The RailStaff Awards 2024

Sam Hadley

Said the following about Wales Comms Team (Wales and Western):

“The team executed a collaborative and engaging communications plan during a four-month closure of the Conwy Valley railway line, following extreme flood damage, earlier this year. The plan was proactive, creative, engaging and ensured passengers and lineside neighbours were at the heart of all the messaging and kept informed at every stage of the project.

The team successfully brought together the project team, engineers, contractors, key stakeholders and industry partners, to successfully deliver the plan through close partnership working.

The comprehensive communications plan included engagement through a series of drop-in events, engaging with the local community, attended also by local political figures, to proactively keep them fully updated on the damage and ongoing repairs to the line.

Local and national media were engaged through facilitating a host of media interviews and securing print and digital media coverage. The team also produced three videos which were utilised on social media channels, including drone footage of the line.

Six press releases were issued bilingually to the local and national media, as well as on Network Rail’s website and intranet, and all communications and collateral were produced bilingually throughout the project.

To celebrate the reopening of the line ahead of the National Eisteddfod - an event that has great cultural and political significance to Wales - which was being hosted locally in Llanrwst, a town located on the Conwy Valley line, the team also organised and hosted a steam train trip.

Key stakeholders and partners, colleagues from Network Rail who worked on the restoration of the line and members of the local community were all invited to mark the line reopening, to thank them and host an enjoyable day for the local community and rail enthusiasts after months of being without the railway line.

The team offered volunteering opportunities to colleagues across the route to steward on the day, publicised the event in the internal newsletter and on the office digital screens, and resulted in a wide range of colleagues from north and south Wales taking part in the trip. Memorabilia tickets were also produced for guests.

The team worked with Ffestiniog Heritage Railways to organise an additional trip for guests on the narrow-gauge railway once they arrived at Blaenau Ffestiniog. The team executed a very proactive internal plan across the organisations internal channels sharing the updates and progress to colleagues and senior leaders across the route.

The team received overwhelmingly positive feedback from the steam train event, as well as the overall communications activity delivered throughout the duration of the project. Key to the success of the communications plan implementation was the close co-ordination and collaboration across all partners, with the ability to respond in an agile, creative and efficient way as the project progressed within a pressured timescale to reopen the line. Senior Public Affairs Manager for the Wales route Sam Hadley said:

“I am extremely proud of the whole team for all their efforts and hard work in delivering such a collaborative and engaging plan, that really did put our passengers, partners and the local communities affected by the closure first.”“