Operating Department News - January 2010
From the Operating Office.
2009 has been a very good year for the railway. Looking back on it from the warmth and comfort of the Operating Office I am pleased to say that we have operated a safe railway. However, we must not be complacent and there is still much training and the brushing up on skills that we should improve on. This was brought home to me when I attended the HRA ‘Systems Management Systems (SMS)’ course at Quainton Road in November. David Keay, from the ORR, made it very clear that heritage railways (including ours) will be inspected to ensure that what we say we do in our SMS is what we really do on the ground. That means that all of us need to ensure that our skills are where they should be and that we take our training and monitoring of those skills and competencies very seriously, which we do!
Now for the statistics.
Over Christmas we operated trains on 15 days and carried 7,106 passengers. This is 250 more than last year. On Christmas Eve we carried in excess of 900 people so well done to all involved, especially the platform staff. The timetable for the Santa runs before Christmas is tight. We have to get in five round trips before 4.00pm and there is little, if any, recovery time. Even the lunch time break is short. So smart working from all concerned is the order of the day. After Christmas it is only four round trips so the timetable is not so tight.
Christmas concluded a very satisfactory year. The railway operated trains on 192 days. We completed 911.5 round trips (I am sure someone will work out the mileage!) and carried 97,089 passengers. That is 4,678 more than last year and represents a 5% increase in traffic. The aim now must be to increase our passenger numbers to over 100,000.
We are now looking forward to, and planning, the 2010 season. The timetable is broadly the same as last year and, yes, ‘The Tourist’ still runs on the two-train service but leaves Smallbrook a couple of minutes later in order to connect with an Island Line train. Challenges for the coming season include, first and foremost, running a safe railway and then improving our skills, fully rostering the railway on all operating days and enjoying and getting personal satisfaction from what we do. Roll on 2010!
The majority of the railway's operating staff are volunteers, we are always keen to recruit new members to the team. There are opportunities in all areas of the department; Signalman, Guard, Platform Staff, Pointsman, Booking Office staff and so on. If you would like more details contact our Volunteer Coordinator Clive Miller who will be pleased to arrange a visit to the Railway and show you around the various on going projects and tasks in hand. His contact details can be found on the Volunteer Information page.
