Whitby than Wareham is.

 

On 15/11/2023 at 11:32, Jeremy Cumberland said:

not running on Sundays seems absurd if you want to capture the day tripper market travelling by rail, but I assume there is a reason for it.

That was my thought too - especially when the Wareham-Swanage bus reduces to two-hourly on Sundays (so a competing or supplementary rail option could actually be more useful than on weekdays). I note though that the NYMR timetable similarly only shows one train each way to Whitby on Sundays. It’s odd because there would be less National Rail traffic using the railway on a Sunday as well (so potentially more paths, especially in the NYMR example where connecting to National Rail services doesn’t seem to be so important). Unless it’s related to the availability of Network Rail signalling staff on Sundays, or the heritage railways concerned not having enough advance notice of Sunday engineering work to block Whitby/Wareham ticket sales far enough ahead.

 

On this point, does anyone know the specifics of the signalling changes needed for the NYMR to operate to Whitby? Also, I’m sure I read somewhere about a time when engineering work between Grosmont and Middlesbrough somewhere had closed the Esk Valley line, but the NYMR still ran to Whitby as that specific bit was OK.

[john new]

33 minutes ago, 009 micro modeller said:

I don’t know if it’s more likely to be used by people from (or staying in) Swanage travelling to and from other destinations via Wareham or by people from elsewhere using the rail link at Wareham to get to the railway and Swanage itself. The wait time is a possible issue with any bus or National Rail train connection at a heritage railway (at Keighley or Cholsey, for instance) but they don’t have to actually share the same track and platforms with the service they’re connecting to, as at Wareham. I’m not sure how relevant the NYMR comparison is though from a visitor experience point of view because, in a way, for passengers it’s rather incidental that their train runs on Network Rail lines between Grosmont and Whitby, and it doesn’t do so to allow them to connect to National Rail services, instead forming a sort of alternative to these on the shared section. And in a lot of ways Swanage is more comparable to Whitby than Wareham is.

 

That was my thought too - especially when the Wareham-Swanage bus reduces to two-hourly on Sundays (so a competing or supplementary rail option could actually be more useful than on weekdays). I note though that the NYMR timetable similarly only shows one train each way to Whitby on Sundays. It’s odd because there would be less National Rail traffic using the railway on a Sunday as well (so potentially more paths, especially in the NYMR example where connecting to National Rail services doesn’t seem to be so important). Unless it’s related to the availability of Network Rail signalling staff on Sundays, or the heritage railways concerned not having enough advance notice of Sunday engineering work to block Whitby/Wareham ticket sales far enough ahead.

 

On this point, does anyone know the specifics of the signalling changes needed for the NYMR to operate to Whitby? Also, I’m sure I read somewhere about a time when engineering work between Grosmont and Middlesbrough somewhere had closed the Esk Valley line, but the NYMR still ran to Whitby as that specific bit was OK.

The service pattern will reflect the changed holiday/day trip habits over time of the passengers. It has changed over the nearly 40 years we've lived in this seaside/tourist area, the old come for a week/fortnight with Saturday as the main change-over day is much reduced. On the roads Thursdays often seem to be the busiest now for incoming traffic. 

[009 micro modeller]

1 hour ago, john new said:

The service pattern will reflect the changed holiday/day trip habits over time of the passengers. It has changed over the nearly 40 years we've lived in this seaside/tourist area, the old come for a week/fortnight with Saturday as the main change-over day is much reduced. On the roads Thursdays often seem to be the busiest now for incoming traffic. 

I’m still wondering why they would expect fewer visitors on weekends. For a museum or tourist attraction weekends are usually busier, even during school holidays (I’ve worked in one - weekends during school holidays tend to be even busier, with the school holiday visitors added on top of those who would normally visit on a weekend). The point being that I wonder if there are fewer services to Whitby on Sundays than at other times in the week (but apparently a similar number on the rest of the line) because of some external constraint related to operating on Network Rail on Sundays.

[Jeremy Cumberland]

32 minutes ago, 009 micro modeller said:

I’m still wondering why they would expect fewer visitors on weekends. For a museum or tourist attraction weekends are usually busier, even during school holidays (I’ve worked in one - weekends during school holidays tend to be even busier, with the school holiday visitors added on top of those who would normally visit on a weekend). The point being that I wonder if there are fewer services to Whitby on Sundays than at other times in the week (but apparently a similar number on the rest of the line) because of some external constraint related to operating on Network Rail on Sundays.

It largely depends on whether most of their customers are holidaymakers or daytrippers. Holidaymakers, even today, tend to travel to and from their holiday at weekends, and are more likely to visit local attractions on Monday to Thursday. Several heritage railways in holiday areas structure their timetable accordingly, including the Ffestiniog Railway, the Ravenglass and Eskdale Railway and the North York Moors Railway.

 

Attractions outside of holiday destinations rely more on daytrippers. Unless these are mainly retired people (or unaccompanied schoolchildren), then visitor numbers will be higher at weekends. The Keighley and Worth Valley Railway is an excellent example, with a 100% steam service on summer weekends, a 50% diesel service (and one less train) on summer Tuesdays to Thursdays and a considerably reduced service on Mondays and Fridays.

 

I don't know which pattern best fits the Swanage Railway. It's got a large catchment within daytripper distance (anywhere between London and Bristol down to the south coast, I should think), but Purbeck and the Jurassic Coast is also a holiday destination. In terms of potential visitors by main line train, though, I'd have thought it more likely to be daytrippers from Southampton/Bournemouth/Poole, and further afield to London and Reading - anyone with reasonably easy access to the Waterloo to Weymouth line. I am not sure where most holidaymakers stay, but I doubt that many of them are close enough to a railway station to think of leaving the car behind.

[john new]

57 minutes ago, 009 micro modeller said:

I’m still wondering why they would expect fewer visitors on weekends. For a museum or tourist attraction weekends are usually busier, even during school holidays (I’ve worked in one - weekends during school holidays tend to be even busier, with the school holiday visitors added on top of those who would normally visit on a weekend). The point being that I wonder if there are fewer services to Whitby on Sundays than at other times in the week (but apparently a similar number on the rest of the line) because of some external constraint related to operating on Network Rail on Sundays.

Slightly flippant but have you ever tried driving on a Saturday using the roads leading to the central and west Dorset coast? Return runs in the evening equally frustrating. Roads within the triangle bordered by Exeter - Bristol - Southampton are nothing to write home about and both main routes [road - A303 and the ex-LSWR main line via Yeovil Junc.] run east to west.  Weymouth & Bournemouth the only two towns where the railway station is anywhere near being convenient for the beach.

[phil-b259]

11 minutes ago, Jeremy Cumberland said:

It largely depends on whether most of their customers are holidaymakers or daytrippers. Holidaymakers, even today, tend to travel to and from their holiday at weekends, and are more likely to visit local attractions on Monday to Thursday. Several heritage railways in holiday areas structure their timetable accordingly, including the Ffestiniog Railway, the Ravenglass and Eskdale Railway and the North York Moors Railway.

 

This is a very important point!

 

IIIRC I was chatting to one of the signalmen at The Gloucestershire & Warwickshire Railway about their timetable a few years ago and they said they specifically didn't operate on a certain day even during the school summer holidays because that was 'changeover day' when one lot of tourists would go home and a fresh lot would arrive so there were a lot less potential visitors on that day.

 

Its not just Railways which do this - I was in Barnstable during the summer and found that lots of places (tea rooms etc) were shut on Monday - because that was the 'changeover day' in that part of the world.

 

On the other hand if you are not really in 'long holiday' country and most visitors will tend to be folk making day trips out from a big city (as is often the case with attractions in the South east of England) then the number of potential visitors tends to be more consistent over the week without a specific 'changeover' day

[phil-b259]

2 minutes ago, john new said:

Slightly flippant but have you ever tried driving on a Saturday using the roads leading to the central and west Dorset coast? Return runs in the evening equally frustrating. Roads within the triangle bordered by Exeter - Bristol - Southampton are nothing to write home about and both main routes [road - A303 and the ex-LSWR main line via Yeovil Junc.] run east to west.  Weymouth & Bournemouth the only two towns where the railway station is anywhere near being convenient for the beach.

 

Yes but how about asking yourself why the roads are so busy?

 

Its because like it or not, most groups, particularly families go for days out by car!

 

They have no intention of messing round with trains however bad the queues and its very naive / foolish for people to think that will change even if the Swanage Railway did have good connections between themselves and SWR at Wareham

[john new]

4 minutes ago, phil-b259 said:

 

Yes but how about asking yourself why the roads are so busy?

 

Its because like it or not, most groups, particularly families go for days out by car!

 

They have no intention of messing round with trains however bad the queues and its very naive / foolish for people to think that will change even if the Swanage Railway did have good connections between themselves and SWR at Wareham

Don't disagree regarding use of rail alternatives should they be there - the point I was making is why people who can do so shift their day trips to mid-week as another responder up the thread was surprised at the lower level of weekend running. 

 

Edited November 16, 2023 by john new

[009 micro modeller]

1 hour ago, Jeremy Cumberland said:

It largely depends on whether most of their customers are holidaymakers or daytrippers. Holidaymakers, even today, tend to travel to and from their holiday at weekends, and are more likely to visit local attractions on Monday to Thursday. Several heritage railways in holiday areas structure their timetable accordingly, including the Ffestiniog Railway, the Ravenglass and Eskdale Railway and the North York Moors Railway.

And the NYMR gold timetable is on Monday to Thursday during school summer holidays, so that’s probably the rationale for it. It was the difference between Saturdays and Sundays in particular (and specifically to Whitby - the rest of the line seems to have about the same number of services on both days) that I thought was more surprising.

 

53 minutes ago, phil-b259 said:

 

Yes but how about asking yourself why the roads are so busy?

 

Its because like it or not, most groups, particularly families go for days out by car!

 

They have no intention of messing round with trains however bad the queues and its very naive / foolish for people to think that will change even if the Swanage Railway did have good connections between themselves and SWR at Wareham

Not disagreeing with this overall, however it does also depend a bit on the area (for instance, in London with good public transport and congested roads, people are more likely to use the train). Although I don’t think Swanage is necessarily near enough to London to tap this market in the same way as the Bluebell or Spa Valley (both of which have main line connections). From an environmental point of view it would be good if heritage railways could encourage people to visit by public transport, but I’m not sure how well-placed they are to do so, independently of any other similar local initiatives.

 

57 minutes ago, phil-b259 said:

 

This is a very important point!

 

IIIRC I was chatting to one of the signalmen at The Gloucestershire & Warwickshire Railway about their timetable a few years ago and they said they specifically didn't operate on a certain day even during the school summer holidays because that was 'changeover day' when one lot of tourists would go home and a fresh lot would arrive so there were a lot less potential visitors on that day.

 

Its not just Railways which do this - I was in Barnstable during the summer and found that lots of places (tea rooms etc) were shut on Monday - because that was the 'changeover day' in that part of the world.

 

On the other hand if you are not really in 'long holiday' country and most visitors will tend to be folk making day trips out from a big city (as is often the case with attractions in the South east of England) then the number of potential visitors tends to be more consistent over the week without a specific 'changeover' day

Even in areas that have more day trippers than holiday visitors, or a mixture of the two, a lot of museums etc. seem to be closed on Monday and/or Tuesday. Again this will often be based on trends in visitor numbers (and also in many cases because it suits their operations to have a closed day for maintenance, exhibition installation, staff training etc.).

[Railpassion]

Whitby has fewer NYMR trains on Sundays due to a more concentrated Northern timetable, meaning the paths available are restricted. 

Before the year round Sunday service from Middlesbrough etc, NYMR had  freedom to operate more trains and even run to Battersby. 

This is no longer possible. 

 

[009 micro modeller]

9 hours ago, Railpassion said:

a more concentrated Northern timetable

Yes, looking at the journey planner they did seem less spaced out on Sundays, but with no early morning or late evening service. Is that what you meant by ‘more concentrated’?

 

I thought occasional running to Whitby and Battersby pre-dated the proper extension to Whitby, complete with dedicated platform and siding etc. for NYMR trains? Did anyone really get on and off at Battersby or was it mostly an excursion out and back?

[45655]

20 hours ago, 009 micro modeller said:

On this point, does anyone know the specifics of the signalling changes needed for the NYMR to operate to Whitby? Also, I’m sure I read somewhere about a time when engineering work between Grosmont and Middlesbrough somewhere had closed the Esk Valley line, but the NYMR still ran to Whitby as that specific bit was OK.

The last time I visited the NR Whitby line was train crew operated Electric Key Token (from Nunthorpe I think) with an intermediate instrument at Grosmont in the Battersby-Whitby section and a ground frame unlocked by the token to allow NYMR trains to access the Whitby line. At Whitby the NYMR now has its own platform which allows its trains to "lock out" of the section.  This is accessed by another token-released ground frame.  Simple but effective.

 

Keith

Alton.

[MarkC]

45 minutes ago, 45655 said:

The last time I visited the NR Whitby line was train crew operated Electric Key Token (from Nunthorpe I think) with an intermediate instrument at Grosmont in the Battersby-Whitby section and a ground frame unlocked by the token to allow NYMR trains to access the Whitby line. At Whitby the NYMR now has its own platform which allows its trains to "lock out" of the section.  This is accessed by another token-released ground frame.  Simple but effective.

 

Keith

Alton.

It's actually the Glaisdale-Whitby section. Also, not only can Platform 2 be locked out, as you say, the sidings & associated loop are now only accessed from P2 as well.

 

It all seems to work quite well; sadly the cost of modifying the branch operation further, by splitting Glaisdale-Whitby into Glaisdale-Grosmont and Grosmont-Whitby, was too high to be justified.

 

Mark

[45655]

4 minutes ago, MarkC said:

It's actually the Glaisdale-Whitby section. Also, not only can Platform 2 be locked out, as you say, the sidings & associated loop are now only accessed from P2 as well.

 

It all seems to work quite well; sadly the cost of modifying the branch operation further, by splitting Glaisdale-Whitby into Glaisdale-Grosmont and Grosmont-Whitby, was too high to be justified.

 

Mark

Thanks.  I had forgotten that the section was from Glaisdale.

 

As you say, it seems to work well enough as it stands, and the cost will have been a whole lot less than the £3m I believe it cost for the signalling alterations needed to get Swanage Railway trains into Wareham.

 

Keith 

Alton.

[Wheatley]

On 15/11/2023 at 09:46, Railpassion said:

On the NYMR, most journeys begin at Pickering for Whitby. A seven coach train can be filled at 0920 on a weekday morning even in early season. 

It's a full day out 0920 to 1840 or later.

A substantial journey. Whitby is a long way from anywhere. 

 

This. Through running to Whitby has opened up the market to day trippers from Leeds and York, and to holiday makers south of Scarborough who would previously have gone to Whitby by car* and who would not have considered going from Grosmont even if they could find it. A substantial part of the West Riding decamps to the East and North Yorkshire coasts during the summer and Pickering is dead easy to get to from Scarborough, Filey and Bridlington. 

 

* Of which there are still plenty, but the train is an attractive add-on to those who don't want to fight their way through Scarborough or drive around in circles at Whitby looking for a parking space.