Ok, being controversial here. I lived in Scotland for 15 years. We had some great heritage railways who relied on people from England. There is now way we can repeat that here. However, when I lived in Scotland, they pushed the boat out with the Riverside Museum. Cost £74m with an anticipated 1m visitors. More than that now and a lot would be from abroad. It became a place to visit, on the waterfront, amazing architecture, easy to get to etc.
If we were commercial here, would it succeed? I think it would, iconic building, our transport heritage and like in the case of the Riverside, lots of models of boats and locomotives.
IRM has been a success story (due to the guys hard work, attention to detail and sheer vision) but I remember being skeptical putting the money down for the first ballast wagons. I didn't think it would succeed. But it did, as the guys thought outside the box as to how it could be funded.
So, more controversial, is there a way that we can, as a group, protect our heritage? I, for one, would be willing to give it a go. How could we do it? Put it forward as a business opportunity? Lottery? Any ideas?