simon wrote:Unfortunately, the railways have an obligation to protect us from them - dates right back to the start when landowners didn't want railways (on the whole) and certainly didn't want them running over their sheep and cows. Hence the railways have an obligation to stop access on to their land.
Clearly the same isn't true in some other countries.
Whilst I can't disagree with the basic sentiment, it does perhaps need some amplification.
They have livestock in other countries too, and even in this country there are occasional stories of animals getting through fences and onto the line.
What we have here that many other countries don't is a compensation culture, and over-zealous interpretation of Health & Safety legislation. The two run hand in hand. Health & Safety legislation in itself is no bad thing - where it falls down is when it is interpreted over-zealously by those who are concerned that a law suit will be coming their way from a firm of ambulance chasers if they could conceivably be shown to have "not done something"
Alternatively, dare I say it, I think the current mania with Health & Safety has also been jumped upon by some preserved railways as a bit of a money-spinner. Let me explain further.
A little off-topic (or perhaps not - draw your own conclusions) is some correspondence I've been reading only today in the railway press about the issue of issuing lineside photography permits on preserved railways, and also railway trespass in general. Here are some of the thoughts of individuals who we may even count amongst our ranks on here:
Railway trespass is a criminal offence, not civil. Each railway has a big safety management system and 200+ rules in their rulebook. Why should heritage railway volunteers have to argue with enthusiasts over this?
Whilst it is true that railway trespass is a criminal offence (and there were plenty of cast iron signs reminding us all of that fact and threatening us with a fine of not exceeding forty shillings many years ago), in my view there is trespass and trespass. Even today, people still use official footpaths crossing high speed lines (there is at least one between Wootton Bassett and Swindon in case you are interested) and, provided they stop, look and listen before they launch off a cross the tracks they are perfectly entitled to do so. However, if they do exactly the same thing 10 yards either side of that footpath, they are trespassing. I'm sorry, I don't see the difference. Using that crossing is a potentially dangerous thing to do, and if they get knocked down by a HST going at full bore they've only got themselves to blame. The same thing applies 10 yards each side, or indeed anywhere else on the network.
Now I hope the author of the next missive isn't one of our members, because if he is he won't like me very much by the end of this post
I must disagree that ..... the idea that "survival instinct and common sense" is sufficient to make one safe was disproved by William Huskisson's death in 1830. More recently, I daresay many readers remember the near miss in 2010 which arguably could have put an end to main line steam, thanks to someone's defective common sense.
It is this attitude that results in the hideous carnage on our roads ... And while it is unfortunate that the railways are held to a meaningful safety standard, while road deaths are dismissed as unavoidable accidents, surely the answer is not to make the railways equally lax?
We must remember that one cannot contract out of one's own negligence. If a preserved railway lets a photographer out with only their common sense and they are then killed. there is no agreement that the railway can have to prevent expensive legal action from following. It is in all our interests for preserved railways to avoid such a situation"
We can kick off with the fact that William Huskisson wasn't employing common sense. He was a politician (there might be a link there) who was trying to get in to the Prime Minister's compartment and did a damn stupid thing when told to get out of the way of an oncoming train.
You will notice how the correspondent then takes a leap into conjecture to "prove" his point. Apparently a "near miss" may have led to the end of main line steam. Oh really? If a Pendolino doesn't quite give somebody a fatal clout between Stafford and Crewe, might that mean the death-knell of the WCML? No, I don't think so either.
He then goes on to make reference to the "hideous carnage on our roads" (which has been falling every year since records were first kept in the 1930s, but don't let us let the facts stand in the way of a good soundbite) and then uses this nonsense of a statement to somehow suggest that, if we don't hold to "the rules" then the railway will go the same way.
However, he leaves the best bit until the end:
If a preserved railway lets a photographer out with only their common sense and they are then killed, there is no agreement that the railway can have to prevent expensive legal action from following.
Well in fact, yes there is. As in the old days of Shed Permits and the like, you were told that entry to the premises was at your own risk, and that no liability would be accepted for loss or injury however caused. If you were daft enough to walk in front of a moving engine, the railway could hardly be blamed for your stupidity. And they wouldn't be.
We are not talking here about defective or missing locks on level crossing gates, we are talking about somebody, presumably "in the know" about railways, asking permission to go lineside and point their camera at what comes towards them. Even if they were "novices," somebody with an IQ of 2 could suss out that it would probably be a bad idea to stand in front of a moving train, and their subsequent demise would do much to clear out the gene pool but, in truth, would do nothing to clear out the railway's bank balance. We have the ambulance chasing industry to thank for allowing people to think that it would.
In common with many other posters around here, I was all over engine sheds towards the end of steam. I was up a signal in March 1966 at Templecombe taking photographs (and I wasn't the only one up there). I wandered the tracks in Manchester and Blackburn and Rose Grove and Carnforth in August 1968 (before I left school by the way), and had the common sense to check whether anything was moving before I crossed a line. I worked on the railway when anybody who wore a high-viz jacket was considered a bit odd, but learned how to acknowledge the approach of a train and, more importantly, keep out of the way as it passed.
I, and literally thousands of others like me, are still here to tell the tale.
These days, however, I am not considered capable of sussing these things out for myself and, should I want a lineside permit, I have to go and take a course. A course which is only valid for that railway, by and large, and if I want to go lineside on somebody else's heritage line I have to take another one. Because I'm still as thick as the day I was born, apparently, until I take a course for the "new" line. You see where I'm coming from with my suggestion that H&S is being used as money-spinner.
I wonder if these courses are run by the same sort of idiot who was giving me a Health & Safety briefing at Bridgnorth depot some years ago. I was part of a group, we all gathered round and the instructor told us all gravely what dangerous places motive power depots were. The trouble is, as he was delivering his H&S sermon, he was standing in the four foot ....
I don't often rant on here, but I needed to get that lot off my chest. So, I've now lit the blue touch paper and will stand well back ...
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