I have been riding on, as well as being a volunteer, on preserved railways for over 45 years and my visit to the North Yorkshire Moore’s Railway (NYMR) 21st and 22nd September 2021 was the worst I have ever encountered. I booked tickets many weeks before for reserved seats on the Pickering to Whitby service on 21st September. Having boarded the train and waiting to depart, passengers were advised that the service would not go through to Whitby due to an “incident on the line”. This incident turned out to be a diesel impacting on a stationary set of coaches with passengers on board. Having travelled to Yorkshire and booked overnight accommodation, I was able to transfer my reservations to a train the following day. The next day I again travelled to Pickering, boarded the train to find that the seats we had reserved did not exist! Station and train staff were unconcerned, indicating that this often happened with seats in coach C. So despite paying £76 for two seats, having to pay two lots of £5 for parking on two days (no mention of hidden parking charge when booking) and having to make two trips instead of one to the railway I was faced with unhelpful and unresponsive staff. This has been mirrored by the back office staff who simply replied to my first email to them thanking me for drawing the matter to their attention and then, as this reply was not good enough, ignored my subsequent email.
My experiences, over many years of preserved railways has been one of total satisfaction and great enjoyment. Not so with NYMR. I am left feeling undervalued by their complete lack of customer care, zero empathy and lack of respect for customers who pay not an inconsiderable sum to travel on this badly managed and operated railway. I would recommend that anyone wishing to experience the joys of steam give the NYMR a wide birth and travel on one of the many other excellent railways, some of which are not far away. If you want to experience train travel through the North Yorkshire Moore’s National Park there is always the Esk Valley line to Whitby.
