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Northern timetable changes May 2019

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Wtloild

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So if Northern acquired WMT's 26*323s (which are already being refurbished and receiving PRM mods) that would provide equivalent capacity to the 319s. Northern's current 323 fleet could then go into storage without any need to spend money refurbishing them

Heaven forbid they actually increase capacity above crush levels.
 
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LowLevel

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I hope the rumour is true - the 319s are the same age as the 323 but appear to have had a much harder life, plus they are uncomfortable and slow.

319 was introduced from 1987 with 323 from 1992 (but actually closer to 1995 in most cases I believe) so that's a fairly big age gap, they're a world apart in terms of their technology as well.

Aesthetically apart from the lack of air conditioning you could easily make the 323 appear to be a brand new train whereas the 319 is always going to look like a 1980s train. Despite some technical issues I've always thought the 323 is one of the best suburban trains to have been built in the UK and it's a shame there aren't more of them, they look the part and have the performance to boot.

It's all about perception. The EMT 158s have their critics and I'm one of them but when people board them having been used to a traditional Northern train you often get asked if they've boarded in first class - you can polish things up if they're OK to start with.
 

Puffing Devil

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I thought they were about 4-5 years apart, though you're right - there seems to be a gulf in technology.

Interesting that the 319 I saw at Crewe this morning heading back to Manchester was not fully liveried for Northern.
 

Jamesrob637

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319 was introduced from 1987 with 323 from 1992 (but actually closer to 1995 in most cases I believe) so that's a fairly big age gap, they're a world apart in terms of their technology as well.

Aesthetically apart from the lack of air conditioning you could easily make the 323 appear to be a brand new train whereas the 319 is always going to look like a 1980s train. Despite some technical issues I've always thought the 323 is one of the best suburban trains to have been built in the UK and it's a shame there aren't more of them, they look the part and have the performance to boot.

It's all about perception. The EMT 158s have their critics and I'm one of them but when people board them having been used to a traditional Northern train you often get asked if they've boarded in first class - you can polish things up if they're OK to start with.

Possibly the wrong thread so feel free to move, but would the 323s ever be retrofitted with air-con? Especially in 6-car guise, there you have a train fit for the 2020s and beyond! Cool in the summer and good capacity to boot! Their amazing acceleration would only be marginally blunted if at all.
 

DJH1971

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I thought they were about 4-5 years apart, though you're right - there seems to be a gulf in technology.

Interesting that the 319 I saw at Crewe this morning heading back to Manchester was not fully liveried for Northern.
Most likely to be 319372, 319373 or 319446 which are only on short-term hire to Northern.
 

Bovverboy

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Interesting that the 319 I saw at Crewe this morning heading back to Manchester was not fully liveried for Northern.

Most likely to be 319372, 319373 or 319446 which are only on short-term hire to Northern.

319446 is still in Thameslink livery, and I believe 319372/3 are as well, although I haven't seen either of those myself. Anyway, going by where it was later, 319446 should have been on the 1248 Crewe to Piccadilly today.
Here's what it looks like.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/139165953@N08/44551197391/
 

Kite159

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Possibly the wrong thread so feel free to move, but would the 323s ever be retrofitted with air-con? Especially in 6-car guise, there you have a train fit for the 2020s and beyond! Cool in the summer and good capacity to boot! Their amazing acceleration would only be marginally blunted if at all.

Or even air-cooling, similar to what GWR is fitting to the 165/1s.
 

JMan

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Observation from the new timetable at a hyper-local level: last week the 0724 Horwich Parkway to Hazel Grove didn’t call at Lostock. This week now calls at Lostock at 0728 - back in the journey planners but not in the printed timetable! Looks like an oversight so must be more examples.
 

Bovverboy

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05:42 Wilmslow-Liverpool, 07:57 Liverpool-Man Vic etc, are booked DMU’s in the short term. Makes perfect sense to use them on that diagram and allows a 319 to do the Preston-Airport shuttle.

There's no ECS move from Newton Heath booked for tomorrow 29/5, the stock for the 0542 is booked to come from Stockport CMD. It's not obvious what's happening, we may be back to a 319, or the DMU set might be stabling overnight at Stockport CMD. We must wait and see.

The stock for the 0542 has continued to come from Newton Heath. The ECS move from Stockport CMD gets deleted and replaced by one from Newton Heath, but that doesn't happen till the morning of operation. The usual formation is 150 + 142 (150 leading towards Liverpool), but I did see a double 150 one day.
 

Bovverboy

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The stock for the 0542 has continued to come from Newton Heath. The ECS move from Stockport CMD gets deleted and replaced by one from Newton Heath, but that doesn't happen till the morning of operation. The usual formation is 150 + 142 (150 leading towards Liverpool), but I did see a double 150 one day.

Strange goings-on yesterday morning (Friday 31/5/19). As expected, 5F15 0450 Stockport CMD to Wilmslow was cancelled and replaced by 5F15 0450 Newton Heath to Wilmslow. However, according to RTT, the latter arrived in P2 at Stockport at 0519.5 (a platform which was apparently already occupied by 5S01 0514 Stockport CMD to New Mills Central) and then terminated, owing to 'a delay not investigated'. Going solely by RTT you would be inclined to presume that the two sets combined at this point and headed off to New Mills together, but something managed to appear at Wilmslow to work the 0542 to Liverpool! There was no arrival shown.
The only consequential working I saw was 2F37, 1927 Manchester Victoria to Liverpool Lime Street, which was covered by a single 150. Can anyone say if this unit worked the entire diagram, or if something else was detached at some point? I didn't think the Sprinter plus Pacer combination would last too long, really.
 

prod_pep

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The 1716 Crewe - Liverpool Lime Street is cancelled from Piccadilly tonight, so it looks like another week before a 323 to Wigan in passenger service!
 

Bovverboy

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The 1716 Crewe - Liverpool Lime Street is cancelled from Piccadilly tonight, so it looks like another week before a 323 to Wigan in passenger service!

At the moment the 1945 Lime Street to Wigan is still shown as operating, but if it does operate it's unlikely it will be a 323.
 

Bovverboy

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At the moment the 1945 Lime Street to Wigan is still shown as operating, but if it does operate it's unlikely it will be a 323.

Looks like the 1945 is going to be formed from the stock off 2C26, 1852 Wigan - Lime Street, so presumably a 319.
 

Bovverboy

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Looks like the 1945 is going to be formed from the stock off 2C26, 1852 Wigan - Lime Street, so presumably a 319.

Nope, looks like it's been formed from 2F31, 1810 Warrington Bank Quay - Lime Street. But still a 319.
 

yorksrob

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Yet again, Hallam line residents are treated as second class citizens with a woefully inadequate Saturday evening service. Last train on a Saturday is a pathetic 22:30, which doesn't even connect with the last train from Lancaster properly.

The people to blame are Network Rail. At last year's May timetable change, Northern even went as far as printing a 23:00 departure from Leeds in their timetables, yet this was thrown out by Network Rail at the last minute, who are more interested in running the railway for their own convenience.
 

northernchris

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Yet again, Hallam line residents are treated as second class citizens with a woefully inadequate Saturday evening service. Last train on a Saturday is a pathetic 22:30, which doesn't even connect with the last train from Lancaster properly.

The people to blame are Network Rail. At last year's May timetable change, Northern even went as far as printing a 23:00 departure from Leeds in their timetables, yet this was thrown out by Network Rail at the last minute, who are more interested in running the railway for their own convenience.

There is a 2300 to Castleford, was the initial 2300 scheduled to run to Sheffield?
 

EIKN

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Hi guys , but does anyone please know what kind of train will replace the horrible Pacer, on the Scunthorpe line. I'm hoping for a 158/170 , but heard it might be the new Spanish trains 195?.
They don't appear as comfortable as say a class 158.
Been trying to find out for months but a concrete answer would be great ( I'm referring to Northern Rail).

Many thanks
 

Mathew S

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Hi guys , but does anyone please know what kind of train will replace the horrible Pacer, on the Scunthorpe line. I'm hoping for a 158/170 , but heard it might be the new Spanish trains 195?.
They don't appear as comfortable as say a class 158.
Been trying to find out for months but a concrete answer would be great ( I'm referring to Northern Rail).

Many thanks
Scunthorpe doesn't appear on the map of Northern Connect services, which means it's not guaranteed to be 195/331/158. That's not to say it won't be, but my money would be on Sprinters (150s/156s). You may also not be happy to know that the fully refurbished 158s will have the same seats as the 195s/331s as they will have been refurbished to be of the same, Northern Connect, standard. Personally, I think they're the most comfortable seats I've used on anything other than a Voyager... but my opinion doesn't seem to be a popular one.
 

Kite159

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Hi guys , but does anyone please know what kind of train will replace the horrible Pacer, on the Scunthorpe line. I'm hoping for a 158/170 , but heard it might be the new Spanish trains 195?.
They don't appear as comfortable as say a class 158.
Been trying to find out for months but a concrete answer would be great ( I'm referring to Northern Rail).

Many thanks

I would put 10p on the Doncaster - Scunthorpe services being primarily 150 operated once the Pacers go to the depot in the sky
 

johntea

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Did Huddersfield-Castleford on 144012 the other day, certainly a very bouncy ride!

On arrival at Castleford the crew seemed to shut the unit up once everyone had alighted and swap ends whilst still inside the train rather than getting out on to the platform then moved it out of the way
 

LNW-GW Joint

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1129 Manchester Airport-Windermere. This train has 2 coaches. Cancelled. (RTT says due to a problem with the train crew).
This just about sums up Northern's current performance - an already inadequate train is cancelled (seemingly between Airport-Preston).
Several other cancellations through Castlefield too.
Nothing obvious on NRE to explain the delays.
TPE also suffering cancellations on Liverpool, Scotland and Airport routes today.

Meanwhile my Merseyrail guard announced an exceptionally good morning to everybody, consequent on a) Liverpool winning the Champions League and b) that he had just landed a lead part in his local amateur dramatic society's next production...
Cheered everybody up no end!
 

Mathew S

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1129 Manchester Airport-Windermere. This train has 2 coaches. Cancelled. (RTT says due to a problem with the train crew).
This just about sums up Northern's current performance - an already inadequate train is cancelled (seemingly between Airport-Preston).
Several other cancellations through Castlefield too.
Nothing obvious on NRE to explain the delays.
TPE also suffering cancellations on Liverpool, Scotland and Airport routes today.

Meanwhile my Merseyrail guard announced an exceptionally good morning to everybody, consequent on a) Liverpool winning the Champions League and b) that he had just landed a lead part in his local amateur dramatic society's next production...
Cheered everybody up no end!
Stuff has been a bit screwed up around West-Manchester/Wigan/Bolton today due to the signalling problems via Atherton. Running everything via Bolton this morning (an extra four trains an hour each way in the peak, three off peak) caused no end of hold-ups, including to the TPE Scotland services now they run that way again.

On the subject of the Barrow/Windermere trains: the majority of services seem to be 3-car units which are plenty big enough from what I've seen the last couple of weeks (I use them almost every day). It's difficult to untangle from RTT what the diagrams actually are, but it is definitely mostly 3-car operated (or at worst a 50:50 2-car/3-car split). And cancellations are actually pretty rare from what I've seen thus far. Honestly, I think you were probably unlucky.
 

absolutelymilk

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On the subject of the Barrow/Windermere trains: the majority of services seem to be 3-car units which are plenty big enough from what I've seen the last couple of weeks (I use them almost every day). It's difficult to untangle from RTT what the diagrams actually are, but it is definitely mostly 3-car operated (or at worst a 50:50 2-car/3-car split). And cancellations are actually pretty rare from what I've seen thus far. Honestly, I think you were probably unlucky.
Indeed, I was on the earlier (3-car 158) Barrow service from the airport this morning which was 3/4 full. This was despite the previous TPE service from the airport to Scotland only starting from Picadilly so it had to pick up a load of extra passengers.
 

mrcaa

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Stuff has been a bit screwed up around West-Manchester/Wigan/Bolton today due to the signalling problems via Atherton. Running everything via Bolton this morning (an extra four trains an hour each way in the peak, three off peak) caused no end of hold-ups, including to the TPE Scotland services now they run that way again.

On the subject of the Barrow/Windermere trains: the majority of services seem to be 3-car units which are plenty big enough from what I've seen the last couple of weeks (I use them almost every day). It's difficult to untangle from RTT what the diagrams actually are, but it is definitely mostly 3-car operated (or at worst a 50:50 2-car/3-car split). And cancellations are actually pretty rare from what I've seen thus far. Honestly, I think you were probably unlucky.

They cancelled the Manchester Victoria to Ellesmere Port too. Not very promising when their new franchise commitments are the first to go.
 

northernchris

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It's difficult to untangle from RTT what the diagrams actually are, but it is definitely mostly 3-car operated (or at worst a 50:50 2-car/3-car split).

I did try to work out the diagrams before the timetables came in, think it was 6 with one being the 319 operating the Preston - Airports. Of the 5 remaining there looked to be the possibility of one being diagrammed a 156 although not sure if all diesels are allocated 158s. They work Barrow / Windermere - Airport and most also do a stint on the Windermere - Oxenholme branch at some point during the day. Hopefully once the 195s are in operation the 158s can head back east to ease the shortforming which can snowballed since the latest timetable changes
 

Mathew S

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I did try to work out the diagrams before the timetables came in, think it was 6 with one being the 319 operating the Preston - Airports. Of the 5 remaining there looked to be the possibility of one being diagrammed a 156 although not sure if all diesels are allocated 158s. They work Barrow / Windermere - Airport and most also do a stint on the Windermere - Oxenholme branch at some point during the day. Hopefully once the 195s are in operation the 158s can head back east to ease the shortforming which can snowballed since the latest timetable changes
Yep. The bit I couldn't make sense of was the Barrow - Preston/Lancaster services and how they slot into the mix. Six feels right, though, I agree.
 

Mogster

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The new timetable doesn’t seem to have done much to improve the evening chaos along the Castlefield corridor.

The familiar “this service is late because of congestion caused by earlier late running services” auto announcement has been getting a serous workout...
 

Bletchleyite

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The new timetable doesn’t seem to have done much to improve the evening chaos along the Castlefield corridor.

The familiar “this service is late because of congestion caused by earlier late running services” auto announcement has been getting a serous workout...

The only way that will be solved is:-

a. Thinning out the service (see the other thread on that)
b. Building 15/16
c. Building NPR.
 
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