Longest Heritage Railway extension

[Doctor Fegg]

And you are happy that your income tax goes towards subsidising a service that would be used by only a handful of passengers e.g. Totnes to Buckfastleigh, Bodmin Parkway to Bodmin, Keighley to Oxenhope, Kidderminster to Bridgnorth? To name but a few......

Given that my income tax would otherwise go towards building more roads and subsidising the current Government’s chums at “PPE R US”, yes, I’m very happy with that.

 

[A S Leib]

Have you seen the St Ives line in peak season? It's no mere handful of passengers, it's a wedged four car 150 that has to run at such an intense frequency that they double crew it so that there's no need to change ends. I understand that they are considering building a second platform at St Ives so that doors can be opened on both sides of the unit to save boarding time. After Truro, the station is the second busiest in Cornwall, with 200k more passengers than Penzance.

As for handfuls of passengers on short journeys. Looe, St Ives, Exmouth, Severn Beach, Pembroke, Penarth, Marlow, Henley, Windermere, Alloa (reopened) North Berwick, Lymington seem to survive, with subsidy

Henley had ~750,000 passengers per year pre-pandemic, or 2,000 per day, or an average of 60 per train (although I suspect that that's rather seasonal); I'd suspect it needs far less subsidy than Wallingford would if the line to Cholsey were brought back into the NR network.

 

[Brush 4]

Still, subsidy is the answer for TOC/heritage line services.

 

[zwk500]

Given that my income tax would otherwise go towards building more roads and subsidising the current Government’s chums at “PPE R US”, yes, I’m very happy with that.

That lot won't be in office forever.

Still, subsidy is the answer for TOC/heritage line services.

But what problem are TOC/Heritage services the answer to? To have a useful service you will realistically need an hourly frequency and a linespeed above 25mph, which few heritage railways could afford to maintain the infrastructure for. There may be isolated cases of first/last trains being helpful, but given the financial help heritage railways already recoeve as charities and museums, sinking more of the railway operating budget into them seems rather poor use of the resources.

 

[paul1609]

That lot won't be in office forever.

But what problem are TOC/Heritage services the answer to? To have a useful service you will realistically need an hourly frequency and a linespeed above 25mph, which few heritage railways could afford to maintain the infrastructure for. There may be isolated cases of first/last trains being helpful, but given the financial help heritage railways already recoeve as charities and museums, sinking more of the railway operating budget into them seems rather poor use of the resources.

Id think that theres a very good argument to be made that the limited support that heritage railways receive is taxpayers money well spent when compare to "the railway operating budget". Im thinking of the large part of the national network that is actually a thinly disguised tourist industry rather than main stream public transport: Settle & Carlisle, Cornish Branches (ex St Ives), Conwy Valley, Highland lines, I could go on...., let alone the billions spunked on knocking 10 mins off the London to Manchester service or providing a fourth competing London to Birmingham route.

 

[A S Leib]

spunked on knocking 10 mins off the London to Manchester service or providing a fourth competing London to Birmingham route.

Knocking forty minutes off of Birmingham–Manchester / Leeds / Preston times, freeing up space for intermediate stations on the existing routes...

 

[paul1609]

Knocking forty minutes off of Birmingham–Manchester / Leeds / Preston times, freeing up space for intermediate stations on the existing routes...

Not until the Euston "extension" is built it wont. If you dont believe me see Roger Fords article in the latest Modern Railways.

 

[A S Leib]

Not until the Euston "extension" is built it wont. If you dont believe me see Roger Fords article in the latest Modern Railways.

So are you in favour of HS2 in full but against the scaled-back version, or opposed to any of it? I can't really tell from your original post.

I agree that the savings are a lot less without doing anything north of Crewe or heading northeast from Birmingham.

 

[paul1609]

So are you in favour of HS2 in full but against the scaled-back version, or opposed to any of it? I can't really tell from your original post.

I agree that the savings are a lot less without doing anything north of Crewe or heading northeast from Birmingham.

I didnt express an opinion, I was just pointing out that I believe it was rather poor value when compared to economic benefits of heritage railways provided by modest Government concession: charities, VAT etc. in the context of the topic.

 

[Mag_seven]

Right can we get back to discussing the longest Heritage Railway Extension and ditch the HS2 discussion please for which plenty of other threads exist.

thanks

 

[zwk500]

Id think that theres a very good argument to be made that the limited support that heritage railways receive is taxpayers money well spent when compare to "the railway operating budget".

I agree, so keep spending only a limited amount of heritage railway who provide an excellent return to the tourist industry, and keep the actual train service focused on trying to be more efficient.

Im thinking of the large part of the national network that is actually a thinly disguised tourist industry rather than main stream public transport: Settle & Carlisle, Cornish Branches (ex St Ives), Conwy Valley, Highland lines, I could go on....,

Which Heritage railways would take over these lines, or how would national TOCs running onto Heritage Railways achieve this? Considering that the S&C and Highland lines have freight on them.