The cross-industry think tank, the Railway Forum, has been quietly wound up after some 15 years. Train operators have been cancelling their subscriptions in increasing numbers, until the Forum simply ran out of money at the end of 2009.

The Forum was launched when the railways were being privatised, in a bid to provide a single voice for the newly fragmented industry. Its best-known director general was Adrian Lyons, a retired senior army officer whose enthusiasm for High Speed Rail in particular kept the Forum busy from the end of the 1990s until 2006.

After his departure the Forum lowered its voice, only sponsoring a few events each year and no longer producing the thought-provoking discussion papers which gained so much attention while Adrian Lyons was at the helm.

Support for the Forum had been falling away for some time. Railnews has learnt that fewer train operators have been willing to subscribe recently, partly because the railway has developed new channels of communication and other cross-industry forums. 

"In the end, the decision had to be made because the year was coming to an end, when normally the coming year's subscriptions would have been due. The Forum Council met in December and reluctantly decided that it would be sensible to wind it up," said Graham Coombs of the Railway Industry Association, one of the Forum's sponsors.
 
The Forum had occupied offices near Hyde Park, overlooking the back wall of Buckingham Palace gardens. Its website is still live, but is expected to disappear soon.