A very sad time for the FR

[METHSSNIFFER]

This year is seeing some drastic changes to what was once a traditional narrow gauge railway, preserved by the work of so many.
But commercialism has overtaken traditional heritage and money has become more important than keeping it has it was once. To the point the FR are now laying plastic sleepers, creating a Clapham Junction with increased signalling at Harbour station. Have influenced the council to build a bypass increasing a flooding risk and an eyesore to the estuary creating a new bridge over it that doesn't fit in with the traditional construction. What is happening to the old FR its so so sad.

[WVLR]

This year is seeing some drastic changes to what was once a traditional narrow gauge railway, preserved by the work of so many.
But commercialism has overtaken traditional heritage and money has become more important than keeping it has it was once. To the point the FR are now laying plastic sleepers, creating a Clapham Junction with increased signalling at Harbour station. Have influenced the council to build a bypass increasing a flooding risk and an eyesore to the estuary creating a new bridge over it that doesn't fit in with the traditional construction. What is happening to the old FR its so so sad.

No it isn't, it's progress, stop living in the past.

[bessytractor]

This year is seeing some drastic changes to what was once a traditional narrow gauge railway, preserved by the work of so many.
But commercialism has overtaken traditional heritage and money has become more important than keeping it has it was once. To the point the FR are now laying plastic sleepers, creating a Clapham Junction with increased signalling at Harbour station. Have influenced the council to build a bypass increasing a flooding risk and an eyesore to the estuary creating a new bridge over it that doesn't fit in with the traditional construction. What is happening to the old FR its so so sad.

what utter rubbish.  Its no different to what happened in the past, they are merely adapting to new requirements, just like every preserved railway in the country. Quite frankly if it was kept as it was it would probably not survive.

[WVLR]

For one I can't wait to get over to Porthmadog to see what they've been up to.

[laurence703]

The Changes will bring nothing but good things! The bypass has freed up traffic in the honey-pot town. The new station layout will make operating the two railways so much easier!

It's not like they're knocking down harbour station and building a mini Birmingham new street...

[METHSSNIFFER]

The Changes will bring nothing but good things! The bypass has freed up traffic in the honey-pot town. The new station layout will make operating the two railways so much easier!

It's not like they're knocking down harbour station and building a mini Birmingham new street...

I've seen no freeing up of traffic in the honeypot town. The traffic has an equivalent volume has it once did, cos of the visitors to the railway, which has increased since its opening. The railway is over promoting itself and will suffer the consequences if it doesn't take a step back.

[WVLR]

The railway is over promoting itself and will suffer the consequences if it doesn't take a step back.

Yes METHSSNIFFER Your right, let's go back to 1832 and remake the railway as the tramway that it was intended to be as of the act of Parliament.
That will certainly do the economics of the area a lot of good. All the money that was spent on the upgrade to Harbour station
could have been spent on re-instating the line through what is now Tanygrisiau reservoir.

[laurence703]

The Changes will bring nothing but good things! The bypass has freed up traffic in the honey-pot town. The new station layout will make operating the two railways so much easier!

It's not like they're knocking down harbour station and building a mini Birmingham new street...

I've seen no freeing up of traffic in the honeypot town. The traffic has an equivalent volume has it once did, cos of the visitors to the railway, which has increased since its opening. The railway is over promoting itself and will suffer the consequences if it doesn't take a step back.

Why are you being so Negative of all the hard work that has gone into the railway by the countless volunteers?? Have you done anything to help them? Or are you just another Armchair Enthusiast... Go and tell them your views on what they're doing to THEIR railway and see where that gets you!

[MuzTrem]

The railway is over promoting itself and will suffer the consequences if it doesn't take a step back.

WHAT?!

I mean, literally, WHAT?!

The railway needs allthe passengers that it can attract, otherwise how will it ever have the revenue to be sustainable?

As for the harbour station mods, to be honest the "heritage" atmosphere of the station had already been ruined by the 1970s extension. But without the facilities that the latter provides, the railway would not be able to offer a satisfactory service to visitors - result, everyone tells their friends what a bad day they had and never comes back. Result, no visitors; result, no money; result, no FfR!

Preserving any kind of "heritage" - be it a railway, or a historic house, or a museum collection - will alwaysinvolve compromises. IMHO the station mods are a price worth paying to allow the reopening of the WHR through to harbour station.

[METHSSNIFFER]

The FR has not yet reached its peak, that it wants to achieve like other railways have done so already. Th TR, The VOR etc.
The FR still has to rebuild all the England Locos and a rake of all the types of quarrymans coaches plus a lot lot more. In achieving this yes it has to promote itself and put bums on seats to get the revenue. The soon its done the better. If it will ever. The FR will continue to alter and change. That's now its nature.

[DolwyddelanLightRail]

The FR has not yet reached its peak, that it wants to achieve like other railways have done so already. Th TR, The VOR etc.
The FR still has to rebuild all the England Locos and a rake of all the types of quarrymans coaches plus a lot lot more. In achieving this yes it has to promote itself and put bums on seats to get the revenue. The soon its done the better. If it will ever. The FR will continue to alter and change. That's now its nature.

Erm, why exactly do they need to re-build ALL the englands? I'm pretty sure that the Railway has plenty enough locos, actually, MORE than enough locos for what it needs. It appears all you seem to really do is just watch the webcam too much from you armchair to actually know what it can be like at Harbour Station now that the WHR runs in there.

[METHSSNIFFER]

I'm always there and I've seen the operations over the last thirty years. That's why I'm  so passionate about the FR and modelling it. For the latter I do sit in an armchair.

Correction 46 yrs I went there when I was 6.

[laurence703]

Then you'll know how much of a pain in the bottom the current station layout is...
There's no point in rebuilding all of the Englands as they depict different eras and why would you want four of the same loco???

[IRON MAN]

My only gripe and worry is the WHR platform placement. When the welsh weather does its thing, WHR passengers will get very wet. Also worried that it will end up with a canopy like Caernafon.

The signalling although complicated will be interesting. In thirty years time it will be common practice and the norm.

Methsniffer? you have watched it for 40 odd years and not taken part. If you had been here for that long it could be you making the decisions. If you had been around here enough you would have noticed that the cob isn't the mile long car park that it once was. And that traffic flows a hell of a lot better than it used to.

Locowise the railway has too many of the tings to use for service. In High summer the FR requires two doubles and a single to operate the main service. Double headed Englands or double headed Ladies could however sub in to provide a few days of maintenance for the doubles.

Talking of maintenance does anyone know how many service trains failed this year....?

[jim@NAL]

I think this is call progress .if everything stayed the same life would be very boring

[TonyW]

... Have influenced the council to build a bypass increasing a flooding risk and an eyesore to the estuary creating a new bridge over it that doesn't fit in with the traditional construction.

I do not wish to comment on the FR, but as one who lives 3 miles from Porthmadog and who visits the town frequently your comments concerning the bypass are wrong wrong wrong.

The "council" (although I am unsure whether you mean Gwynedd Council or Porthmadog Town Council) had nothing to do with the construction of the bypass. All of the work was done by the Welsh Assembly Government. See http://www.ceequal.com/awards_133.html to see a confirmation of this and details of the Outstanding Achievement Award 2013 for Ecology & Biodiversity that the project won.

It was Porthmadog Town Council that fought tooth and nail to stop the WHR from crossing Britannia Bridge and having the "street running" sections of track.

The only issues with flooding appear to concern a school playing field and the local football club's pitch. From my own observations, I believe that both issues must now be resolved as I have not seen any flooding of these areas for over a year, even following the latest heavy rainfall in this area.

The classic view of the estuary is from the Cob, from which the new river bridge (alongside and behind the railway bridge) is all but invisible. The bypass was built deliberately with no street lighting and behind an earth bank planted with trees to make its visual impact as minimal as possible. At present, looking from the Cob it is difficult to even know the bypass is there, with only tall lorrys visible as they pass in the distance. The trees are doing their best to grow as quickly as possible.

Minffordd Quarry continues to be a clearly seen industrial blot on the landscape.

Most importantly, the bypass has brought Porthmadog back to life. Instead of being the traffic clogged (and polluted) place it used to be it now has a feeling of the bustling town it always wanted to be. There were worries that the bypass would take trade away from the shops but the exact opposite appears to have happened. Visitors can now enter the town quickly (rather than sitting in a traffic jam for anything up to an hour) and park. Crossing the High Street no longer requires passing between the bumpers of queueing cars.

My wife and I used to have a policy of not visiting Porthmadog during daylight hours in July and August because the place was a living hell. The bypass changed that overnight when it opened. Porthmadog is now a nice place to visit!

One last thing: Following the problems with the bridge at Penrhyndeudraeth and the recent storms we have a very real prospect of there being no Cambrian trains at all from Harlech to Porthmadog and Pwllheli until 2015.

[Lner fan Sam]

Having no Cambrian trains, is that a good thing or a bad thing for the area tony?

[TonyW]

Having no Cambrian trains, is that a good thing or a bad thing for the area tony?

Bad. Very bad.

The trains provide useful transport for those that do not have their own vehicle. While there are quite good bus services, especially considering the very rural nature of this area, they do not have the same direct routes that the trains provide. Before the storm washed away the track at Tywyn last week our "train" service was provided by buses to and from Harlech. The road alongside the railway at Penrhyndeudraeth is either closed or only open to cars (depending on the time of day) so the buses have to travel via Maentwrog, adding about 15 miles to the journey just to cross the river.

The Tesco store in Porthmadog is very close to the railway station, and there were many people who visited the town by train from all points along the coast to do their weekly shop. Again, far more difficult and time consuming when done by bus.

The trains also carried a lot - a lot! - of schoolchildren to and from Harlech, Porthmadog and Pwllheli, and the timetable was built around their movements. They now have to go by bus, adding the best part of an hour to most journeys.

Not good.

[steamie1]

We have to be careful not to 'take a pop' at a fellow rail enthusiast 'blowing steam'. Views make a colourful mix, but a mild argument can knock down within. Lets all agree to love railways, nod to a fellow enthusiast. We hope for the future. Promotion of the railway whatever form and endeavours help shape what we enjoy and what others will when we are gone. Our time is but brief and understanding too often limited.

I think you are all passionate railway folk as are the FR folk. I salute all who like a railway and hope enjoyment and peace rule, now and when I'm gone.

[Soar Valley Light]

Woo hoo! What a contentious post!

The bottom line as I see it is that this is a free country. Methsniffer is perfectly entitled to his opinion and has every right to voice it if he so wishes. That doesn't mean any individual or organisation has to take any notice of it if they disagree. They do, of course, have an equal right of reply.

Being actively involved in the development and maintenance (not just the glory operational jobs) on two heritage railways I feel I may have some useful comment to add to the debate - otherwise I'd have kept my head down and watched with interest!

Firstly I have no idea what the aims and the objectives of the FR are. If they are to preserve the FR of a particular period or style then the points Methsniffer makes have weight and credance. However, if the aim is simply to keep the railway operating for the pleasure of it's membership and the local area then it has to be accepted that the 'old' railway will be tweaked, modified, rebuilt, extended and otherwise developed to attract business. Some changes HAVE to be made to meet H&S legislation, generally of the operating aspects of a railway. Other changes of a similar nature may be required to keep the catering arangerments compliant. Indeed, the catering arrangements have almost exclusively been new additions to every railway and without them there would be a terminal decline in family traffic. For the same reason some other facilities have to change too. The number of visitors, for instance, mean that a single earth closet WC is totally inadequate for the numbers visiting - and who wants to have a dump in an earth closet in the first place these days?!

I have know the FR for a similar number of years to Methsniffer and have seen many changes which would suggest to me the company are running a business rather than a museum. No matter how museum orientated a railway is, in this day and age they MUST look to commercialism or face the very real risk of going out of business. The jam is spread too thin these days to survive on goodwill donations alone. They remain vitally important but Heritage is (somewhat sadly) now a business. This is a fact some volunteers have yet to grasp (or risk destroying their own hobby). It's sad, but until the economy picks up dramatically, a harsh reality.

A friend of mine spent several years working on a the traditional signalling at Rhiw Goch, only to see it swept aside by modern replacement before it was even commissioned. Not unexpectedly he voted with his feet and left. The company must have had a reason for it's course of action though. I seem to remember similar contention over the issue of conversion to oil firing many years ago. I'm not sure how the governance of the FR works but most heritage railway companies are accountable in some way to their membership organisation on such matters, the members therefore have a say on how their railways are run.

And there we come to the primary point in my view. How any particular railway is run is really down to it's membership, and it's working membership in particular. They are the people making the mos t valuable investment in their railway - that is their own spare time and money.

Whilst working Loughborough box last Sunday I had the pleasure of a chat with one of the FR's signal engineers when he asked if he could have a look in the box. The Porthmadog project is clearly operationally driven and well considered. I can't see the ORR wearing WHR train backing into harbour station simply because that's how it used to be done. As such the scheme would appear to have justification, not having seen the design of the infrastructure I hesitate to comment on how appropriate it is.

Right, this is me ducking to miss all the brickbats!

Andrew