Rail Operations Group - 769s & 319s to be used on freight between West Mids and Central Belt

[Bald Rick]

Also remember that this isn’t just about the parcels market. Indeed it may not be even mostly about the parcel market. They are going after palletised, high value freight.

 

[ABB125]

Also remember that this isn’t just about the parcels market. Indeed it may not be even mostly about the parcel market. They are going after palletised, high value freight.

Cheap business travel: 4 people per pallet, tied to a pole in the middle to stop them from falling off.

It would be good if they were successful, and given the recent investment in ROG I suspect they will be! Hopefully they'll grow the market, and other FOCs may start their own services.

 

[Wyrleybart]

I'm wondering how well a 769 will cope shoving an attached 319 around even at lower speed. While just over 1000hp available so nominally 3 x that of an 08 there is only traction from two bogies / four axles. Other threads refer to issues and restrictions when 319's run in multiple with one set having two or four motors out.

I am assuming the use of class 319s as "trailer" units for 769s only applies to non electrified sections of route. So in the case of Birch Coppice - Scottish services, the 769 will need to haul or push the "trailer" from Birch Coppice to Walsall, or to Nuneaton via Whitacre. Neither route is particularly high speed, after which the pans are raised on both units and "100mph here I come" !!!.

Presumably the piece of route from London Gateway to the OLE frontier is also not particular far. I am guessing Gateway is somewhere near the old Thames Haven site, in which case the 769+319 combo would run under 25kV past East Tilbury to the old Thames Haven Jn before dropping pans and running on diesel.

Birch Coppice to the "Southwest" would be a whole different ballgame for a class 319 / 769 combo, and perhaps Orion have other rolling stock plans for that.

 

[21C101]

I am assuming the use of class 319s as "trailer" units for 769s only applies to non electrified sections of route. So in the case of Birch Coppice - Scottish services, the 769 will need to haul or push the "trailer" from Birch Coppice to Walsall, or to Nuneaton via Whitacre. Neither route is particularly high speed, after which the pans are raised on both units and "100mph here I come" !!!.

Presumably the piece of route from London Gateway to the OLE frontier is also not particular far. I am guessing Gateway is somewhere near the old Thames Haven site, in which case the 769+319 combo would run under 25kV past East Tilbury to the old Thames Haven Jn before dropping pans and running on diesel.

Birch Coppice to the "Southwest" would be a whole different ballgame for a class 319 / 769 combo, and perhaps Orion have other rolling stock plans for that.

If serious freight flows start running to Plymouth, then they will need a rail route that runs in storm tides or a diversionary route.

 

[ac6000cw]

then they will need a rail route that runs in storm tides or a diversionary route.

...it's called a truck (or a bus for passengers) - for the odd occasions when the route might actually be completely closed due to weather.

 

[hwl]

I am assuming the use of class 319s as "trailer" units for 769s only applies to non electrified sections of route. So in the case of Birch Coppice - Scottish services, the 769 will need to haul or push the "trailer" from Birch Coppice to Walsall, or to Nuneaton via Whitacre. Neither route is particularly high speed, after which the pans are raised on both units and "100mph here I come" !!!.

Presumably the piece of route from London Gateway to the OLE frontier is also not particular far. I am guessing Gateway is somewhere near the old Thames Haven site, in which case the 769+319 combo would run under 25kV past East Tilbury to the old Thames Haven Jn before dropping pans and running on diesel.

Birch Coppice to the "Southwest" would be a whole different ballgame for a class 319 / 769 combo, and perhaps Orion have other rolling stock plans for that.

About 2miles unwired till you hit the container unloading area where the wires would stop in other terminals and about 3miles max to where the actual loading /unloading would take place.

Also remember that this isn’t just about the parcels market. Indeed it may not be even mostly about the parcel market. They are going after palletised, high value freight.

Indeed most posters focusing on Business-to-Consumer which they are more personally familiarity with forgetting the large palletised haulage for which most of the long distance hub to hub movements take place at night.

 

[edwin_m]

Remember that non-Royal Mail couriers aren't wedded to the old "distribute overnight and deliver by breakfast" paradigm. In our street it's not unusual to see Hermes and DPD vans dropping off around Sunday teatime for example.

They don't deliver after 1900 in my experience, so goods doing a long daytime transit would probably be delivered early the next day, which is probably the same as if it had travelled overnight. But due to engineering access, a 100mph electric path is probably more consistently obtainable in the daytime than overnight - I agree a 769 hauling/pushing a 319 will be pretty sluggish and probably only useful for "last mile".

Indeed most posters focusing on Business-to-Consumer which they are more personally familiarity with forgetting the large palletised haulage for which most of the long distance hub to hub movements take place at night.

But is an EMU conversion suitable for pallets? Would they manage any more than one pallet in each door vestibule area, so eight per unit?

 

[ExRes]

But is an EMU conversion suitable for pallets? Would they manage any more than one pallet in each door vestibule area, so eight per unit?

Obviously weight would be the major factor but cargo aircraft have been using roller floors for a long time, these could easily increase the number of pallets to sixteen per unit

 

[edwin_m]

Obviously weight would be the major factor but cargo aircraft have been using roller floors for a long time, these could easily increase the number of pallets to sixteen per unit

Do we know if ROG are fitting these? I recall they were experimentally fitted in a parcels van back in the 1990s - TOPS coded LFA allegedly for low-flying aircraft...

Palletised goods would need some serious mechanical handling equipment, and unlikely to be viable in a station unless road vehicles could be brought close to the train and probably the area cordoned off from the public.

 

[Dr Hoo]

Do we know if ROG are fitting these? I recall they were experimentally fitted in a parcels van back in the 1990s - TOPS coded LFA allegedly for low-flying aircraft...

Live Floor Air-braked of course.

 

[Bald Rick]

Do we know if ROG are fitting these? I recall they were experimentally fitted in a parcels van back in the 1990s - TOPS coded LFA allegedly for low-flying aircraft...

ROG were certainly putting roller floors in one of the vehicles as a trial.

The handling equipment need not be too serious - quite simple to move pallets up to a tonne using hand pallet ‘trucks’. Needs to be broadly level of course. I used to shift all sorts of stuff in / out of artics and in warehouse with these. Putting them in a train would be no different.

 

[edwin_m]

ROG were certainly putting roller floors in one of the vehicles as a trial.

The handling equipment need not be too serious - quite simple to move pallets up to a tonne using hand pallet ‘trucks’. Needs to be broadly level of course. I used to shift all sorts of stuff in / out of artics and in warehouse with these. Putting them in a train would be no different.

Wouldn't it need a raised "loading bay" to get the pallets into and out of a road vehicle, or can pallet trucks cope with that sort of height difference?

 

[mcmad]

Wouldn't it need a raised "loading bay" to get the pallets into and out of a road vehicle, or can pallet trucks cope with that sort of height difference?

usually use a tail lift in/out of road vehicles if a loading bay isn't available.

 

[hwl]

They don't deliver after 1900 in my experience, so goods doing a long daytime transit would probably be delivered early the next day, which is probably the same as if it had travelled overnight. But due to engineering access, a 100mph electric path is probably more consistently obtainable in the daytime than overnight - I agree a 769 hauling/pushing a 319 will be pretty sluggish and probably only useful for "last mile".

But is an EMU conversion suitable for pallets? Would they manage any more than one pallet in each door vestibule area, so eight per unit?

Do we know if ROG are fitting these? I recall they were experimentally fitted in a parcels van back in the 1990s - TOPS coded LFA allegedly for low-flying aircraft...

Palletised goods would need some serious mechanical handling equipment, and unlikely to be viable in a station unless road vehicles could be brought close to the train and probably the area cordoned off from the public.

Yes they have for a trial vehicle:

https://twitter.com/Andym13/status/1293314903990829061/photo/3

Notice the lack of vestibules....

 

[Bald Rick]

Wouldn't it need a raised "loading bay" to get the pallets into and out of a road vehicle, or can pallet trucks cope with that sort of height difference?

usually use a tail lift in/out of road vehicles if a loading bay isn't available.

Yep pallet delivery vehicles generally have a tail lift. Certainly all those I’ve used have.

And you can get specialist pallet ‘trucks’ (which are no more than the wheeled jacks you see in warehouses) that can bridge the gap between platform and train. Having said that, a small forklift would be just as good.

 

[Wyrleybart]

Do we know if ROG are fitting these? I recall they were experimentally fitted in a parcels van back in the 1990s - TOPS coded LFA allegedly for low-flying aircraft...

Palletised goods would need some serious mechanical handling equipment, and unlikely to be viable in a station unless road vehicles could be brought close to the train and probably the area cordoned off from the public.

IIRC EWS developed two vans capable of taking aircraft containers. Not sure if they had roller floors though. Think they were ex Super BG numbered something like 95400 and 95401. This image might be them

Mk1 95410 & 95400 Crewe South 19 February 1993

Formerly 95213/80826 and 95203/80621

www.flickr.com

EDIT
Actually those dates don't seem right. I thought the airline container project was EWS led and EWS weren't in existence in 1993. Perhaps someone else knows the truth.

 

[ExRes]

According to an old post on RM Web from 2014 these two vans were an experiment from around 1990, they were intended to take airline hold containers, it seems they went into general parcels traffic, then into Res livery and into EWS livery in 2001 and were put between two PCVs for the Walsall - Aberdeen Securicor pallet freight service, no mention of what happened to them afterwards, personally I don't recall ever setting eyes on them between Feb 1995 and November 2000

 

[gimmea50anyday]

But is an EMU conversion suitable for pallets? Would they manage any more than one pallet in each door vestibule area, so eight per unit?

I would imagine removing the seats and the door partitions will make a difference in floor space and capacity.....

 

[Clip]

Wouldn't it need a raised "loading bay" to get the pallets into and out of a road vehicle, or can pallet trucks cope with that sort of height difference?

They sure can - you could use somethign like this which would negate having to use the tail lift on the wagon which would obviously speed up loading

Pallet Stackers | Free Delivery

Discover our range of Pallet Stackers at The Workplace Depot; buy with our price match promise and FREE delivery.

www.theworkplacedepot.co.uk

 

[Grumpy]

I find it amusing that Royal Mail specified the class 325 as almost a class 319 clone so that they were capable of easy and cheap conversion into passenger vehicles to readily find another user should RM no longer need them, but now it's the 319's being converted into 325 clones.
The demonstration vehicle suggests they are undecided whether to go for wheeled containers (like RM) or pallets on a roller floor. Or a combination
There are lots of existing types of pallet movers and wheeled containers available on the market and sourcing these and converting the units shouldn't be difficult. Costing all this should be simple.

The trick will be in three parts. Firstly finding existing vacant locations with easy access to the road network, planning permission for 24/7 use as a distribution terminal, and space to park an 8/12 car train so that it can be easily unloaded, together with apron/parking space for road vehicles. The second part is finding the most efficient method of transferring the pallets/cages from rail to road vehicles. The final part is doing this without needing Network Rail to do any works such as signalling and thus likely to blow the business case

 

[Clip]

The trick will be in three parts. Firstly finding existing vacant locations with easy access to the road network, planning permission for 24/7 use as a distribution terminal, and space to park an 8/12 car train so that it can be easily unloaded, together with apron/parking space for road vehicles. The second part is finding the most efficient method of transferring the pallets/cages from rail to road vehicles. The final part is doing this without needing Network Rail to do any works such as signalling and thus likely to blow the business case

one would hope they have done all that with them starting next month

 

[Steddenm]

Orion have a strategic network route map available on their website:



Source: https://orion.railopsgroup.co.uk/

 

[theironroad]

Orion have a strategic network route map available on their website:

View attachment 91913

Source: https://orion.railopsgroup.co.uk/

Can't imagine they intend using all those stations/terminals.

They planning on using Holyhead???

 

[martin2345uk]

Will some kind of infrastructure need to be built at London Gateway for this? At the moment all the used roads go under the massive gantry cranes...

 

[Steddenm]

Can't imagine they intend using all those stations/terminals.

They planning on using Holyhead???

Looks that way. Isn't The Irish Post/Mail the last "parcels" service up that way. Not sure that Res even ran to Holyhead. Did Holyhead even have a Red Star Parcelspoint?

 

[kylemore]

Orion have a strategic network route map available on their website:

View attachment 91913

Source: https://orion.railopsgroup.co.uk/

No mention of Mossend.

 

[anthony263]

Swansea will be interesting especially as the station seems busier than when I remember the mail trains running from there.

 

[antharro]

I wonder where in Bournemouth they're planning on using. Platform 1 can take a 4 carriage 450, so possibly a 769? That would then give direct access to the road, and with minimal building required. Or there's platform 4 which is rarely used, but that's the platform furthest away from a road, unless they build an underpass under the tracks and lifts so they can use part of the car park. There's also the tiny bit of track adjacent to the country end of platform 2 which is used by NR to get their vehicles on and off the railway, but I would think this is far too short. It would also require any trains to reverse to gain access, which is do-able using the sidings, but adds a bit of messing around.

 

[zwk500]

Separately, CrossCountry are trialling medical freight which they are carrying in non-passenger areas:

Freight and passenger operators team up for medical supply service in UK

InterCity RailFreight and CrossCountry are to provide vital support to the medical sector across the UK. The long distance passenger train operator CrossCountry, which has the most geographically comprehensive network of all the passenger operators, and specialist carrier InterCity Railfreight...

www.railfreight.com

Is there any confirmation/suggestion this will be continued when travellers return?

 

[380101]

The lack of platform space


So the sleeper can use three platforms, the rest aren't long enough. These are 1, 2 and 7, so the sleeper needs to occupy one of these overnight for the sleeper to arrive into (even though there aren't any trains in the platform, it is still reserved as the sleeper platform during this time)

I did make a mistake, in that there are also two Avanti departures south before 6am, using two of these platforms (usually 1 and 2) so these are occupied as well.

Caley Sleeper can't use plt 7 as it's miles too short!!! Can use 1,2, 9,10 and 11 at Central.