Railtours

This page and contents last changed on Thursday 24 June 2021

Gentle Resumption of Railtours

Since spring 2020, the pandemic has brought disruption to our plans, as with every organisation.

Our cost profile is very different to that of a Heritage Railway: our fixed costs are relatively small but our operating costs per journey are astronomical. Running a quarter-full socially-distanced railtour is simply out of the question.

As the public health situation continues to evolve, we are now (24 June 2021) making plans to run a short railtour on 7 August, between Eastbourne/Hastings and Tonbridge.

Full details are expected to appear here in the coming days.

Plans for future railtours

We had outlined plans for railtours during 2020 as shown below, prior to the advent of the pandemic:

Alton and the Mid-Hants Railway (bookings originally taken for 4 April 2020)
Worcester via the Cotswold Line (originally outlined for May 2020)
Skegness (originally outlined for June 2020)
Portsmouth (originally outlined for August 2020)

Very tentative dates for your diary

When it is appropriate to recommence planning outings, we are considering the following ideas. Please be aware that these are extremely tentative proposals and anything shown here is merely ‘pencilled-in’ in the most provisional fashion imaginable:

July 3—no event now
August 7: two trips from Hastings to Tonbridge
September 11 to East Kent?

Code of Conduct

It is a condition of holding a ticket for any outing on our train that passengers abide by the letter and spirit of our Code of Conduct (updated January 2021).

Leaning out of windows

We continue to endeavour to keep our passengers safe by not allowing them to lean out of our train’s windows. This notice (updated January 2021) contains further information.

Accessibility Policy

HDL’s 1950s-built train may pose difficulties to certain classes of user: our Accessibility Policy describes what these are and how they may affect users.

Folding bicycles

It may be possibile for you to bring your folding bicycle on the Hastings DEMU, with prior written approval; our guidelines on carriage of folding bikes will help you to determine your bike’s suitability for carriage.

Railtour Archive

We can recommend a dip into the HDL Railtour archive, which contains details of all the previous “days out” which HDL has operated to date; you may also find interesting our YouTube Channel which contains 32 cab-ride videos featuring outings during 2016–18.