At least until the 1980s a number of popular holiday destinations on lines otherwise worked by DMUs were served by summer-only loco-hauled trains to cater for holidaymakers.
Were there any instances of such trains terminating at stations where the platform was too short for the number of coaches on those trains? If so, how was the detraining of passengers dealt with, especially on trains formed of Mark 1 and/or non-aircon Mark 2 coaches without public address systems (which a lot of those summer holiday trains were)?
I would guess that the most likely answer would be that passengers would simply be expected to check that the platform was adjacent before alighting, and if not, walk through to the nearest coach that was adjacent to the platform. If there was an on-board ticket check during the journey, some guards might have warned passengers of this but they might not necessarily always think to do so. Obviously it would have been a bit of a pain to have to walk through two or more coaches to the nearest coach that was adjacent to a platform if you were elderly or had heavy luggage and/or young children in tow. In those days passengers were much more expected to look after their own safety, though.
Three other possible solutions that I can think of:
(a) The guard or a member of station staff could have used a loud hailer to tell passengers seated in coaches beyond the end of the platform to walk through (or an announcement to that effect could be made over the station PA system).
(b) The train could be split, with a shunter hauling half the train into one platform while the train loco hauled the rest of the coaches into another (only possible if there were enough spare platforms).
(c) The train could stop with the first few coaches in the platform first, then once the passengers from those coaches had detrained, the loco could haul the train a few coaches further forward so that the last few coaches were in the platform, allowing passengers seated in those coaches to alight (only possible at through stations, as opposed to terminal stations, and if doing this would not get in the way of other trains).
Take Tenby as an example (see also this now-closed thread on the third platform at Tenby: https://railforums.co.uk/threads/tenby-station-did-it-ever-have-3-platforms.213956/). As I recall the now disused outer side of the Carmarthen-bound platform used to be used by summer Saturday loco-hauled trains at least until about the mid-1980s, such as the York-Tenby train. It only looks long enough to take up to 6 or at the most 7 or 8 coaches, which might have been long enough but many of those summer Saturday trains (and indeed regular trains on the Cross-Country route in pre-HST days) were formed of up to 10 or even 12 coaches.
Were there any instances of such trains terminating at stations where the platform was too short for the number of coaches on those trains? If so, how was the detraining of passengers dealt with, especially on trains formed of Mark 1 and/or non-aircon Mark 2 coaches without public address systems (which a lot of those summer holiday trains were)?
I would guess that the most likely answer would be that passengers would simply be expected to check that the platform was adjacent before alighting, and if not, walk through to the nearest coach that was adjacent to the platform. If there was an on-board ticket check during the journey, some guards might have warned passengers of this but they might not necessarily always think to do so. Obviously it would have been a bit of a pain to have to walk through two or more coaches to the nearest coach that was adjacent to a platform if you were elderly or had heavy luggage and/or young children in tow. In those days passengers were much more expected to look after their own safety, though.
Three other possible solutions that I can think of:
(a) The guard or a member of station staff could have used a loud hailer to tell passengers seated in coaches beyond the end of the platform to walk through (or an announcement to that effect could be made over the station PA system).
(b) The train could be split, with a shunter hauling half the train into one platform while the train loco hauled the rest of the coaches into another (only possible if there were enough spare platforms).
(c) The train could stop with the first few coaches in the platform first, then once the passengers from those coaches had detrained, the loco could haul the train a few coaches further forward so that the last few coaches were in the platform, allowing passengers seated in those coaches to alight (only possible at through stations, as opposed to terminal stations, and if doing this would not get in the way of other trains).
Take Tenby as an example (see also this now-closed thread on the third platform at Tenby: https://railforums.co.uk/threads/tenby-station-did-it-ever-have-3-platforms.213956/). As I recall the now disused outer side of the Carmarthen-bound platform used to be used by summer Saturday loco-hauled trains at least until about the mid-1980s, such as the York-Tenby train. It only looks long enough to take up to 6 or at the most 7 or 8 coaches, which might have been long enough but many of those summer Saturday trains (and indeed regular trains on the Cross-Country route in pre-HST days) were formed of up to 10 or even 12 coaches.