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West Coast Partnership: Awarded to First Trenitalia

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Journeyman

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Do you believe First actually offer this now? In my experience there was no overlap between bus and rail staff travel arrangements other than that Arriva Cymru bus drivers got ATW rail concessions too.

First bus staff can buy day rover tickets on First TOCs for £6 a pop.
 
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Journeyman

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Let’s be honest, if they exhumed Keir Hardie and Stanier to run the railways and had a guarantee of 20% pa pay rises, no automation and a union pilgrim for every site, they’d still put out the same stuff.

As someone once said to me, "if the RMT demanded a £500 bonus, and you gave them £1000, they'd still go on strike over it".
 

StaffsWCML

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I'm not sure how you make the link between 'comfortably pleasant' and 'make the service worse'. Can you not have fast (tilting if necessary) comfortably pleasant trains?

Please do let us know what these trains are? I can not think of a decent fast train currently use in the UK at least. It has to tilt to run at 125mph with the current infrastructure. The 390s are probably one of the better more modern fleet trains in use. They are not going to upgrade the WCML anytime soon I would think.

We have to accept the older stuff is going. The Class 800s are horrible, far worse than the 390s.
 

Whisky Papa

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First bus staff can buy day rover tickets on First TOCs for £6 a pop.

Thanks, it has been brought to my attention back upthread that they are now more generous than they were in my days with them. Pity I let my PCV lapse...
 

StaffsWCML

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With respect, you or anyone else currently have no idea what the management team will be, so instead of condemning blindly, why don’t you wait and see who they actually appoint first? By all means be sceptical, but let’s see who gets the job....

I would imagine they will probably keep the incompetents they already have, why would they duplicate. It will all be about 'cost synergies' to maximise profit. There will be huge pressure from Firsts US board members to cut cost and maximise revenue.
 

RealTrains07

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Yes lets make the service worse. May as well bring back the old 75Mph Diesel Trains or Steam.

Then knowing the management team at First Group, that probably could happen.

Should be fun getting to London with the 2 WCML operators being absolute crap now. Cant wait until December! as if dealing with the sheer incompetence of WMT (LNR) on a daily basis, the alternative option will now be First Group or if I go the MML more sodding Abellio nonsense. The sooner these cretins go out of business the better.

Better get used to some long distance driving.
I wonder why people my age dont travel by train anymore

Not everyone will agree but First has been abysmal financially. SWR and TPE near disaster. How they will be able to manage 7 years with west coast?

Its all good promising these improvements but unless we know more how do we know they are gonna be better?
 

Clip

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I think its more the case on the WCML if you go from the North West you can only use First from now on. First will being First almost certainly use that to drive up prices. Its very bad news for Management staff at Virgin as First already have their team of 'top. dogs' The real issue is if they are useless, like they are on most their current routes.

Not true - a combination of Northern and Scotrail* I do believe are options and it wouldnt surprise me if they brought out a raft of cheap advances to capture that market too


* I have no idea of how frequent they are and they probably take ages but they are options open to the traveller
 

Roose

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Yes but the DfT seems to be planning LMS this time and owns the trademarks to the name. It is also very appropriate for the franchise
Historically certainly and as a set of initials OK but the full name ignores the huge number of passengers in the North.
 

Clip

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I wonder why people my age dont travel by train anymore

Not everyone will agree but First has been abysmal financially. SWR and TPE near disaster. How they will be able to manage 7 years with west coast?

Its all good promising these improvements but unless we know more how do we know they are gonna be better?


But using the logic - how do you know they will be any worse on the West Coast - you simply dont but are stating it as fact.
 

RealTrains07

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Historically certainly and as a set of initials OK but the full name ignores the huge number of passengers in the North.
I guess Northwestern would have been an option if abellio didnt pinch it
 

RealTrains07

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But using the logic - how do you know they will be any worse on the West Coast - you simply dont but are stating it as fact.
Its okay to make presumptions considering their past performance
 

EE Andy b1

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Historically certainly and as a set of initials OK but the full name ignores the huge number of passengers in the North.

Do you really think the government care about ignoring passengers in the North? They've been doing it for years.
 

StaffsWCML

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But using the logic - how do you know they will be any worse on the West Coast - you simply dont but are stating it as fact.

The reason recent bids have been won is because on financial risk taking and government liability shifting I expect this to be no different.

First have a record of delivering sub mediocre services universally on rail and bus, why would they suddenly change?

None of this is about delivering a competent services for customers, its about government liability shifting.

I think the top 2 providers were Virgin and Stagecoach in terms of customer satisfaction and reliability. Those 2 are now gone! Talk about rewarding failure! Punishing success.
 

LNW-GW Joint

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Historically certainly and as a set of initials OK but the full name ignores the huge number of passengers in the North.

When the LMS was created, they considered a series of names before settling on London, Midland & Scottish.
Names in the frame were:
Midland & North Western
London, Midland & North Western
London, Midland & Northern

The Midland Railway insisted its name was included in the title.
"Scottish" was added when agreement was obtained from the Caledonian to merge into the West Coast group.
Today's operation has nothing to do with the Midland in LMS - that was for the Midland Railway which has only a tiny connection with WCP routes (at Birmingham and Carlisle, where there were joint stations).
All the WCP routes were originally LNWR or Caledonian, bar a few outliers like Wrexham, Gobowen and Shrewsbury (largely GWR) and Blackpool (LNWR and L&Y Joint).
The last mile into Edinburgh Waverley was originally North British (E&G).
Colwich-Macclesfield was North Stafford (which for a long time had an agreement with the LNWR for some of its London services to go via Stoke).
For these reasons I wouldn't go mad for a return to LM&S.
Grand Junction has as good a claim as any, as I think all WCP services touch it at some point in their journey, even after HS2, and it's the very core of the system.
 
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EE Andy b1

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Taken from WNXX. Tony Miles has asked the question about the shop and apparently, it’s staying. So the 25000 seats in place of 23310 (standard only?) seats as now sounds ‘cozy’. Include first class in the number of seats and it sounds like it would be very low density. He’s also mentioned separately that the 397s ARE being tested at 125 on the northern stretches of the WCML

I think the 25000 seats is First, standard and hopefully drivers, so like you say @driver_m low density, which is good.

As for the Class 397s, First will have all the info they need from West Coast testing now for TPE.

I personally hope that TPE scrap the idea of Nova 3s and First use them on West Coast diesel service up North Wales. How many sets 13? ;);)

Joking aside i just don't want Class 802s for the West Coast, must be something better around.
 

centraltrains

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Yes but the DfT seems to be planning LMS this time and owns the trademarks to the name. It is also very appropriate for the franchise

While agree that LMS is the most likely name for the branding, I don't think it is appropriate at all.
London Midland was only 2 years ago, and is extremely 2/3 the same as London Midland Scotland. Given what a mouthful to say "London Northwestern Railway" (8 syllables) and "West Midlands Railway" (6 syllables) me and a few others I know still accidentally call the services "London Midland" still, (a vastly shorter 4 syllables). Given that LM was the local stoppers, and LMS will be the express trains, I think that is even more so confusing, especially to those who don't take the train very frequently. (One could assume LM just extended to Scotland if you weren't a West Midlander).

Given WMR/LNR still use the LM code, even more confusing!

I think something of 2000s/2010 nature which the WCML skipped from using brand king virgin instead would be more appropriate.
e.g.
West Coast Trains (<region> trains)
West (Coast) Express (Wessex Express)
Central Trains (It is certainly the economic centre with the large cities of London, Birmingham, Manchester & Glasgow comparative to the other North to South franchise), or perhaps go))) more modern "Central Railway"
Just "West Coast" (Too obvious? East Coast)
Great/Grand West Coast Railway (GNER/GC)

"West Coast" or "Central Railway" would probably be my favourite.
 
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pt_mad

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I personally think this announcement brings many benefits which many weren't expecting. Six months ago most of the speculation on the West Coast Invitation thread pointed to little expected improvements due to the minimum service specification being broadly the same as now, and HS2 looming.

Some people suggested bi-modes to replace Voyagers and were told that was unlikely due to no tilt. However, that has happened although we don't know whether tilt will be involved or not. There was very little suggestion of new EMUs and there will be New EMUs. There were people hoping for a full Pendolino Refurb with new seats, and it seems that will be coming. There were suggestions there will be no new services or very few. Liverpool may receive a second tph subject to ORR approval, and Walsall and Gobowen will be served.

All in all pretty good pre HS2 I should say. Considering many were speculating it would be a tread water phase with a mini 390 221 refurb and shorter delay repay period only.
 

GingerSte

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Taken from WNXX. Tony Miles has asked the question about the shop and apparently, it’s staying. So the 25000 seats in place of 23310 (standard only?) seats as now sounds ‘cozy’. Include first class in the number of seats and it sounds like it would be very low density. He’s also mentioned separately that the 397s ARE being tested at 125 on the northern stretches of the WCML

As well as being quite large for what they sell (in my opinion - others are available), there appears to be a bit of dead space between the shop and the London end of coach C. I think this was space for a trolley, but I don't know. Add to this the Train Manager's office, and I could see an extra 8-16 spaces in coach C. Multiplied by 57 sets and that's 456 to 912 extra seats, without affecting seat pitch elsewhere or losing the shop entirely.

The East Coast mark 4 coaches had flip-down seats in the vestibules, that provided a little extra capacity at a crunch. As I've never seen them since, I imagine that they fall foul of some rule somewhere, but if not, then that could be a possible source of extra seats.

I assume that the prospects of additional trailers to provide these extra seats are dim.
 

Andyh82

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The obsession that every brand needs to be traditional sounding, with initials that hark to the past and everything ending in ‘railway’ is getting quite tiresome in my opinion.

Half the TOCs are going to have a combination of compass point letter, the letter L for London, and the letter R for railway! They don’t even seem to be allowed to use ‘T’ for trains occasionally.

As others have said LMS is too close to LM and not that different to LNWR.
 

EE Andy b1

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Whatever the name and livery, I for one just hope that First/Trenitalia do as they say and build onto what is already solid foundations and run it at very least to how it's been under Virgin/Stagecoach.

We will only know once they take over and have run the West Coast service for a while, never mind what they have done elsewhere.
 

Darandio

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Whatever the name and livery, I for one just hope that First/Trenitalia do as they say and build onto what is already solid foundations and run it at very least to how it's been under Virgin/Stagecoach.

What, you mean spit the dummy out when things don't go their way and take credit for everything that goes right even though it wasn't them behind it? That sounds easy enough.
 

RealTrains07

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I personally think this announcement brings many benefits which many weren't expecting. Six months ago most of the speculation on the West Coast Invitation thread pointed to little expected improvements due to the minimum service specification being broadly the same as now, and HS2 looming.

Some people suggested bi-modes to replace Voyagers and were told that was unlikely due to no tilt. However, that has happened although we don't know whether tilt will be involved or not. There was very little suggestion of new EMUs and there will be New EMUs. There were people hoping for a full Pendolino Refurb with new seats, and it seems that will be coming. There were suggestions there will be no new services or very few. Liverpool may receive a second tph subject to ORR approval, and Walsall and Gobowen will be served.

All in all pretty good pre HS2 I should say. Considering many were speculating it would be a tread water phase with a mini 390 221 refurb and shorter delay repay period only.
Walsall doesn’t need intercity trains, and actually where would they go? except london, their are no paths considering its location and current services that already exist.

It was always expected that the pendolinos would be refurbished. Its a new franchise after all. Train refurbishments are always expected, thats no surprise at all

Things like free onboard wifi which virgin already implemented, first are trying to take credit for funnily enough

I doubt without any tilt technology the new trains will prove successful as the pendolino
 

Metal_gee_man

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So either First or Trentitalia will be running services from 5 London Termi, does anyone else think they might be dominating the market
Fenchurch St/Liverpool St (occasionally)
Kings Cross
Euston
Paddington
Waterloo
 

RealTrains07

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So either First or Trentitalia will be running services from 5 London Termi, does anyone else think they might be dominating the market
Fenchurch St/Liverpool St (occasionally)
Kings Cross
Euston
Paddington
Waterloo
Agreed. Its funny how people can complain about stagecoach and virgin dominating and making monopoly out of the market up north while first do it in london and the south right now and soon will have the north aswell

Its great we have one UK train operator left but it isnt a good one thats for sure
 

Darandio

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First already done that in the press announcement

The wi-fi you mean? At least one page on the Virgin website still states it's paid for in second class, maybe First read that? Although saying there will be faster and more reliable wi-fi isn't exactly taking credit anyway.

Virgin would take credit for the air you breathe if they could, and their fanboys would believe them!
 
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