President’s Annual Report for 2016/2017
It gives me great pleasure to present this, my last annual report as President, to the Annual General Meeting of the Society.
The Society continues in good health both financially and in terms of its membership levels. I am therefore pleased to report that we have managed to maintain our total membership at 260 members.
As always, the main means of engagement between the Society and its members is through the lecture programme. During the course of the year we enjoyed nine lectures, all being presented in the Lecture Theatre at the Derby Conference Centre, continuing a long tradition of this being our principal venue. As a Society, we are grateful for the support of the Conference Centre that enables us to continue to enjoy a low cost of subscription. . The lecture start time of 1800hrs continues to be popular with the majority of the membership with attendance numbers being comparable with those for the previous year, including a number of visitors, some of whom have subsequently joined as members.
Throughout the year, the Committee has sought to provide a balanced mix of topics for the lectures, including both heritage and modern aspects associated with the railway industry. The lecture season began with the usual Rob Foxon railway themed film show and was followed over the course of the session with lectures on the following subject areas: Wheel Slide Protection, the considered thoughts of Nigel Harris (Rail managazine), the Ultra Class 73 Upgrade, West Midland Trams, the new LNER P2 2-8-2, Improving Rail Safety, New Trains for PRASA South Africa, and the Bombardier lecture on the Adventra platform. The Society was also pleased that joint lectures were held with both the IMechE and IET – which continue to be very successful.
As well as our lecture programme, the society has arranged a series of complimentary visits. During the year visits were successfully undertaken to Shrewsbury Signal Boxes, Midlands Metro and the Beeches Light Railway. The sum total of the attendances at these visits was a healthy 53
During the current session, the customary Peter Parkin led annual visit took place, this time to the North East. A party of 28 visitedeight places of interest over the course of threedays. Thefirst day was devoted to railways old and new, the latter being a conducted tour of Hitachi's new assembly plant at Newton Aycliffe. The current build programme is the Class 800 bi-mode trains for the GWR and the ECML routes. We are greatly indebted to ourPresident Elect, Jonathan Wragg, for facilitating this visit. The first day was completed by a introductory talk by David Elliot and conducted tour by Tony Lord of the LNER P2 2-8-2 steam locomotive, under constructionin the Darlington Locomotive Works. Day twoprovided an opportunity for attendees to appreciate the wonderful scenery of Weardale and Teesdaleen route to theNorth of England Killhope Lead Mine, followed by a visit to High Forcewaterfall. The morning of the final day was devoted tothe "world's oldest railway", the Tanfield Railway, whose origins dateback to horse-drawn wagontraffic in 1725 and its renowned Causey Arch - a single span bridge of amazing proportions for its age. The Annual Visit was concluded with an afternoon spent at the Beamish Open Air Museum.
The success and popularity of the Annual Dinner held at our traditional venue of the Midland (now known as the Hallmark) Hotel continued this year, although a number of regular-attending Society members were unfortunately away on holiday, or otherwise engaged, so the members' number was slightly down this year. Nevertheless, the ongoing support of our President, Vice-Presidents and corporate friends in taking corporate tables for their staff and clients, which is greatly appreciated, ensured that the attendance was still very good and again the two rooms, the Garden/Wyedale and Edale Rooms, had to be used to accommodate the 125 guests. Six local companies, Bombardier Transportation, Onyx Rail (for the first time), Ricardo Rail, SNC-Lavalin,Porterbrook Leasing and Serco Rail supported the Dinner, which was held on Friday, 10 February 2017, a date that avoided the local schools' half-term holiday break. Our original speaker was unable to attend at the last moment and we were indebted to Andrew Munro, the relatively new Chief Executive of the Great Central Railway at Loughborough, for giving us a fascinating update on the exciting new developments taking place on that railway, including thereconnection of the railway to the national network and a new transport museum at Leicester, the latter being in conjunction with the National Railway Museum. The Mayor of Derby, Linda Winter and her Consort, Mrs J.Tittley, attended to maintain the long-standing tradition of civic involvement with our Society, which we greatly appreciate. Peter Parkin acted as the MC for the evening and ensured that, as usual, everything went smoothly. The first Annual Dinner was held in 1908, the year in which the Society, then a Club, was formed, and hoping to continue the level of support for this very traditional Society event, the next Annual Dinner will be held on Friday evening, 9 February 2018 at the same venue. All members, partners and friends are very welcome to attend this function, which is always a thoroughly enjoyable evening.
A statement of the Society’s finances (over the last 3 year) is presented separately and shows the Society continuing to have a healthy financial position. As a result the Committee is again recommending no immediate increase in subscription fees for the 2017/18 session but, mindful of the current economic climate and a number of important improvements being considered, it again requests the meeting to authorise it to make any necessary fee adjustment ahead of the session starting in September 2018. Members will remember that (for a number of reasons) we were unable to present a robust statement of accounts at the last AGM and I want to single out the work undertaken by Messrs Russell, Parkin, Saunders and Graham Wild in getting our finances properly presented and back on track!
The Society is keen to continue moving with changing times in order to appeal to a diverse audience and in particular to continue to grow the membership with younger colleagues. As a Society, the way that we are striving to achieve this is as follows:
· We have a full and technically varied and relevant calendar of lectures and visits. Our forward list is as strong as ever, covering most of the key developments in our industry
· We are already moving into the world of social networking – Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and an ever improving website
· Reinvigorating our ‘marketing’ campaign which is geared to promote the benefits of the society across the whole railway community
· Promoting the Society through social networking events – giving the opportunity for members (and particularly younger members) to network with industry peers, experienced engineers and our Vice President cohort
· Better levering the support and capability of our Vice President cohort
· Supporting event such as iRail and building a relationships with the Derby Manufacturing UTC and Rail Forum East Midlands etc.
· Forming a close working relationship with Young Railway Professionals (YRP) and other bodies
As my third (and final) year of office comes to a close – I would like to offer my sincere thanks to all members of the Committee for their hard work and ongoing support. The smooth running of this society is very much down to them! Likewise, I am also indebted to the Vice Presidents for their support behind the scenes – particularly promoting the Society within their own organisations. Also, I wish Jonathan Wragg all success in his tenure as the President of this great Society – I am convinced that Jonathan will continue to robustly drive forward the Society – so that it can offer an ever developing, informative, and enjoyable forum for the benefit of the membership.
Finally, and with considerable sadness, I have to announce that after c50yrs sterling service to this Society, and a considerable amount of that time as a Committee Member, Peter Parking has decided to step down from the Committee. Peter has very big boots to fill – but we do truly wish him a happy ‘retirement’! That being said, I am sure that Peter will continue to have an active participation in the Societies events and activities.
Martin Giles
President
2nd October 2017