WRHA NEWS

The annual WRHA open weekend was held over the 17th and 18th July 2010, with the official opening of our heritage centre and platform at Whitrope taking place on the Sunday afternoon. Carrying out the ribbon cutting was our local MP, the Rt Hon Michael Moore, recently elevated to the post of Scottish Secretary in the new coalition government. Also in the official party and delivering speeches on the day were Madge Elliot, veteran Borders rail campaigner who led the anti- closure protests all the way to Downing Street in 1968, Richard Crockett, current Chairman of the Campaign for Borders Rail and Ian Crooks, current Chairman of the WRHA.

Despite a dreich, damp day on the Sunday (Scottish summertime??), the weekend was very well attended, with the car park overflowing at times onto the trackbed and roadside verges. Local media was in attendance, and the coverage on Borders TV both before and after the event culminated in the best publicity the Association has had to date. It was also one of our most profitable events, with income from catering, raffle and tombola, merchandise and railwayana sales, hogroast and memberships well into four figures.

For anyone who has ever doubted how serious and determined the Association is in creating a heritage railway and viable tourist attraction in the Scottish Borders, we hope that the recent fantastic rate of progress on the ground, culminating in this well received open weekend, will go a long way to convincing you that we are well and truly on our way. Everything you see at Whitrope is a result of the sheer hard graft of our volunteers, and it’s worth remembering that construction work on the platform itself didn’t even start until late 2007.

Thoughts are already turning towards how we can deliver an even bigger and better event next year (a working locomotive?), but in the meantime we must thank everyone who contributed so magnificently this year: Joyce Crooks for manning the buffet; Heather, Jan and Anna for the home baking; Philip and Helen- Jane Hedley for the hog roast; the girls from Black Diamond FM*, Sharon Colvin, Janet Murray, Ailsa and her Daughter Kimberley MacIntoshfor manning the tombola and raffles; the Ruderham clan for merchandising, publicity and the supply of copious bunting; Joe for the mad dash to the “wire” in finishing off the car park fencing; Tom and Peter for assuming the role of car park marshals on Sunday; Iain for the posters; the coach painting gang who managed to get rid of the South West Trains livery on the west side of the Mark 1; Alastair for the printed programme and lots of other things; the volunteers who tidied the site and manned the centre; ITV Borders for doing us proud; all the local businesses who generously donated prizes, support and publicity; David Tough who donated the two coaches in the first place; Leader Plus for grant assistance; Matt for the making and erecting the running- in sign and last but not least, to all our members, visitors and friends for turning out to support us (including some of our furthest flung members from Germany and even New Zealand!!!).

Our new storage container has finally arrived and has been lowered into position adjacent to the snow plough as planned. The workbench and vice, formerly in the “tin shed”, have been moved into the container along with a number of loco spares etc.

The Palfinger crane was then used to lift our red telephone box from its former position at the top of the drive up onto the platform. Tom Stoddart has kindly loaned us a couple of old wooden platform barrows originally from Carlisle Citadel, and these were also delivered to site over the weekend. Elsewhere on site, frantic grass strimming, fencing and coach painting continue as our open weekend draws ever closer.

Thanks as always to all our volunteers, but special mention must go to Tony Cormack and his mini- digger for grading the link path, the member who kindly sponsored the Palfinger lorry, Iain MacIntosh for almost single handedly strimming all the banks south of the house (often on his way back from work during the week) and finally to Ian Crooks for his dogged determination in transforming the visual appearance of the Mark 1 buffet coach.

A good weekend was had by all! The weather was warm and dry on Saturday but wet and cool on Sunday. Not long to go now before the big day arrives: 37 days to go (report compiled 11th June). It will soon be upon us before we know it!

Following last month’s abortive attempt at installing the power unit into the Fowler, we decided that the solution was to remove the front bonnet section and the radiator. With all the relevant bolts undone beforehand, we arranged for Cumbria Lift & Shift to pay us another visit on Saturday 5th, and this time everything went according to plan, simple as that!

The shipping container (or “Motive Power Department Stores”!!) we mentioned last month now belongs to the Association, its purchase having been funded through a generous donation from one of our members. It’s hoped to have it on site within the next few weeks so we can get all our spares, tools and equipment under cover and secure. We’ve created the space for it by moving the snow plough onto the shorter panel as planned and breaking down the longer sixty foot one.

On the loco, work can really crack on now that the power unit is in place: if you fancy lending us a hand, work takes place most Saturdays. Simply drop us a line on info@wrha.org.uk for details of what’s happening.

Once again there was a good turnout of volunteers, the life blood of the Association. Thanks go to them and also to Cumbria Lift N Shift, Michael “Bomber” Forster for the flatbed arctic and member Tony Cormack who kindly gave us free use of his mini- digger (and operated it) all weekend.

The planned work for this weekend was effectively ditched after we were donated a load of concrete sleepers from Carlisle. These are in excellent condition and couldn’t be turned down, so we mobilised our “away team” to load up in conjunction with Cumbria Lift & Shift’s Pal-finger crane equipped truck. We also organised an articulated flatbed lorry, and this was loaded first with 98 sleepers. The Lift & Shift lorry then loaded itself with a further 16 sleepers before heading off to Carlisle Airport to load up the Fowler’s power unit, spare gear box and air compressor.

On arrival at Whitrope, we used the Pal-finger crane to build a short thirty foot panel adjoining the longer sixty foot panel on which the snow plough currently sits. We plan to move the plough onto the shorter panel then break down the longer one to create space for further material storage, as well as an additional shipping container we have the chance of acquiring.

After this it was the reverse process from the morning, unloading and stacking sleepers off both lorries south of the Golden Bridge. We even started laying some out just off the south end of the bridge itself.

The next job was supposed to be installing the power unit into the Fowler, but when we took the demountable roof section off and went to drop it in, we found that it’s actually slightly longer than the “hole” available- doh! It looks like we’ll either need to take the radiator out the front or the fuel tank out the back to create the necessary space, and both these options will require a fair bit of preparatory dismantling.

With time running out, there was no option but to lower the power unit onto the track in front of the loco and cover it over with a tarpaulin. Ah well, we live and learn and we’ll aim to book the Pal- finger crane again to complete the installation.

Thanks as always to our loyal volunteers, to Cumbria Lift & Shift and to Michael Forster of Newcastleton for the flatbed artic.

Track weekend 20th/21st March and other works.
For this particular report it is best if it is done as an appraisal of what was achieved over the two days to keep it short and sweet. Like the last working weekend, plenty was happening such as:-

As if that wasn’t enough, on the platform the flower beds were erected waiting to be filled with soil and planted up and the car park has now acquired a pair of gates which were previously used at the crossing.

Outside of the track weekend, we must thank Pete Benson for hand- digging some open drains next to the link path, a laborious task if ever there was one. Outside contractors have also completed the oversail course on the main platform wall.

Fingers crossed, the heritage centre will be ready for the open weekend later on this year, funds permitting, so if any of you millionaires out there could anyone spare a few thousand perhaps?!

A members-only image gallery has been set up - any member requiring access please send an email to info@wrha.org.uk quoting your current membership number. A small selection of images will still continue to be put on this site but WRHA members will have complete access to all the photographs - what better excuse to join WRHA today!