Swanage to Wareham postponed again

[paul1609]

You can have a very good estimate though.

For example, I don’t know for sure that it’s not going snow in Hertfordshire tomorrow, but the clever weather models rather suggest that it won’t.

Similarly, I don’t know for sure exactly how many passengers a year would use a reopened line from Carmarthen to Aberystwyth, but I’d bet my last penny it would be nearer 200,000 than 20m. The clever transport models will give you a reasonable estimate.

The perceived wisdom in heritage railway cycles for new services and extensions is that the novelty effect means that if you take passenger numbers in year 1 of a new service as 100% all things being equal it will drop to around 90% in year 2 and then to around 75 to 80% in year 3 and subsequent years.

 

[Bald Rick]

The perceived wisdom in heritage railway cycles for new services and extensions is that the novelty effect means that if you take passenger numbers in year 1 of a new service as 100% all things being equal it will drop to around 90% in year 2 and then to around 75 to 80% in year 3 and subsequent years.

I can well believe that for heritage railways.

for the main line, the convention is a build up over the first three years, as people move house etc.

 

[tumbles]

If Covid was the excuse last year, when there may well have been the biggest opportunity given the foreign travel restrictions and the amount of UK holidays taken, then they may well have missed the boat. If it couldn't be made to work last year, then it's probably never going to work.

It was heaving down there last summer and 2020. As I say thou, it was £25 return for a family of four to go from Corfe/HC to Swanage and back, per day.. and a weeks car parking at the main beach car park was a very reasonable £33. Thankfully our campsite was on the right side of Corfe so its a simple 10 minute car journey. Would love to use the train but not at that sort of price!

 

[VEP3417]

£25 for a family of 4 seems reasonable when just 1 ticket for the diesel gala this year is £40pp

as i have previously said, seeing as the beer festival is also on.....would have been nice to be able to take the train all the way there rather than drive....and no i dont wish to take the bus....

 

[yorksrob]

Yes, but not when it has been restored under false pretences using taxpayer’ cash. They’ve had all the kit fitted for mainline operation, but haven’t used it. I think that’s called taking the proverbial.

Not at all. There's always been the intention to run the service to Wareham. As far as I'm aware, the still is, however the SR seem to be biding their time until they're sure the market has recovered.

 

[43096]

Not at all. There's always been the intention to run the service to Wareham. As far as I'm aware, the still is, however the SR seem to be biding their time until they're sure the market has recovered.

As I said above if it couldn’t be made to work last year with the number of holidays taken in the U.K., then it’s hard to see how it will ever work.

 

[yorksrob]

As I said above if it couldn’t be made to work last year with the number of holidays taken in the U.K., then it’s hard to see how it will ever work.

Passenger numbers were still down and there was still uncertainty over what restrictions would be brought back. It's no wonder they didn't embark on it last year.

 

[zwk500]

Not at all. There's always been the intention to run the service to Wareham. As far as I'm aware, the still is, however the SR seem to be biding their time until they're sure the market has recovered.

Will it ever recover to the point where the £70k loss over 60 days is reduced to something sustainable?

 

[yorksrob]

Will it ever recover to the point where the £70k loss over 60 days is reduced to something sustainable?

They had the expected number of passengers who presumably paid the fare. They will have calculated the necessary number of passengers running their own trains, so it's likely they could get down to something sustainable.

 

[A0]

Will it ever recover to the point where the £70k loss over 60 days is reduced to something sustainable?

Any charitable body knowingly operating something with a £ 1000 day avoidable loss over a 2 month period needs to be *very* careful indeed otherwise the Charity Commissioners and others will, quite rightly, start looking at whether the charity itself is financially sustainable and viable.

The adult / OAP return fare between Swanage and Wareham in 2017 was £ 15 - so they'd need to carry an extra 75 passengers a day, every day, just to break even - that's a big ask.

I suspect Wareham will occur occasionally on a "high day and holiday" type basis a bit like the NNR - but any prospect of "regular" week in week out services is frankly not viable.

 

[paul1609]

Will it ever recover to the point where the £70k loss over 60 days is reduced to something sustainable?

I believe its more complicated than just a £70k loss on Norden - Wareham because the new service extracted passengers from the core heritage Swanage to Norden operation there's probably forum members with better info than me but I recall passenger numbers decreased by about 6000 over the period of the trial. I think it was basically a disaster financially for the Swanage Railway.

 

[yorksrob]

I believe its more complicated than just a £70k loss on Norden - Wareham because the new service extracted passengers from the core heritage Swanage to Norden operation there's probably forum members with better info than me but I recall passenger numbers decreased by about 6000 over the period of the trial. I think it was basically a disaster financially for the Swanage Railway.

Would they not be getting a substantial chunk of the £15 fare anyway ?

 

[A0]

Would they not be getting a substantial chunk of the £15 fare anyway ?

A substantial chunk of the fare when the overall scheme was loss making is still loss making - that much I'd have thought was obvious ?

 

[yorksrob]

A substantial chunk of the fare when the overall scheme was loss making is still loss making - that much I'd have thought was obvious ?

Someone mentioned "abstraction" from existing Swanage Railway services. Surely if part of the fare is going to the Swanage Railway, that's less abstraction than from one TOC to another, which is the normal meaning of the term. I'd have thought that was obvious.

 

[paul1609]

Would they not be getting a substantial chunk of the £15 fare anyway ?

Like I say there are probably people with a better understanding than me but I believe that people were still driving to Norton but instead of travelling to Swanage they were just doing a return to Wareham instead so they were reducing the losses on the new service but also reducing the income on the core service.
In the Southeast I don't think there are any heritage railways that receive a significant proportion of their visitors by Rail even amongst those with a shared adjacent national rail station. My figures are out of date now but I think the biggest was the Isle of Wight Steam Railway with around 9% of passengers at Smallbrook Junction.

 

[A0]

Someone mentioned "abstraction" from existing Swanage Railway services. Surely if part of the fare is going to the Swanage Railway, that's less abstraction than from one TOC to another, which is the normal meaning of the term. I'd have thought that was obvious.

It surely depends on whether people would have travelled on the SR in any case - for reference though this year's fare from Nordern or Corfe to Swanage is £ 17 adult return, so even allowing for the increase in fare since 2017, it's unlikely Wareham is going to be adding to their bottom line - and if anything may prove to be something of a drain.

I suspect there is very little "abstraction" - and I also very much doubt that running to Wareham uplifts the SR's visitor numbers significantly, certainly not enough to make it a financially attractive offering.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 25 Mar 2022 ==

Like I say there are probably people with a better understanding than me but I believe that people were still driving to Norton but instead of travelling to Swanage they were just doing a return to Wareham instead so they were reducing the losses on the new service but also reducing the income on the core service.
In the Southeast I don't think there are any heritage railways that receive a significant proportion of their visitors by Rail even amongst those with a shared adjacent national rail station. My figures are out of date now but I think the biggest was the Isle of Wight Steam Railway with around 9% of passengers at Smallbrook Junction.

Which given the IoWSR's special nature in that you have to get there from the mainland means that for anyone doing it as a day trip, access by train makes some sense because you can tie it up with the Fast cat / Hovercraft crossing.

When in the SE you've got lines like the Bluebell, Mid Hants where they are pretty much on the same station site and they are attracting fewer still of their visitors by rail, it does rather beg the question about how important a "national rail link" really is to the Heritage sector, particularly when you consider the cost and impact of achieving these links.

 

[yorksrob]

Like I say there are probably people with a better understanding than me but I believe that people were still driving to Norton but instead of travelling to Swanage they were just doing a return to Wareham instead so they were reducing the losses on the new service but also reducing the income on the core service.
In the Southeast I don't think there are any heritage railways that receive a significant proportion of their visitors by Rail even amongst those with a shared adjacent national rail station. My figures are out of date now but I think the biggest was the Isle of Wight Steam Railway with around 9% of passengers at Smallbrook Junction.

That does seem quite bizarre. I've been to Swanage and Wareham, and Swanage seems quite the more attractive destination. Was there an influx of track bashers wanting to get the unusual section of line perhaps, in which case they probably wouldn't have been interested in the main Swanage route anyway !

It surely depends on whether people would have travelled on the SR in any case - for reference though this year's fare from Nordern or Corfe to Swanage is £ 17 adult return, so even allowing for the increase in fare since 2017, it's unlikely Wareham is going to be adding to their bottom line - and if anything may prove to be something of a drain.

I suspect there is very little "abstraction" - and I also very much doubt that running to Wareham uplifts the SR's visitor numbers significantly, certainly not enough to make it a financially attractive offering.

Maybe. Any benefit would be from people coming from further afield on the network, rather than SR passengers treating it as an extension of the preserved railway.

 

[A0]

That does seem quite bizarre. I've been to Swanage and Wareham, and Swanage seems quite the more attractive destination. Was there an influx of track bashers wanting to get the unusual section of line perhaps, in which case they probably wouldn't have been interested in the main Swanage route anyway !



Maybe. Any benefit would be from people coming from further afield on the network, rather than SR passengers treating it as an extension of the preserved railway.

Which if the IoWSR can manage ~10% - that's probably the highest any railway can reasonably achieve and they have a special set of circumstances.

The SR has about 200,000 visitor numbers a year - even getting 5% using a Wareham link would be about 10,000 people - and assume 60 running days to Wareham, they'd need about 150 a day to reach that. And that's 150 *extra* visitors, not abstraction - which doesn't feel particularly likely.

 

[yorksrob]

Which if the IoWSR can manage ~10% - that's probably the highest any railway can reasonably achieve and they have a special set of circumstances.

The SR has about 200,000 visitor numbers a year - even getting 5% using a Wareham link would be about 10,000 people - and assume 60 running days to Wareham, they'd need about 150 a day to reach that. And that's 150 *extra* visitors, not abstraction - which doesn't feel particularly likely.

I'm not sure. I get the feeling the local preserved railways I use quite frequently (K&WVR and ELR) get a decent amount of business from public transport users. Of course for them the link is already there, but nevertheless.

 

[paul1609]

I'm not sure. I get the feeling the local preserved railways I use quite frequently (K&WVR and ELR) get a decent amount of business from public transport users. Of course for them the link is already there, but nevertheless.

You'll have noticed that I qualified my statements in the Southeast. That's because the likes of the KWVR and ELR are different being on the edge of metropolitan conurbations and their associated travel schemes. Gretna Green is the equivalent distance from Leeds that Wareham is from London or Manchester to Carlisle. The only equivalent railway in the south east that could end up like the likes of the KWVR & ELR is the Epping & Onger if it could get an extension to Epping LU.

 

[zwk500]

I'm not sure. I get the feeling the local preserved railways I use quite frequently (K&WVR and ELR) get a decent amount of business from public transport users. Of course for them the link is already there, but nevertheless.

What may feel like a good amount of passengers making a mainline connection could still be a very small proportion of the railways annual business. And as has been pointed out, these particular railways are among the most favourable to visit by public transport.
Unfortunately, the only people who are likely to be able to give a definitive answer on heritage railways served by mainline connections are those with access to internal accounting who can compare ticket sales.

 

[yorksrob]

You'll have noticed that I qualified my statements in the Southeast. That's because the likes of the KWVR and ELR are different being on the edge of metropolitan conurbations and their associated travel schemes. Gretna Green is the equivalent distance from Leeds that Wareham is from London or Manchester to Carlisle. The only equivalent railway in the south east that could end up like the likes of the KWVR & ELR is the Epping & Onger if it could get an extension to Epping LU.

Well, Bournemouth/Poole must count as a metropolitan conurbation. Perhaps it needs a PTE !

 

[43096]

It surely depends on whether people would have travelled on the SR in any case - for reference though this year's fare from Nordern or Corfe to Swanage is £ 17 adult return, so even allowing for the increase in fare since 2017, it's unlikely Wareham is going to be adding to their bottom line - and if anything may prove to be something of a drain.

I suspect there is very little "abstraction" - and I also very much doubt that running to Wareham uplifts the SR's visitor numbers significantly, certainly not enough to make it a financially attractive offering.

What would be even more loss making would be if the various funds they have had for this operation were asked to be returned by the funders on the basis that they haven't delivered what was promised.

 

[Mike Machin]

It would be absolutely marvellous in an ideal world if through services could be established, but as a business owner myself I have to say that any decisions involving expansion in the provision of activities can only ever be made if there is going to be a near certainty of a positive financial reward.

In the current difficult financial situation faced by all businesses and most households, if the many existing heritage railways can continue to operate as they have done at all, this has to be viewed as a major financial success.

Maybe one day the business case will be compelling, but at the moment a prudent approach is the only sensible choice.

 

[jupiter]

I have to agree that regrettably, this is the only realistic way forward at the moment. I believe the next few years will be very challenging financially for a large number of people and businesses, who will have some difficult choices to make.

 

[341o2]

What would be even more loss making would be if the various funds they have had for this operation were asked to be returned by the funders on the basis that they haven't delivered what was promised.

Well, they have at least partially delivered what was promised- the 2017 service had to run under T&C of being financed, and due to the unavailability of stock to run the service was forced to hire, hence the £70k deficit.

The units were brought up to mainline standard by Arlington Eastleigh, with the need to source replacement wheelsets from the USA, since no engineering firm in the UK deals in imperial units anymore. Then the US supplier took over a year to deliver. I believe two training sessions with the units were held before lockdown occurred

 

[Titfield]

The units were brought up to mainline standard by BR Eastleigh, with the need to source replacement wheelsets from the USA, since no engineering firm in the UK deals in imperial units anymore. Then the US supplier took over a year to deliver. I believe two training sessions with the units were held before lockdown occurred

Sorry not BR Eastleigh. It was Arlington Fleet Services at Eastleigh.

 

[paul1609]

The units were brought up to mainline standard by BR Eastleigh, with the need to source replacement wheelsets from the USA, since no engineering firm in the UK deals in imperial units anymore. Then the US supplier took over a year to deliver. I believe two training sessions with the units were held before lockdown occurred

I don't think that's true about no firm in the UK being able to order wheels in imperial units anymore. I can believe it was cheaper but that was probably reflected in the delivery timescale.

 

[341o2]

Sorry not BR Eastleigh. It was Arlington Fleet Services at Eastleigh.

Post edited, but it does not alter the fact that Wareham services cannot operate without the DMUs which were being rebuilt to mainline standards by an outside firm over which they had no control.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 26 Mar 2022 ==

I don't think that's true about no firm in the UK being able to order wheels in imperial units anymore. I can believe it was cheaper but that was probably reflected in the delivery timescale.

Has been stated on these forums before and was not challenged as being incorrect https://www.railforums.co.uk/threads/swanage-to-wareham-reopening-delayed.124918/
BBC news reports "problems with the wheels", but does not mention the USA

 

[Dougal2345]

Would there be no possibility of building a Smallbrook Junction-style interchange station at Worgret Junction itself, with a platform on the Swanage line a short walk from platforms on the main line?

The mainline platforms need only be very basic indeed (no road access, car park or facilities other than a footbridge), the 'Swanage' platform/station could be as elaborate as SR wanted to make it.

I appreciate the land at the Junction isn't flat, the railway is in something of a shallow cutting, but a bulldozer could probably carve out room for platforms without too much difficulty.

That would enable the day-tripper to enjoy the Swanage line, Corfe, and Swanage itself by train all the way, without any of the issues of mixing 'mainline' and 'preserved' services, and no need to involve a bus.

Just a thought anyway!

From a personal point of view, I live in the New Forest and regularly make Saturday trips by train to Poole, Wareham, Weymouth, Lymington and so on. But the thought of getting on a packed bus for the very long and rattling haul from Bournemouth to Swanage (and paying the extra £9.50 for the privilege, with no railcard discount) means I only head to Swanage at most once a year... very disappointed there'll be no direct rail service this year again...