Severn Valley Railway Charitable Trust Ltd

Severn Valley Railway Charitable Trust Ltd is a Registered Charity, Number 1092723, for the purpose of raising funds to support the SVR. It is commonly referred to on the SVR as "the Charitable Trust", and was originally called the SVR Rolling Stock Trust. Its objectives are to help fund restoration and maintenance projects, to help arrest the decline of heritage engineering skills and to safeguard the long-term future and operational capability of the Railway.

Contents

Support

• The Charitable Trust funds most of the costs of the SVR’s Heritage Skills Training Academy and team of apprentices.
• Income from its endowment Future Fund will allow sustainable investment on the Railway in the years to come. Donations to the Future Fund were matched, pound for pound, by a Heritage Lottery Fund grant of up to £500,000 which was reached on 26 May 2017. It has aspirations to grow the Fund to £10 million.
• In May 2016, the Trust secured a grant of £75,000 from the Department for Transport towards a project which will transform the Railway’s facilities for disabled visitors by adapting a carriage to wheelchair use to complete the SVR’s fleet of accessible carriages, and rebuilding a second carriage to provide wheelchair-accessible dining facilities
• It works with supporters to ensure their wishes are kept when they decide to leave a final legacy to the Railway in their Will.

Current appeals

• It is appying to the HLF for funds to repair Falling Sands Viaduct
• The Trust supports the diesel groups' appeal seeking to improve facilities at the Kidderminster Diesel Depot which opened in June 2016. As of July 2017 donations have reached £6,430.
• The Charitable Trust is supporting the SVR’s ambitious Bridgnorth Development Project. As of November 2017 £83,000 has now been received for the project, including £18,000 that has been restricted to restoring the Bristol Bath Road turntable at the station.

Previous support

• It secured an HLF grant of £95,000 towards the restoration of 4930 Hagley Hall .
• The Trust has worked closely with volunteers from the LNER Carriage Group to raise funds for and in conjunction with Carriage & Wagon to complete the final restoration work on three Gresley teak carriages (Kitchen Composite 7960, Brake Third 24506 and Open Third 52255.) These were splendidly showcased when Flying Scotsman visited the SVR in September 2016.
• It contributed to the annual track re-laying work that took place in 2016 between Eardington and Bridgnorth.
• In January 2018 it raised over £10,000 by appeal to repair damage caused by vandals to two coaches.
• A rolling stock fundraising and restoration project for GWR Toad van 17410 took place in collaboration with the LNER Carriage Group. By 2017 donations reached £7,275.

Fundraising events

Events organised by the Charitable Trust include:

• April 2014: Charity Race Day at Ludlow Races
• June 2015: Charity Race Day at Worcester Racecourse raising £34,500
• June 2016: Charity Race Day at Worcester Racecourse raising £22,000
• September 2016: VIP Flying Scotsman Charity Day
• 14 June 2017: Charity Race Day at Worcester Racecourse raising £23,000.
• 11 June 2018: Annual Charity Race Day at Worcester Racecourse raising £13,000.

The Charitable Trust took over the organisation of the annual Peep Behind the Scenes day for 2017.

Rolling stock

The Charitable Trust owns GWR 7819 Hinton Manor, BR Class 11 12099 and a number of carriages and goods wagons:

• Some of these carriages were formerly owned by a separate body, the L.M.S & B.R. Coach Fund. The Coach Fund donated them to the Charitable Trust in 2007, following which it became a department within the Charitable Trust. The department maintains a sales coach at Bridgnorth.
• Three carriages were also acquired from the LNER (SVR) Coach Fund in 2010, at which time the LNER Carriage Group similarly became a department within the Charitable Trust.
• In early 2016, the LNER (SVR) Coach Fund and the SVR Holdings Company transferred the ownership of their LNER carriages to the Charitable Trust, resulting in the Trust now owning all nine LNER carriages based on the SVR.

The Charitable Trust is the SVR's 'owner of last resort', "...ensuring that various locomotives, coaches and wagons that have been lovingly restored over many years by SVR volunteers can remain at the Railway, in perpetuity. As the members of the many preservation groups inevitably age and their numbers dwindle, items of rolling stock can be donated to the Charitable Trust, in order to be absolutely certain they will remain at the Railway for the long-term."

A full list of all the rolling stock owned by the Trust can be found here.

See also

The SVR Organisation
List of rolling stock owned by The SVR Charitable Trust
List of Charities associated with the SVR
L.M.S. & B.R. Coach Department - a department of the Trust
The LNER Carriage Group - part of the Trust
Friends of 4930 Hagley Hall - integrated into the trust to maximise income through Gift Aid
Falling Sands Viaduct

Links

Charitable Trust website
SVRLive page