This reminds me of a recent thread about DB freight locos where people were complaining that it's boring that everything was the same "red" but also complaining that DB weren't painting everything into this colour scheme fast enough...
...so expect enthusiasts to complain that Arriva are spending lots of their own money on repainting trains whilst also complaining that Arriva aren't painting everything quickly...
...even the Isle of Sodor repainted its engines from time to time, IIRC - though the less said about James's black/yellow colour scheme the better
I'd guess (like others have speculated) that Arriva will keep things fairly simple/ consistent over the first year or two, partly to avoid complicating things, partly to ensure that the new EMUs/ DMUs are seen as a Great Leap Forward (which is why I presume VTEC haven't painted their stock in the upmarket Pendolino colour scheme - so that IEP will turn heads).
Keep the blue/ purple/ white, or a version of it - it's a nice enough colour scheme - given that it has to work on several classes of unit (compared to colour scheme that can be designed to look good on just one or two types of train).
I wonder exactly what the cost of a rebrand is.
If it comes out of that pittance they usually pay off to shareholders, let em do it.
Good points.
I'm of the opinion that it'll be pretty cheap in the grand scheme of things, given that everything needs repainting/ revinyling every few years anyway (e.g. Stagecoach and First don't change their bus liveries very often but still need to give them paint jobs every few years).
If private companies would rather use money to keep their colour schemes fresh (rather than pay them as dividends) then fair enough.
(and let's not pretend for a moment that BR didn't do this kind of thing... how many versions of InterCity were there? Mainline, Swallow, Executive etc)
I'm sure I've read somewhere or other that there is a proposal floating around to do it with ICWC when that comes up again. Plus, of course, ScotRail at Transport Scotlands behest
I don't mean to argue, but I've heard this kind of thing over the years (e.g. before the East Coast franchise was won by VTEC - the story doing the rounds was that the white "base" of DOR would be kept as the basis for the winner).
Repainting typically occurs at the same time as a C6 overhaul for rolling stock, which takes place every seven years or so; no more frequent than changes of franchise are currently. Following sectorisation, BR certainly undertook to update its' image at around this frequency
Agreed - if a unit is off being overhauled then why not give it a splash of colour whilst they are at it?