Remarkably resilient
Nicola Fox finds how steam lines are surviving Covid-19
Steam’s recovery following the spring lockdown was vital to keep the wheels of preservation turning and, as found, has provided a financial boost previously considered improbable.
s the country descended into lockdown in March and rules moved on a daily basis, several UK railways declared themselves shut, for not just the foreseeable future but, in some cases, for the rest of 2020. Events were pulled, shed doors locked and volunteers told to stay home. The situation was bleak.
Then in June, tentative announcements of potential reopenings gave cause for optimism again, and many of the mainstays and a good number of smaller outfits were back in action by the middle of August.
This summer hasn’t panned out how any of us would have expected at the start of the year, though it was certainly better than many feared back in the dark weeks of lockdown, but how has it been for the railways themselves?
Steam Railway spoke to six railways that have weathered the storm thus far and risen as steam-powered phoenixes from the ashes. This is their August story…
ASTIRRING IN THE FOREST
The 4½-mile Dean Forest Railway, in Gloucestershire, was ready for reopening on August 1.
Part of its Covid-19-safe practice included temporarily closing two stations, meaning that the service runs from Norchard to Parkend where the engine runs round, and the train then runs fast to Lydney Junction before returning to Norchard in the middle of the line.
The DFR was able to make the most of the holiday time available to it, and after a few teething problems (a tentative opening with diesel was quickly replaced with steam running) the line has been able to sell the majority of trains at its new capacity, selling out on every steam day. Because of social distancing, a 2020 sell-out looks very different to a 2019 sell-out, but is nonetheless a positive.
The DFR website carries the customary Covid-19 information page; something we are all getting used to seeing and, in addition, a video showing the safety protocols employed by the line to protect passengers, staff and volunteers. There is no messing around here.
Arriving at the Dean Forest is now inevitably a very different experience: marshals and porters are used to guide the customers around the station, regulate queuing to help with distancing, and keep visitors informed and happy. Tickets are pre-booked and distance markers help passengers navigate the one-way systems. Compulsory in the shop, museum and café, the DFR also requests that passengers wear face coverings on the train and station platforms.
The Dean Forest’s chosen coaching stock consists of Mk 1 Tourist Second Opens (TSOs). One booking encompasses eight seats and eliminates the neighbouring bank of eight, reducing capacity per carriage by half.
With a minimum purchase of two tickets, a couple travelling together would be guaranteed eight seats over which to spread themselves and their belongings. Less profitable for the railway, true, but more luxurious for the passenger!
In between services, the set is thoroughly cleaned and ‘fogged’ on a daily basis, using the same anti-viral fluid currently used on London Underground.
In spite of the necessary deviations from standard practice, passengers are clearly pleased. Online appraisals
for the DFR are overflowing with gratitude for the work put in to keep the line open and praise of the safety precautions taken, with phrases such as “above and beyond” and “brilliantly organised” jumping out of reviews.
But passenger gratitude alone does not pay the bills, so what do the figures say? A direct comparison with the previous August shows an expected drop; with the number of potential passengers per train reduced by half, this was inevitable. Commercial manager James Graham could be heard steeling himself for the blow as he calculated the final figures, only for the finished calculation to produce a buoyant, “Oh! They’re not as bad as I thought!”
In August 2019, the DFR carried 4,434 passengers. In 2020, despite Covid-19 restrictions, that number was 3,267, 73% of the previous year’s total. A steep drop, yes, but given the circumstances it is encouraging that so many passengers still felt safe to travel.
The DFR’s services have been selling at 93% of the new available capacity and – while the line is still heavily reliant on the emergency appeal to pay off the backlog accumulated during the weeks of closure – for August at least, the railway was making money.
Although the Christmas season is full of unknowns, when booking for Santa specials was opened in September, within the first week 43% of the available bookings were filled; an encouraging sign.
NEAR NEIGHBOURS
Forty miles east, the Gloucestershire Warwickshire Steam Railway has also reinstated successful running using a similar approach to the DFR. That the GWSR was running at all was especially remarkable, as it had announced in May that it wouldn’t be running again until September at the earliest.
A minimum booking of two tickets has also been implemented, as well as pre-booking, extra passenger-facing volunteers, a one-way system, and reduction of on-train capacity. The GWSR’s Covid-19 coaching stock almost exclusively relies on corridor coaches, where each booking books out an entire compartment, whether the booking is for just
two tickets or up to six, meaning that capacity on each vehicle ranges from 14 to 42. A single TSO supplements this capacity by 16.
Services resumed on August 15, following ‘shakedown’ trains the previous weekend to troubleshoot and allow staff to rehearse their new roles.
Talking to the GWSR team, the word that surfaces over and over is ‘cautious’. Public relations officer Ian Crowder says: “We’re taking it cautiously, but it’s been pretty successful; some of our older volunteers are understandably cautious about mixing with the public, so we are going above and beyond with hygiene procedures.”
The service offered is a 14-mile round trip from Toddington travelling the full length of the line, although because of the relatively short length of Toddington platform, the number of coaches has had to be reduced to six to prevent exposing passengers to additional risk of infection by walking through other carriages to disembark.
Face coverings are requested to be worn when on railway premises, although passengers who have booked compartments may remove them once seated to enjoy the journey in more comfort.
“People on the whole,” Ian says, “have been very respectful of what we’re trying to do.”
Running a greatly reduced service in comparison to previous years, the GWSR’s fortnight of running in August initially offered just two round trips a day running on three days a week; this was later increased to four.
With such big changes for the 2020 season, Ian describes a direct comparison with last year as comparing “grapes with melons”. On a similar two-week period in August 2019 the GWSR carried nearly 9,000 passengers. For the two weeks of running in August 2020, passenger numbers were around 2,800.
Grim as this may appear, in the context there are some positives.
In order to be Covid-19 compliant, the capacity for each train has been potentially reduced to 84, should every booking comprise only two tickets. However, Ian says they are selling around 3.5 seats per compartment and averaging 155 passengers per train which, at nearly 70% of the available capacity, is a healthy loading.
This means the costs of running the reduced service are actually still being covered, and some money is being made to contribute towards general overheads.
Richard Winstanley the GWSR’s finance director, said, “We are cautiously optimistic about the future. It is, of course, too early to be confident about emerging from the
Covid-19 fog, but with careful control of costs and expenses, together with attracting passengers to the railway, we have taken the right steps. But it is not yet time to relax!”
Christmas services on the GWSR are in the planning stages, though at the time of writing, they had yet to be announced.
THE OPTIMIST
Heading further north, the North Yorkshire Moors Railway fittingly celebrated August 1 as ‘Yorkshire Day’, and it too employed similar distancing measures in carriages and with one-way systems around stations.
Many trains were completely sold out, although the NYMR took the potentially risky decision to still offer single fares, which has an inefficient knock-on effect for available seating. However, the gamble appears to have paid off as, like the GWSR, the 18-mile railway also ran at 70% occupancy on available seating.
It is a performance with which general manager Chris Price is content. He described secondary spending on the café’s takeaway service and so on as “buoyant but proportionally down owing to lower numbers.”
Chris’ attitude matches that of the railway’s only named service currently running; ‘The Optimist’: “All in all, we’re happy with our performance while working within such tight constraints”.
The trends for running a successful and Covid-19-safe steam service are clear: distancing measures, one-way systems, pre-booking, thorough cleaning of carriages between services, encouraging passengers to wear face coverings and providing extra customer-facing volunteers to direct passengers around the stations. Using these and supplementary bespoke methods, the 4ft 8½in gauge lines managed to have a successful August.
ROLLING RATTY
In contrast, how has the situation played out for narrow gauge railways? The smaller scale is reflected in platform and carriage size, where capacity is just as much a headache, as encountered by the Ravenglass & Eskdale Railway in Cumbria.
‘La’al Ratty’, was, on the surface, in the fortuitous position of using compartment coaches, each of which has the benefit of being accessed by its own doors. But the downside is that they are open to the other compartments above seat height once inside the coach.
To avoid the loss of 60% capacity, the ‘Ratty’s’ joiner swung into action, adapting the carriages with Perspex screens.
The materials may have been different, but the concept was not new to the R&ER.
In the 1920s, certain carriages had glass screens to protect the passengers from smuts and cinders and, although long since removed, the railway joiner worked to recreate
this historical style for a new safety-specific purpose.
The decision to use these screens was a “massive investment in time and money” but general manager Stuart Ross is very pleased with how they’ve turned out. “The partitions mitigate transmission,” he told Steam Railway, “but we also asked the customers to wear a face covering. We needed them to buy into and appreciate what we’re doing, and for the most part, they have done so.”
The first post-lockdown trains ran on July 30, and plans were made to maintain the timetable, but after two days of test trains the management realised that the rigorous cleaning of the sets took twice as long as had been allocated, so the timetable was further adjusted and in the end the number of trains offered was reduced from 12 to six.
Like the NYMR, the Ravenglass & Eskdale has welcomed a high number of solo adult travellers and, afraid of alienating them or losing valuable custom, the line also opted not to specify a minimum purchase, instead increasing the price of every ticket by the modest increment of £1.
Knowledge of the traditional passenger demographic seems to have paid off. Trains ran largely at full Covid-19 occupancy, but with a 30% drop in passenger figures from the previous year: in August 2020 the line carried 17,972 passengers, compared with 25,591 in 2019. To be able to achieve 70% of August 2019’s passenger figures with only 50% of the available trains running (while adhering to the various government guidelines!) is a remarkable achievement.
In tough times, the line has looked to increase customers’ additional spending, although the fervour with which this happened took Stuart rather by surprise.
Catering revenue for August was about 25% more than projected, with retail over 30% ahead and car park revenue nearly double what was expected.
Stuart described the opening weeks as “a mad frenzy”, as people found themselves with the first opportunity to head out and spend money. As August progressed this calmed down, but the fall-off was less than expected and the retail and catering arms of the railway continued to perform well over the summer.
The changes have put Stuart in a reflective mood. “This whole Covid-19 thing, it’s a time in which we can change, we’re looking to the future rather than at what we’ve always done.”
The relative success of the line, despite the reduction in the service, has given Stuart cause to reassess how the line may operate; the old frenzied timetable of 12 or more trains (which Stuart describes as a throwback
STUART ROSS
to the limited season of running in the 1960s) is up for re-evaluation.
Additionally, pre-booking may be a post-Covid-19 legacy, as pre-paid tickets meant that even on wet days, when passengers may have previously stayed at home, trains have run heavily loaded.
“It hasn’t been plain sailing, setting up the online booking crammed several months of development into one month, but we’ve found that pre-booking has weatherproofed us”.
Food for thought.
BALA BOUNCES BACK
The Welsh Government imposed tighter travel restrictions than in England and things looked grim for the Bala Lake Railway and its Great Little Trains of Wales counterparts. In June, manager of the Bala Lake Railway Dave Jones said it looked unlikely that the railway would reopen at all in 2020 and strategy meetings were held to discuss how to keep afloat without visitor income. Things changed quickly, however, and after two weeks of preparation “from a standing start” the first train ran on July 9, the first line in the principality to do so.
Faced with the challenges created by similar compartment carriages to Ravenglass, the Gwynedd line also fitted screens to allow every compartment to be used and reduced saloon capacity from 28 to 12. In the fortunate position of having long platforms
– a legacy of its former standard gauge life – train lengths were increased to compensate for the loss of available seating, enabling the line to offer 60% of pre-coronavirus capacity.
Unlike many other lines, where the journey becomes a round trip at fixed times, Bala wanted to maintain flexibility and employed a new ticketing system allowing passengers to book journeys in two halves. Pre-booking is essential, but daytrippers are given the flexibility of booking both their outgoing times and their returns with a minimum purchase of £20 imposed.
To achieve this, a whole new ticketing arrangement was required and the Bala was lucky to have a volunteer among its ranks with the requisite skills for designing an all-new booking system.
In the first week of opening, overnight