Steam engines are the purpose – not the means

IF THE cap fits, the following is aimed at you. When railway preservationists drove down to Barry in the early 1970s they weren't thinking, “We want to run a tourist attraction, make loads of money, and we need a steam engine to achieve it...”

Much more likely they were thinking, “We need to buy engines while they still exist, how are we going to raise the funds, and where the hell are we going to put the thing...?”

I don't need to re-tell the Barry story nor the early preservation movement's trials and tribulations here now. It is enough to ask to consider the subtle difference between the two mindsets in light of the title of this letter.

As a preservationist myself, I read and experience with dismay the decisions made on our behalf by ‘Johnny come lately management' and the expressed sentiment that ‘our railway is a multimillion-pound entertainments business and as such, 15-40 paid employees is the going rate'.

Okay, this management may very well love trains as much as I do, and they will no doubt have better management credentials than myself, but they are missing the point.

Acknowledge it please, before you do even more damage – you've got it the wrong way round, hence your deficient decision-making.

Yes, we have to run a safe and proper railway. Yes, the bills have to be paid. But you are not running a conventional business nor a job creation scheme. And stop alienating your volunteers.

Nigel Barnes, Poynton, Cheshire