European Railroad Discussion > Owning a Private car in Europe

There is constant discussion of Private Varnish (PV's) or Private cars in the U.S. Passenger Trains forum, these cars can operate through the AAR system in US, Canada and Mexico but are largely legislated by AMTRAK standards, if your car meets Amtrak standards, it can operate through all of North America. I would like to know what are the requirments for owning a private car in Europe (and Asia?). If there's a UIC rule regarding this for the car to be compliant to operate through Europe except U.K. (or if you own a U.K. private car, can you run it also through Europe)?

Also where can you go? If you have a private car in France, for example:

-Can you run it south to Iran? Regauge it and run it as far southeast as Bangladesh through Pakistan and India?
-Can you run it to South Korea and China via Poland and Belarus through the TransSiberian and North Korea (changing the trucks)...

Also, what system do they use in Europe regarding HVAC (Heating, ventilation and air conditioning)? HEP? I also think my car would need to have an independent generator...

What is the main recommended thing to do?

Thanks!
-Hector

Are you talking about freight cars, passenger coaches or automobiles on the rails? The answer might differ depending what you mean.

Basically the freight cars are the form that travels most on the international routes (counting on the volumes), just like trucking happens European wide. But as soon as you meet the chancing gauge, the profits disappear so regauging these days in done rarely by changing wheel sets / bogies. In Spain there are also applications for gauge change on the fly.

I'm pretty sure what's meant is owning a passenger carriage which can be, in North America, attached to existing Amtrak trains to get it from A to B. As far as I'm aware this is very much a North American phenomenom - while they are privately owned carriages, for example by tour operators these run as separate trains rather than being attached to existing services.

Buy the available books on 'Venice-Simplon-Orient-Express' and read them; then get in touch with the parent company, maybe the same name or Sea Containers Ltd., your travel agent could help you find them. They have the most experience traveling over Europe and could set you straight on becoming the Beebe & Clegg of Europe.

McKay,

Yes, I'm reffering strictly to passenger coaches on rails "private varnish", they might be called in Europe "Private carriages"? I don't know. I'm aware of Iberian gauge and Talgo "on the fly" gauge changers.

I don't mean large corporations such as the Venice Simplon Orient Express or such carriers of at least 10 private cars requiring a private train. I'm reffering to regular people owning a private coach on rails that want to run it WHEREVER it's possible... In North America you only have three countries to do so, unless you want to ferry your car to Panama, Peru and some of Brazil which are standard gauge and should be AAR compatible.

Yes, I'm being a little utopic, but I like to see what's possible.

I have never seen private varnish on the rear of a train in Europe but then I haven't been everywhere. In France I would say this would be impossible. In the UK the probability is that a private car would be restricted to a heritage railway, of which there are many but many of them are not connected to the system. I have to say I think the options are few and very expensive.

In addition, you have to consider the loading gages of the different countries. This would be particularly relevant in the UK. Britain sent several steam locomotives to North America in the 1930s (Flying Scotsman, Royal Scot, King George V and Coronation) but this could not possibly be reciprocated due to the restricted loading gage in the UK.

In the good old days (pre-1922!) many land owners in the UK did have private cars which could be attached at a whim to the trains passing across their estates, and before that (i.e. in the 1830s) it was common for the wealthy to literally put their coach on a flat wagon as part of the train. That is probably why passenger cars are called coaches in the UK.

As I understand it (from a lay UK perspective) the whole concept of private cars attached to scheduled passenger trains disappeared in Europe the best part of a century ago. In the 19th century it was not unheard of for members of the British aristocracy to have private saloons, while the conveyance of horses {and grooms) could be arranged in "horse boxes" attached to passenger trains. Many main line railway companies maintained their own private saloons for hire and operation in scheduled services.

In the 21st century the idea seems quite unimaginable. Most European passenger trains are multiple units, or at the very least semi-permanent formations with a locomotive at one end and a control trailer at the other. They often operate in intensive diagrams, with little time for adding or detaching extra vehicles.

In contrast, there is also the trend within the European Union for a liberalisation of operating monopolies, with the hope that open access to the rail network cannot be denied to compliant operators. The conditions are often very stringent, however, for anyone intending to operate a public service.

This leaves the option of the privately chartered train, with its own motive power. Such operations can be arranged at huge expense and are not uncommon in Britain, but still involve a huge amount of bureaucracy in the approval process with Network Rail, the owners of the right of way. One important issue is compatibility with modern high tech signalling and safety systems.

In a nutshell, it seems that running a whole train privately is not impossible in Europe, at least on many of the more secondary routes, but individual cars are effectively out of the question. I would be interested to hear if anyone else has a more authoritative opinion, as I might be wrong!

spflow Wrote:
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> As I understand it (from a lay UK perspective) the
> whole concept of private cars attached to
> scheduled passenger trains disappeared in Europe
> the best part of a century ago. In the 19th
> century it was not unheard of for members of the
> British aristocracy to have private saloons,

Very few though were privately owned. Companies like the LNWR provided private saloons but they wore the livery of the LNWR. The Duke of Sutherland is one aristo who owned not only a saloon but also an engine, built for him by the Highland Railway. Today the salon is owned by the National Railway Museum but is on loan to the Scottish Railway Preservation Society, it was built by the London & North Western at Wolverton in 1899 and so resembled the other saloons and semi-royals which the LNWR built.

A 1903 example of a semi-royal/family saloon, currently based located at the Bluebell Railway is for sale

http://www.bluebell-railway.co.uk/bluebell/pic2/806.HTML



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/01/11 15:43 by 86235.

There is the Royal Train in Great Britain, used fairly often by Her Majesty the Queen, and occasionally by the Prince of Wales. In the Netherlands there are two or three Royal Carriages, which get used on rare occasions. Other than those the only passenger carriages resembling North American Private Varnish, were operated by EW&S as a Business Train in Great Britain, I don't know if they still own or use them since the Deutsche Bahn takeover.

Private cars were very rare in the UK, but they did exist.

The Duke of Sutherland had a private train to carry him to and from his Scottish estate.

"Dunrobin" and its coach has had an interesting history in preservation. After being on display beside the miniature Romney,Hythe & Dymchurch in the 1950's in the UK, the train was purchased for a planned museum in Vancouver BC. When the museum project didn't happen, the "Dunrobin" became property of the BC Government. In 1966, it helped celebrate the Centennial of Vancouver Island becoming self governing. Later it was sent to Fort Steele, an historic village where it remained for the next thirty years, with a visit to "Steam Expo" in Vancouver in 1986.

Recently, "Dunrobin" and its coach returned to preservation in the UK in exchange for a large cash donation to Fort Steele.

In my first roll of slide film, "Dunrobin" is shown on display at the CP Vancouver station in 1966.

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Wow! Thanks for the replies, those Royal Trains do look nice!

In regular trains I believe you "could" put up a Private car in between the locomotive and the rest of the train assuming it has a cab control compartment car on the other end, but yes, the problem is the time it takes to attach it to a train in countries like France... I'm also assuming the private car meets the loading gauge for most countries, for example:

I believe a U.K. passenger car/carriage could roll through all Europe (assuming the most stringent mechanical standards a' la UIC, it has a low loading gauge and clearance, but a Russian car even if Regauged might have limits. Maybe a UK car could be broad-gauged for Russia, but I don't know if it would be too "small" and if CIS countries would limit crash-worthiness...

Speaking of more countries, maybe if you have an Amtrak approved car in North America, you might be able to operate it in China if you put it on a ship... I don't know if it would be too heavy, but the couplers, airbrakes seem compatible, and physically you "could" move it in China into Vietnam and into the Koreas?

Or maybe also you could regauge the AAR North American Amtrak certified car, re-couple it and run it on CIS countries?

Maybe "open access" carriers will mean more convinience to own a private carriage/passenger car.

More food for thought...

-Hector

Hector,
While technically you could have a private car, as long as it conformed to UIC standards for coupling, safety, etc. the issue is there's no financial means to do so. Amtrak has a tariff for carrying private cars, the European passenger operators do not.

Basically, you'd need to run it as a train, even if it were just one car, as you couldn't find another train operator to pull it for you.

I have this lovely image in mind of an LNWR semi royal saloon hanging off the end of a TGV taking Focalplane back home to Beziers. :-)

86235 Wrote:
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> I have this lovely image in mind of an LNWR semi
> royal saloon hanging off the end of a TGV taking
> Focalplane back home to Beziers. :-)

Hanging off the end at 186mph! Yes, that's an interesting image.

Another private train was, I believe, owned by the Duke of Marlborough for the short branch from Woodstock into Oxford.

Early photos and track diagrams of Birmingham New Street Station in the 1850s show small wagon turntables along the platforms for loading private carriages onto London bound trains. Warwickshire Railways has some excellent material on this, for example:

http://www.warwickshirerailways.com/lms/lnwrbns_str426a.htm

I don't have a link to share, but I do recall that several years ago there were some tour operators in Germany who did have private coaches used for excursions on the DB.

Sometimes handling private cars or whole trains can be easy. On the Russian and Finnish networks this happens all the time. Some examples on the pictures at the high season during the Russian Christmas time (which is more or less our Western new year season).

1) Alexander Nevsky is a whole private train sometimes seen even in Finland. The inside is furnished very much like late Zhars Winter Palace, something that would be very exotic to the Western tastes, if Western wages would permit travelling this train...

2-3) A private celebration car in one of the special extra trains during the high season.

All pictures here by Trainorders member Stas.

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Pullman Wrote:
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> I don't have a link to share, but I do recall that
> several years ago there were some tour operators
> in Germany who did have private coaches used for
> excursions on the DB.

Yes, there are complete excursion trains of various opulence. For example;

http://www.swissclassictrain.ch/en/

The key of course is that you must charter a complete train.

There is a group in Britain at the moment who are slowly restoring one of the 5BEL electric Pullman sets built for the Southern Railway in 1932. It is being restored to mainline condition so that it can operate on the 3rd rail network (not sure if it will be dragged away from the 3rd rail). But again it is a whole train, not a single car.

eminence_grise Wrote:
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> Recently, "Dunrobin" and its coach returned to
> preservation in the UK in exchange for a large
> cash donation to Fort Steele.

The Duke of Sutherland is one of the aristocrats most associated with the Highland clearances, when tenant farmers were forced off the land to be replaced by sheep. Many emigrated, taking passage to the USA, Canada and Australia. Others were resettled in towns like Helmsdale, where, having been farmers they were expected to become fishermen! Of course if you visit the Sutherland's stately home at Dunrobin Castle much of this is glossed over.

Dunrobin (II), the engine, was built in 1895 to a design of David Jones, the locomotive superintendent of the Highland Railway. The Highland had absorbed the Sutherland Railway, which the Duke had promoted so it was not surprising that it was they who designed his new locomotive. The cab is very spacious, it contained a bench seat at the back for the Duke so he could ride on the engine whilst his family rode in the saloon. He also persuaded the Highland to buy his first locomotive, Dunrobin (I), a 2-4-0T. The station at Dunrobin, specially built to serve his castle is still open and trains on the Inverness to Wick route stop there (on request). The saloon in the picture was the Duke's first private car, as I mentioned elsewhere, his second, a much more opulent bogie coach built for him by the LNWR, is in the hands of the National Railway Museum.

With the "distance" of time I have reflected on this post. The concept of a Private Car in Europe these days is just not acceptable to those who control. It actually amazes me that Amtrak has the time and resources to allow private cars to run at the rear end of its cross country services, but there is clearly money to be made so why not.

I have several friends who belong to AAPRCO but they don't own cars, they work on them as crew members, cooking, cleaning, stewarding and so on. It's hard work but can be very rewarding.

A number of posts above have commented on the concept of the private train, but even in this situation it would be hard to imagine the owner of a private car being allowed to attach to the end of the private train. The modern day culture here would have a hard time accepting what is "normal" in North America.

The equivalent of my AAPRCO friends in the UK are the hard working volunteers on the many heritage/preservation railways.