Is electric traction the way forward?
I have read with interest your discussions around the pollution that steam and diesel locomotives produce. You appear to have overlooked the obvious solution: electricity.
It is widely recognised that the general public don’t just want a steam engine, they want a heritage experience. A heritage Electric Multiple Unit is just as historic and interesting as its loco-hauled peers, as several tram museums and the London Transport Museum’s trips with their electric stock shows. EMUs would be ideal for turns currently done by first generation Diesel Multiple Units, without the clouds of blue smoke.
Electric rolling stock has, sadly, not fared well in preservation. Items are often dumped outside and neglected, before being scrapped or sold off for other uses. In recent years we have seen the increasingly dilapidated museum at Coventry close, and lines such as the Epping Ongar dispose of their ‘3-CIG’ unit, despite, if I remember correctly, its ‘film star’ status.
Steam Railway has a long history of successful campaigns. Maybe you ought to start championing electric preservation?
First, by promoting the vehicles themselves, and second, by promoting consideration of the technical challenges of powering them.
Failing that, we could resign ourselves to recreating the earliest waggonways and tramways, and just make everything horse-drawn.
Phill Spowart, by email
Ed: Alas, being a 100% steam magazine, heritage electric traction is not in our remit.
As there is currently little prospect of such vehicles working under their own power, volunteers and donors are less willing to support them and, until a solution can be found – batteries being the most likely – EMUs and their ilk will, sadly, remain consigned to the sidelines.
Electric traction has traditionally attracted less interest from the wider public, but perhaps attitudes may change as years go by. Electric traction certainly has its place – Crich is wonderful and we look forward to the launch of the renewed ‘Brighton Belle’ set, and hopefully one day the surviving Bulleid ‘4DD’ cars will be restored – but for now, it doesn’t represent a viable solution to our potential future motive power problems.