Latest ABC - Steady as you go!

It's ABC time again.

Remember most industry magazines don't submit their titles to circulation audit so a bowler tip to those that do.

Here the 2013 circulation figures with those for 2012 in brackets...

Railway Magazine: 37,853 (37,285) - up 1.5% 

Rail: 20,122 (20,123) - no change

Railway Gazette International: 10,711 (10,533) - up 1.7%

And by way of comparison, Steam Railway: 31,281 (31,810) - down 1.7%

Yet again reports of the demise of Dead Tree Media appear somewhat exaggerated.

Stand by your beds!

This from Whitehall...

Several hundred civil servants who serve in the Reserve Forces are proudly wearing their military uniforms to work today, 26 June, in job centres, tax offices and government departments across the country to mark Uniform to Work Day.

And quite right too!

After all Saturday is Armed Forces Day.

But who is this we spy in the accompanying pictures?

 
Well blow me, if it isn't Sgt 'High-tops' Stargazey, of the Queen's Own Regiment of Spinners!

Eye wonders if a certain Lt Col in the trade press isn't tempted, just very occasionally, to pull rank?

Highland Main Line 150 - properly celebrated!

This from Anon...

As the Highland Main Line celebrates its 150th anniversary, I thought Eye readers might enjoy this image of three dubious characters propping up an Inverness bar at the weekend.

Can you work out who they are yet?

Leveson, Regulation, Exemplary Damages & the Railway Press

One for Messrs Jackson, Briginshaw, Abbott, Preston, Harris (both), Pigott, Jack, Abell, Dunn, Jones, Milne, etc... to mull over.

With a bowler tip to the latest issue of Private Eye for highlighting this part of the debate on Awards of exemplary damages in relation to the Royal Charter regulating the press:

Richard Bacon (South Norfolk, Conservative)
One could easily envisage a railway enthusiasts’ magazine which had a range of authors whose material was subject to editorial control but which many people would nevertheless consider to be a hobby magazine. It would fall outside the regime because it was aimed solely at enthusiasts. What would happen, however, if such a magazine were to get hold of some information, perhaps confidential information, about High Speed 2? Would it then be caught by the regime? Does my right hon. Friend not see the path that she is going down?

Maria Miller (Basingstoke, Conservative)
We have clearly set out the direction that we are going in, and it is there in the information for my hon. Friend to read. Ultimately, the court will decide whether any particular issues fall near the line. If a publication is concerned about whether it would be caught by the new regime, it can of course seek legal advice, but we have done a great deal to make this clear to individual publications.

Hmmm...

Eye suggests doing like the Speccie and just saying NO! 

A good civil servant, sex, trains and the Railway Gazette

Dear Occupants of Great Minster House.

This from Wales Online...

A civil servant in Whitehall was almost jailed in the 1970s for saving Aberystwyth’s train service and many others targeted for a wave of Beeching-style closures, it has been revealed.

That's the way to do it!

An incredible tale and unbelievably one that isn't dated the 1st April - read it!!

Good effort!!!

New Franchising Policy - RAIL Exultant!

Amongst senior industry figures the take on today's New Franchising Policy has been somewhat upbeat.

Phrases like: 'competent', 'pleased', 'deliverable' and 'making the very best of a bad job' abound.

Meanwhile there is near euphoria in Peterborough, the home of RAIL, as tomorrow (Wednesday) is press day.

After much lobbying it appears that  DfT has finally gotten the message!

Today's announce allows RAIL scribes to analyse the New Franchising Policy so that subscribers can ruminate over both it and their cornflakes on Saturday morning.

And as any ful kno RAIL has '523,198 copy sales a year with an estimated 2,615,990 readers'.

ABC circulation figures - An editor writes...

Dear Fact Compiler...

Following on your round-up of ABC figures a week or two back, a quick note to let you know that Rail Technology Magazine also put on readers, all through individual subscription requests rather than just bunging a load of copies out to irrelevant offices or depots or similar dodgy practices (shurely: '...rather than through meticulous database management and highly targetted mailings? Ed).

It’s now 9,118, up from 8,800 a year ago. We joined ABC in 2001.
 

We appreciate the implied tip of the bowler hat for allowing our figures to be audited!

As you say, it’s not a common enough practice among industry titles, especially the rail B2B sector, where we sit.

Adam Hewitt, Editor

Latest ABC - RAIL reverses the trend

It's ABC time again.

Remember most industry titles don't submit their titles to circulation audit so a bowler tip to those that do.

Here the 2012 circulation figures with those for 2011 in brackets...

Railway Magazine 37,298 (36,523)
 
Rail 20,123 (19.801)
 
And by way of comparison, Steam Railway 31,810 (32,266) 

Railway Magazine continues to perform strongly and RAIL has grown its circulation for the first time in several years.

If Eye has missed anyone out, please shout.

Once again reports of the demise of Dead Tree Media appear somewhat exaggerated.

UPDATE: This from the Railway Gazette...

Railway Gazette International has been a member of ABC since the 1960’s and has every intention of remaining a member for the foreseeable future.

Our 2012 certificate has been submitted to the  ABC.  We were a week later than usual in submitting this but well within the ABC deadline.  ABC have issued the draft certificate to us and the official one will be live next week.

Figure for 2011 was 10,548 print copies, figure for 2012 will be 10,533. 

We are 15 print copies down but this has been replaced by a huge increase in our digital only copies which are not counted in this audit.

Harris and Walmsley in Paternity Suit - Shocker

This from Alec Trick...
 
It's all getting very competitive in the Dead Tree Media world.

According to Stop and Examine in the latest issue of RAIL (p79 issue 709) Nigel Harris invented the idea of TRAXX UK in 2010!

Hmmm...

Reading through back copies of Modern Railways I discover that one Ian Walmsley, of Porterbook fame, put the idea forward in November 2008 and according to Bombardier sources has been pursuing it tiresomely ever since. (shurely 'tirelessly ever since'? Ed)

Still, success has many fathers whilst failure has none.
 
Who for instance would be brave enough to claim paternity of the Incredibly Expensive Procurement?

UPDATE: This from a Mr Neil Bennett...

May I gently correct the claims of both gentlemen to the progeny of Traxx UK?

This project was initiated in 2007 by Allco Rail (now Beacon Rail) in conjunction with Bombardier locos (Italy).
 
So there you have it. Both Harris and Walmsley cuckolded - Official.

Ian Allan and the key to success?

Eye understands that the Ian Allan stable of magazines, which includes Modern Railways and Railways Illustrated, has been sold.

The new owner is Key Publishing of Stamford, better known for its aviation titles.

As Captain Deltic is no doubt saying, as he jumps up and down with excitement... Chocks Away!

Latest ABC - Railway Magazine up over 6%

It's ABC time again...

As Eye points out each year most industry titles don't submit their circulations to ABC audit, so a bowler tip to those who do.

Here the 2011 circulation figures for industry titles (with 2010 figures in brackets):

Railway Magazine 36,523 (34,168)

Steam Railway 32,266 (32,441)

RAIL magazine 19,801 (20,006)

Railway Gazette International 10,548 (10,258)
Eye's man in the Dead Tree Media comments:
Whilst the general trend in the print market is one of declining sales, railway titles are holding up well. Railway Magazine, sold by IPC in 2010 to Mortons, is the market leader for the 5th successive year and has recorded an impressive growth in sales of 6.85%! But with the chill winds of recession blowing across all sectors of the economy it’s going to be tough in 2012.

Eye wonders if the new owners of Ian Allan's railway titles will submit to ABC audit?

UPDATE: This from Citizen Kane...
Eye readers may be interested to see the circulation of some other titles.

The Beano manages 38,333, whilst Bob The Builder pulls in a mere 37,505.

On the plus side their circulations are down 4.4% and 16.9% respectively.

National train shortage over - Official

This from @ECMLfan, in Clog Rail Land...

Exciting news from the new, improved, multi-media Railway Herald!


One in the eye for the cassandra-like Captain Deltic, with his doom laden projections of future rolling stock orders.

Roll-up, roll-up, roll-up - Mighty Organ for sale!

This from Lord Copper...

Here's a chance for any budding 'Sir Ian Morton-Bauer' to break into the rail publishing world:

Rail Industry Magazine & E-mail Bulletin
£69K turnover. 12 issues per year. Written by 1 P/T staff plus 5 freelancers. 8,000 copies free to recipients. 95% repeat advertisers. Advertising sold by 1 P/T staff. E-mail bulletin to 16,000 opted-in subscribers. Guide price £95K.

But which magazine, produced by a part-time editor and five freelancers, could it possibly be?

RAIL exposes Hammond's lack of trousers

This from Rosebud...

There was good news on the front cover of the latest edition of RAIL which highlighted a massive £5bn investment in the Great Western Main Line, adding for good measure that it was the ‘biggest revamp since Brunel!'.

So excited was the industry by this sudden influx of new money that an event was held at Paddington on the 14th July to celebrate the occasion, presided over by none other than our very own Chief-Envelope-Opener, Paper-knife Hammond!

Away from the glare of the Thameslink debacle Hammond was able to lap up the plaudits of an admiring industry delighted by his sudden largess.

RAIL even afforded space on page 10 to record Paper-knife gushing that this was “a new age for rail in Britain”!

But what's this?

All is not as it seems.

A mere 34 pages later the World's Greatest Living Transport Correspondent fisked the entire stunt.

Wolmar (for it was he) explained that the £5bn consisted of money already spent and reheated previous announcements:

• Crossrail £2.2bn
• Electrification £800m
• IEP £150m
• Reading £850m
• Resignalling £600m
• Cotswolds £17m
• and Newport station £20m.

Sadly that only came to a paltry £3,787m.

Happily by adding in Swindon – Kemble redoubling and estimates for various national projects such as ERTMS, W10 freight improvements, Access for All and the new rail communication system the figure finally tottered towards the £5bn figure, sort of...

Still, good to see that RAIL is prepared to sup with the devil and poke him in the eye at the same time.

UPDATE: This from NR's Internet Rapid Rebuttal Unit...

I was really pleased to see RAIL put on its front cover the work which is going on to modernise Great Western.

This is a recognition of the huge amount of work (Captain Deltic tells me we should use the BR term 'total route modernisation') happening along the route.

No-one has claimed it was new money, but Network Rail and the DfT, rightly, wanted to communicate the scale of the work and what it means to passengers.

When we are asked - inevitably - about the amount of investment, we totted up all the projects and came to that figure.

Knowing how fond Christian is of flashy CGI, he and other Eye readers should point their browsers to Network Rail's YouTube channel and marvel at what we are doing to revamp the Great Western here.

UPDATE: This from Captain Deltic...

Using the same figures eventually provided by Network Rail to the World's Greatest Living Transport Correspondent, and with some extrapolation of the global figures for ETCS and GSM-R costs, I clicked SUM on my spreadsheet and discovered the total cost for the GWML to be £5,004 million.

This precision confirms that the '£5 billion' label is entirely fictitious.

We can only conclude that GWML is the new WCML.

Can a Black Diamond Day on the Western now be far away?

UPDATE: This from the World's Greatest Living Transport Correspondent, evidently in a misanthropic mood...

I hate flash CGI – and this one suggests that only male oversized robots will be travelling on the trains in 2020.

And why does the train only have four carriages on its way to Newport’s ‘iconic’ station?

And the music sounds like something out of the Danish version of The Killing.

I think we should be told.

Back to the future?

Much excitement amongst the Gricerati!

Word reaches Eye that Murray Brown may be polishing-up his editor's chair!

But which Class 1 publication will he oversee?

Hammond upstaged by Railway press - Shocker

Disturbing scenes at today's official launch of NXEA's new Stansted Express fleet at London's Liverpool Street!

Petrol-head did the honours, ensuring that the Railway Media were out in force.

But what's this?

Was RAIL's Phil Haigh, an officer in the TA, making a political point about how stretched our armed forces are?


Eye thinks we should be told!

Meanwhile, Captain Deltic insisted in appearing in every shot...


Eye fervently hopes that there are continued opportunities for similar Gricerati hilarity at future launches of British built trains...

UPDATE: This from Pike...

Diagramming 'Roger' was a nice touch from NXEA's Ops and Fleet teams.

Although unfortunate that he is looking quite so careworn these days.

Time for a visit to the paintshop methinks, or at very least the wash plant!

Latest ABC figures show print holding up

It's ABC time again...

As Eye pointed out last year most railway titles don't submit themselves to the indignity of an ABC circulation audit, so a bowler tip to those that do.

Here the recently published 2010 circulation figures for the top three (with 2009 figures in brackets):

Railway Magazine 34,168 (34,715)

Steam Railway 32,441 (32,842)

RAIL magazine 20,006 (20,546)

Eye's man in the Dead Tree Media comments:

As all three titles recorded a roughly similar decline in circulation this suggests that readers are consolidating the number of titles they buy and that overall readership is subject to... ahem... ‘natural wastage’!

Evidently print media continues to hold its own.

UPDATE: This from Arnie the Anorak...

Of course RAIL is published every two weeks or 26 times a year, where as Railway Magazine is published 12 times a year and Steam 13 times a year.

If you then add up the total annual circulation for each publication... (that's enough gratuitous puffery for Dead Tree media. Ed).

Today Railway Mag, tomorrow the World!

Much hilarity in the publishing world as Mortons struggles to position its purchase of Railway Magazine.

These bullish words from the Brand Manager Heritage & Lifestyle, contained in an email trumpeting the acquisition:

Mortons Media Group is delighted to announce their purchase of The Railway Magazine, making them the UK’s largest railway publisher.

A bold claim indeed!

But does it stack up to ABC verification?

Railway Magazine – 34k - ABC verified.
Rail Express - Not ABC verified
Heritage Railway - Not ABC verified

Oh dear. Is someone perhaps talking cojones?

Dispensing with Ian Allan, who also don't go in for ABC verification, who else might want to lay claim to being the UK's largest railway publisher?

Well, as any fule kno, the best selling railway publications are the modelling titles (see Eye passim).

The market leader is Railway Modeller, published by Peco, which has an ABC audited circulation of 44k, ten thousand above that for Railway Mag.

Next in line is Model Rail which has an ABC verified readership of 28k.

Of course if you added Model Rail's readership figure to that of its sister rail titles - RAIL (25k) and Steam Railway (33k) - then Bauer has a combined rail related readership of well over 86,000.

Eye fears that plucky little Rail Express and Heritage Railway would struggle to lay claim to the 53,000 readers needed to topple Bauer from pole position.

No doubt the new owners of the Railway Mag will take this challenge squarely on the chin and soon shell out for ABC audits on both Rail Express and Heritage Railway.

Alternatively, in these austere times, Eye wonders what the future may hold for such minnows now that the RM shark has entered Morton's pool?

Railway Magazine sold to Mortons

As predicted by Eye way back in August the Railway Magazine has been sold to Mortons Media Group.

This from the Press Gazette...

The Railway Magazine is a monthly title covering all aspects of the rail industry. It has been a resilient circulation performer in recent years, slightly growing its sale over the last decade to the current total of 34,715.

It has been bought by Lincolnshire-based Mortons Media Group – which publishes magazines such as Rail Express, Scootering, Heritage Railway and Towpath.

Altogether now: Robin Jones, Robin Jones riding through the glen. Robin Jones, Robin Jones with his band of men...

Grand Central new MD - Shocker

This from the Railway Herald...


Eye is unsure whether the Tom Windsor mentioned is the former Rail Regulator or a minor scion of the Royal Family?

Perhaps the soi disant 'veteran' observer would care to clarify?

UPDATE: This from a Mr Brennan Brown...

It is neither as well you know!

And can you please stop referring to me as the "soi disant veteran observer", it's not particularly funny and... (sadly, owing to reasons of space, Eye is unable to publish the rest of this email from the soi disant 'veteran' observer. Ed).

UPDATE: This from Chianothus Virginicus

I hope they have considered Psalm 42 before choosing this name and have amended their maintenance regime accordingly!

"As pants the hart for cooling streams
When heated in the chase..."