Could we see a competitive tender exercise for jacobite tourist services in future with all operators with suitable stock and low commotives or indeed even scenic multiple units allowed to participate?
AIUI the Jacobite is entirely a WCRC thing, the promoter are a subsidiary of WCRC IIRC and there is no way on god's earth WCRC would ever tender to a competitor.
You might see competition to operate Steam trains between Fort William and Mallaig but different companies likely wouldn't bother with the Jacobite name.
That’s an interesting thought. There’s only the SRPS in Scotland though and I don’t know if they have a compliant rake on the go or any suitable steam locomotives available to them?
Fairly sure the SRPS don't have an operating license, they contract with the mainline charter operators as and when required. LSL were talking about establishing a scottish base for a long while, not sure if DB or DRS are still in the charter market.
But if another operator with compliant stock came along, WCRC could easily just run a light engine in those paths to prevent it.
Not quite that simple - The bidding operator could dispute the access decision claiming they're bringing passengers to the railway which a Light locomotive certainly isn't. It's also possible that the light locomotive runs would be counted as a cancellation and spot bid so WCRC would be in danger of releasing the paths anyway. (I am aware of at least one other Charter LTP operation that got the paths transferred due to lack of use, despite the original owner using them at the last minute).
Drifting a little further back to topic, it will be very interesting now to see what sort of time scale the review of WC RC application for exemptions takes, would I be being highly cynical if I said that it might be speeded up if somebody fairly senior within the office of real and road or a closely linked department suddenly realized that he couldn't take his eight-year-old on the Hogwarts Express over the late may bank holiday weekend?
I'd be very surprised if the ORR got this close to achieving their goal and then relented when they could easily take an 8yo to the Studio Tour at Watford.