Following the recent news that West Coast Railways have suspended their Jacobite steam train, and the statement released by the Office of Road and Rail, a petition has been launched on change.org
The petition, started by Maria Wilson, says “As a result of the service being suspended we now face the reality of a huge loss in tourism, a direct devastating effect on local businesses and an expected loss of £50m to the local economy.”
The petition encourages people to sign with a view to West Coast getting their exemption renewed so that trains can run again.
You can read the full details of the petition here https://www.change.org/p/get-the-jacobite-steam-train-back-on-tracks
What do you think of the petition? Let us know in the comments below.
You do have to wonder if WCR’s Directors are fit to run the company. A few years ago WCR nearly got all steam and charter trains banned because of their safety standards and training. Yet again they have chosen to fly to close to the sun. The ORR has been reasonable and if last summer WCR had put a plan with an acceptable timetable for fitting CDL we would not be in this position. I do feel sorry for the businesses and tourists who will be affected but not for WCR. A petition will only encourage WCR who just do not want to spend the money needed to comply. Does anyone think it reasonable to drive a car which has no MOT, is it reasonable for Waverley Steam Navigation not to have its annual safety inspection and dry docking, no we don’t. Perhaps it is time to up the stakes and inform WCR that it’s operators licence could be revoked forcing it into insolvency, it is a privilege to run trains on the National network not a right and it comes with safety obligations.
According to the Railway Magazine, it says that Jacobite has been CANCELLED.
WCRC demand a new exemption, but we’re told no chance.
Businesses who rely on the income generated by tourists using the steam train do not care who is responsible. They only care about getting the situation sorted out+ getting the train back in use. I’m sure the folk from all corners of the globe, who travel to Scotland for this train journey will also care+ cancel their visit.
I won’t be signing it, 20 years to fit CDL and still don’t want to. You can’t have one rule for one, and another for everyone else.
I would hope some other TOC with compliant coaches steps in. In the circumstances I would hope the necessary approvals are fast tracked.
LSL are going to run their own Jacobite using MK2 coaches and 2 class 37 diesels.
The only petition needed is the one telling WCR to abide by the law and fit central door locking in order to protect their passengers and the railway. Absolutely no reason why they should be exempt from the law, they’ve had plenty of time to get it sorted out but they have chosen not to bother. Sympathy for tourists who had been looking forward to it, but frankly the Scotrail service is much better value – a quarter of the price and you get exactly the same scenery!
The High Court ruled on the 23rd December 2023 that Central Door Locking must be provided but there is no system yet designed for vacuum braked stock as used on this service so it is being started off a blank sheet of paper – yet the DfT (Office of Road and Rail) expects immediate fitment. You will read that West Coast have had years to design a system yet compulsion to fit was only established three months ago – who fits anything that may yet be ruled out by the courts so that is why the firm requirement is a mere three months old. Also the Office of Road and Rail that is enforcing this “safety issue” is part of the Department for Transport that has forty deaths to its name arising from the introduction of “Notso” Smart Motorways so where is their credence to accuse others with no instances of the problem they insist exist when they have such a copious amount of blood on their own hands? I’m not condoning abrogating safety. I am asking for a realistic and achievable timescale to deliver it and for West Coast to irrevocably sign up to that and for a reasonable stance to be agreed.
I am over 90 and spent many of my early years travelling on Eastern region trains without locking doors. In those days passengers had common sence and had no inclination to open doors when unsafe to do so.. Now we have zspeed awareness courses, how about train door awareness lectures
They have had their chances!
Totally agree with you, West coast railways have my full support and are totally right in their stance, any who disagrees is talking nonsense
I’m only 42 and agree. They shouod maybe only allow for over 18s or something but if the whole world is so stupid as to open a door on a moving train over a viaduct, then I don’t know how to help. But I will say, I’ve booked for September 24, it’s the first year I’ve managed to get a booking. If it doesn’t go ahead because of people’s stupidity, we will be very disappointed.
Does anyone who has commented they have no sympathy for WCR have any sympathy for the local businesses on the route whose livelihood will be affected by the withdrawal of this service or are they just collateral damage expected to take it on the chin because they don’t matter?
Ofcourse but it’s all down to conduct of WCR.
Maybe the local tourist board could offer some funding to either fit the necessary equipment or hire in suitable rolling stock until WCR can upgrade their existing stock?
Entirely of their own making. Others have converted mk1 coaches to cdl
.
Feel sorry for the many foreign tourists who had probably booked tickets for this service
I’m hoping against hope that the ORR stand their ground and insist that WCR obey the law of the land as the vast majority of us do. If they still refuse there are plenty of scrapyards that would welcome their clapped out old coaches.
Richard Harman
The petition is a stupid idea. WCRC have dragged their heels for years over this well warned safety rule. They should have invested years ago and avoided the conflict. The Mainline railway has these rules to keep people safe. You can only do this if you have CDL and one Guard (or equivalent) to manage it.
All it takes is for someone to get seriously injured (life changing) in a platform edge accident. Would WCRC really be blameless if they allowed this. Of course not. Their delay tactics will cause this if they are allowed an exemption.
Stick to your valid legal position ORR.
The petition is NOT “stupid”
There isn’t two sides to this story , there are 3 !
Two being the companies and the third the “people” suffering as a result of the outcome. The “real people” don’t give a dam who is to blame. They give a dam their business will likely sink, their business won’t survive the winter , The holiday makers who have booked and paid for their trips.
This is the reality people are facing and not a single person wants to point a finger and blame. They want a resolution and quick.
Your naivety says it all
You’re the one that’s being naive. WCR were given ample time to comply and chose to bury their heads in the sand hoping the problem would go away. Of course everyone feels sympathy for the local businesses that will lose money but the only culprit is the cowboy outfit that is WCR.
There is a big industry in concocting negligible or non-existent ‘risks’. Job titles, enhanced salaries, corporate status depend on it … modern management has become a self-serving, jobs and bonuses for the boys racket. Even in the days before central locking had ever been invented and before Beeching a person might fall out of a rain maybe once every couple of years. I believe the statistical chances of this happening are around one in every two billion passenger miles.
I thought you could run non central locking coaches at 40MPH, they don’t run much faster than that up there so could run a bit slower
Max line speed used to be 30 mph
All these WCRC apologists frustrate me. It’s not the nanny state it’s a requirement that other operators have followed and fitted. It’s not a last minute decision of the ORR, it’s one that has been nearly 20 years in the making, which of course WCRC ignore. They are trying to play the plucky little private company being shafted by the petty bureaucrats card when it’s arrogant owners that do not believe that they have to follow the rules and can ignore them. Fitting CDL to say 8 carriages a year over the last 20 years would have been an investment in the business and given tax breaks… But the ignored that and are now trying to get others to pay for their incompetence…. They had an exemption last year and we’re found to be in breach of it by not having stewards on every door… What other safety standards aren’t they following which could have been or will be catastrophic? We live in the litigious 21st century not the 1950s….the world is different and everything has to change…. No sympathy for them and the misguided people who think they are being hard done by
Well said. We’re booked for April, they took our money in December knowing they didn’t have the exemption certificate for 2024.Yes I do feel sorry for business in the area, I haven’t cancelled my hotel booking, hopefully WCR will make a contribution! I live in hope.
I suspect that WCR was expecting a third party to fund the CDL. Someone like Visit Scotland or Highland Council who would be too worried about losing the visitor numbers from the Fort William and Mallaig areas.This was total brinkmanship on their part & the visitors and businesses that were relying on the Jacobite have been totally let down.The service does make money,so should be a great opportunity for someone with the appropriate stock into step in.
Very disappointed with WCR. We have a trip booked and we’re looking forward to the steam experience. WCR had no business selling tickets for the 2024 season knowing full well the exemption had not been granted. Hopefully we will get a full refund as promised if our trip is cancelled.
Surely WCR must have a rake of CDL carriages for running on the wider network and steam locos with air brake systems, and they into regular exemptions there?
The only steam engine at Carnforth that is air braked is Tangmere.
Does ruling mean that the NYMR services will not be allowed to run between Grosmont and Whitby?
Sorry, but it does mean NYMR will Not be allowed to run their service from Goathland to Whitby.
Nymr are still running to Whitby, both steam and diesel
I blame both parties involved. The ORR for being over sensitive about danger in what really is quite a low risk situation. And WCR for showing too cavalier an attitude towards the rules. It’s time another operator was given the opportunity to run the Jacobite. But can we now have a properly independent risk assessment carried out on the running of this particular train? I daresay ORR will say they’ve done it but what worries me is that they may now be on a health and safety ‘roll’, looking out for the next ‘tick in the box’ target. How long before they tell us that nobody should be able to lean out of the window to look at the steam engine on a preserved line? If that happens, you might as well shut them all down.
WCR are wholly to blame for this fiasco! They were informed they could not operate this season until the Central Locking System was installed. They have been given exemption certificate’s for years! They knew this day was coming and blatantly ignored it. The WCR have made more than enough profit to comply to the situation. I wholeheartedly agree, not one ticket should have been sold, until they had received the certification or better still just fix the doors!! I am one of the people who bought tickets for this trip(August) and have been informed that might not happen and blaming the situation on ORR. Shame on you WCR! you alone created this situation, so own it, fix it and apologise to all the people and ORR for letting us all down. I have made my feelings clear to WCR in a email, that I received, saying my trip could be cancelled and wholly blaming the ORR. Have I received a reply, that would be a no and I most definitely will not be signing any Petition!!
.For years ever since the early fifties when BR MK 1 coaches were developed all have had no central locking on their doors. Heritage Railways have had no trouble using them and when used on mainline work the same has applied. We live in a complete Nanny state so are we all not surprised when this typical nonsense based on what might happen rather than what has happened is implemented to the detriment of many businesses and families who rely on the Jacobite Line for their livelyhood
John Judson
However the railway has changed since the 50s, and there are no unlockable slam door stock out there anymore, so the general public is used to power doors – when Scotrail introduced the ‘classic’ HSTs back in 2028 they had to produce a training video for passengers because this type of door is unusual now and the public is unfamiliar with them.
The risk is that unfamiliarity and the risks from there, we also now live in an environment in which people are more likely to claim following an accident so that’s got to be proactively managed too.
All locos and rolling stock have to comply with a set standard of safety before being allowed on the national network. HST’s built more than forty years ago had to have central door locking fitted. What difference to the rolling stock used by WCR. They have had sufficient time to fit it during the course of the years they were exempted. If they can’t comply move over and let somebody else manage it. It is not a service restricted to WCR, it is a schedule open to anybody who wants to apply for it. It must be a good earner for those running the service and WCR have had their time with it and are just trying to do it without the safety devices applicable to everybody else.
I am disgusted by the ORR and their ridiculous insistence on central locking. Do we really want to live in a world where every possible negligible risk that someone might do something stupid has to be reduced to zero, regardless of the cost? Ultimately these costs have however to be paid by someone, and that cost is not properly taken into account by bodies like the ORR who don’t care.
When we say WCR have to pay, what that really ultimately means is passengers. Why should hard working ordinary people be priced off trains like the Jacobite by unelected beaurocrats? It is outrageous. We cannot adopt this approach. When will we wake up and realise that when things are over engineered they become to costly to happen and we are all poorer as a result? (See also HS2). Proportionality please. This world that’s being created by people like the ORR I find truly depressing and alienating.
Get this right evening everyone concerned.This is totally down to WCR and not ORR,which is doing it’s job.If WCR have been stupid and negligent enough to continue selling tickets, when the operation of the train was in severe doubt, would you trust them again to do anything or with your safety?
Can’t see a petition would do any good.The only, vain hope, is to find another operator with compliment stock, which might be achievable????
I understand your frustration but I find it hard to consider the addition of central locking as ‘over engineering’. This is not new technology.
The point is, with modern central locking, one action secures all the doors ( or indicators a problem).If you use a team of stewards,say, only one of them needs to be forgetful.If , say, child had fallen from a Jacobite ( or any mainline steam operated tran) what kind public outrage would they have been? And possibly ( probably) at least civil legal action against WCR and ORR??
Also despite WCR saying they have stewards at every door, the number of times I have been on their trains and seen unguarded doors is almost every time. The stewards will be at most doors at stations, but if the loco stops for water they just seem to walk about.
Had enough time to comply, more concerned about lining their pockets. Have done the route on the standard Scotrail service for £8 each way.
The problem is the ORR.
This woke, nanny State have gone too far.
If these clipboard Luddites had been around in the 19th century there would have been no railways.
These people are joy blocking bureaucrats.
I did go on this train years ago people were fighting to get to open windows so at doors 4 people trying to lean out take photos the locks were not mentioned to hold this sort of weight stewards telling them to move back just like talking to brickwall how searts arranged you all get to see the curve on viaduct but No people came from other side sitting on table I had so I could not even see out window I was glad I got off that train that’s the difference between now and when railway’s was built people not like that years ago he had time to do locks but no he kept the money
No they’re not, it’s WCR and their pig headedness to the rules that oddly enough everyone else has been able to comply with, specifically as they’ve had two decades knowing this was coming.
WCR have had ages to comply, but have chosen to do nothing. They need to be made an example of what happens when they totally ignore the ORR.
You are totally wrong.This nanny knows best, ORR killjoys etc.It would be negligence on their part of they had not acted as they have done.
Come on LSL Step in you have steam and stock
IIt is definitely about time another operator stepped in to operate this service.
It must not be lost after around forty years of running starting originally with British Rail.
If LSL are interested give them a chance.
If not could ScotRail not hire in suitable rolling stock and locomotives to operate this popular addition to the tourist trade in this part of Scotland.
Of course crews would have to be trained and the locomotives would have to be fitted with the RETB signalling to operate north of Craigendoran Junction to allow the stock to arrive at Fort William as well as to work to Mallaig.
Unfortunately time seems to be running out for the 2024 season. Dare I be cynical enough to suggest that this is what West Coast have been banking on when they were selling tickets when it was very uncertain that they would be running during 2024.
Well, it has run for a long time and I am not aware of any issues. I know the West Highland line and let’s say for a start that is not a ‘main line’. The expense of centrally locking doors is high and it takes time to raise ‘exceptional’ funds beyond what one would normally expect revenue to cover. Other precautions could be taken in the meantime and the speed of the train (which is relatively slow) could be further reduced. I think WCR should be given a further exemption period but should try to reach compliance in due course.
“Any petition ought to be for encouraging another operator to take over the Jacobite, ideally ScotRail themselves.”
I suspect ScotRail now has no carriages available that are suitable for steam haulage, and the steam engines would still have to be provided by West Coast Railways because, of course, ScotRail does not own any.
I suspect also that West Coast Railway’s steam engines are vacuum brake equipped only, so the carriages must also be vacuum braked – which probably limits them to the Mark 1 types that West Coast Railway owns.
The multiple exemptions that WCR has had from the ORR were supposed to provide it with time to fit central locking to its fleet of Mk 1 carriages, but unfortunately WCR has chosen, over a number of years, to ignore this and just assume that exemptions would continue to be granted.
I fear time has now run out for WCR and that the ORR will not be minded to grant any further exemptions. I hope I’m wrong and that WCR gets one further exemption for this season only, but I fear this isn’t going to happen.
Yes legally and technically it is a main line.So mainline running standards and compliance have to apply.
Any petition ought to be for encouraging another operator to take over the Jacobite, ideally ScotRail themselves. West Coast don’t deserve to keep it, this year or any.
A petition to reverse the exception is against the ORR trend for standard carriages lock systems.
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The failure to comply is wholly with WCR who had plenty of notice and decided not to comply although other providers whose carriage stock required modification, did so and now the resulting outcry…beggars belief that WCR thought to be above regulation and the ORR and never mind the disruption of the tourist trade as a result. The ORR statement clearly shows how inconsiderate WCR were to their travelling public.
If ORR backs down now and allow WCR too run the jacobites it will make a mockery of the hole point of CDL No they must stand firm WCR has has 19 years to fitted the CDL and has stuck his head in the sand and won’t do it .
WCR has had plenty of time to implement the CDL requirements by ORR , they were hoping that the exemption would be extended. I have no sympathy for them
totally agree
WCR had 19 years to comply with the CDL requirements but failed. They would still have the exemption in place if they had complied with the requirements of the exemption. ORR have been far too patient with them and while I hate nanny state thinking, I am sure that ORR are 100% right to take the action they have.