I understand that, but faster services encourage people away from cars and on to trains, which should be the main goal for sustainability here. The service is already barely quicker than driving, and making it slower isn't going to help encourage any more people away from their cars.
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GWR Class 769 information. (Units no longer with GWR - Off Lease March 23)
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Invincible
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When First lost the Thameslink franchise to Govia, who ordered new trains in 2015, Porterbrook and First found they had lots of 319s which had recent internal refurbs and some life left. So they decided to add new diesel gensets for the First/GWR local Thames branch lines (and assumed passengers will not notice the difference with the 165s?)
Not sure if all the 19 319s allocated have had the gen sets added?.
Ideally the 319s should have been scrapped and new diesel/battery hybrid trains ordered, but guess the 769 plan made sense to them at the time?.
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Ideally for whom?
Deepgreen
Established Member
Agreed, but speed can be achieved by not using heavy old trains that run poorly and that run to an artificially-padded timetable. I'm all for slowing down IF the rest of life does too, which may well have to happen. However, now, when rail has to compete with less 'green' options, speed still counts.
With a prevailing line speed of 70mph on the North Downs Line, it is that which dictates the journey time and makes some journeys 'barely quicker than driving'. The few extra minutes for 769s doesn't change that view.
There are parallels with other fully electric routes in the South East (eg Reading to Waterloo) where the number of stations and 70mph line speed means a slow journey despite the use of rolling stock capable of 100mph.
Faster services of course require more energy to deliver. The North Downs Line is only useful for a subset of the car journeys made in the Surrey / Berkshire area through which it passes.
The leases on the 319s will have passed from First Capital Connect to GTR when the franchise changed hands. It wasn't First Group's problem at all to find new uses for the 319s. That problem lay solely with Porterbrook, who touted the idea of the 769 to GWR and the DfT.
It was the DfT, rather than GTR, who ordered the replacement trainfleet for Thameslink.
That wasn't on offer and couldn't be delivered in any case. History can't be rewritten in hindsight.
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Deepgreen
Established Member
Not always - removing timetable padding and redundant ten minute dwell times does it without using extra energy, as does using lighter, more efficient trains. Steel-bodied 319s were/are not those trains. Agreed that hindsight is easy, but the lack of a proper strategy caused directly by the mindset of privatisation has left so many decisions in the wrong hands and that was easily foreseeable/foreseen. Infill electrification was the blindingly obvious option decades ago but the short-term costs were valued above the strategic longer-term benefits, as usual. The railway, by its nature, requires the timescales of strategic thinking, but we've seen that diminish.
The procurement for 700s started in 2008 with the contract being awarded in 2011, it wasn't exactly a surprise to Porterbrook. Especially as Porterbrook financed the 377s which would supplement them and 387s which would temporarily replace them.
The original announcement for Northern 769s credits the delays to NR electrification as to why Porterbrook and Northern were developing them.
Deepgreen
Established Member
Quite - one of innumerable situations demonstrating how the fragmented railway doesn't work properly.
Invincible
Member
Passengers, with new trains having air con and faster journeys, hopefully comfortable seats.
For easier maintenance, although GWR is not a heratige railway, the refurbished 32 year old trains will get increasingly problematic for a regular service.
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If 6 are at Reading (awaiting cab mods) guess there are 13 refurbished at Brush and ready to be delivered to Reading?.
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They are in store at Eastleigh and Long Marston. The conversion process was completed ages ago.
They are now 35 years old. The routes the 769s are proposed to work are all secondary routes, and therefore don't justify a fleet of new trains.
It is by no means certain that the Turbos would be moved west if the 769s never enter service.
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Snow1964
Established Member
That is part of the problem, a view that is binary, might not justify brand new, but 769s are within few years of end of life. If we were discussing mid life trains it would be different
Yes, because even if every turbo moved west, wouldn’t be enough to make every train upto sufficient length to fully sort out crowding on Wessex services AND provide the extra services as part of Bristol metro.
The simple fact is lots of new housing in Wiltshire, Gloucestershire etc causing growth, and railway is more leisure based in these areas, which is growing unlike the shrinking commuter market. The fleet plan devised about 6-7 years (when 769s were chosen) ago didn’t forsee the rail growth in the west.
Invincible
Member
The trains have been in storage since 2015, so have actually had 28 years of use. But still near end of life.
Slightly later than that - most of the GWR ones were still in service on Thameslink routes in 2017.
None (for GWR) left in Eastleigh now, that modification program has finished and they should now all be located either at GWRs Reading depot or Oxford sidings, or Long Marston. It remains to be seen if and where they will receive their next set of modifications, but for now the only GWR related item in Eastleigh is Hitachi’s 80X.
There are 3 / 4 319s left in Eastleigh but they are in storage for ROGs (potentially aborted?) Orion scheme.
... and at times acknowledging that the authorisations for new trains aren't inexhaustable. If all trains were new every time something changed then there would be less change to anything authorised, - music to an old-fashioned train spotter but not much good for passenger numbers across the network. The NDL is a secondary route and the programme to run 769s over it removing as much diesel under wires/over 3rd rail in an attempt to benefit the environment. There is also the possibility that it might encourage authorisation for incremental electrification of the route in the medium turn. There were/are no signs of the DfT making capital purchases of new bimodes for the route, and it is even less likely that yet more pure diesels would be made available. So for the time being, the 769s are the only game in town, unless the Turbos canbe retained 'forever'.
Deepgreen
Established Member
Yes, I would advocate the re-use/re-engineering of old stock, as long as it works! At present it appears that a very long duration programme has resulted in worse performance and various impediments to entering service after years of promises. I want it to work, as a resident of the route, but it just doesn't look likely.
We have the benefit of hindsight. At each stage of it's development there have been minor issues, but each in their own right, not enough to stop the programme. Opinions differ as to if and when to give up, each coloured by significant issues such as sunk cost, remaining budget, estimated cost at completion and of course alternative stock availability. In the case of the 769s:
they are at last working resonably well as bimodes in Lancashire on Manchester - Southport services
they are also working acceptably well in service on the Penarth - Rhymney route
they have been tested with relatively few issues between Reading and Redhill
So in practice, given that the remaining issues on the GWR units concern cab ergonomics and other matters that are more to do with general shortfalls rather than their specific bimode characteristics, it would seem that with no alternative available, they will continue for the forseeable future.Yes, and a similar consideration gave the line Turbos in 1993, but only after a clever plan had been hatched to use spare capacity in the build of Turbos for the Chiltern Line, to make good the absence of a specific order of new trains for the North Downs Line. (I suspect that electrification plans falling through had something to do with it.)
This time round, there isn't the advantage of being able to add a few units to the order for the primary routes.
I think the only chance the NDL would have for brand-new stock would be if GWR placed an order for new bi-modes for their Portsmouth-Cardiff route and for HST replacement, and 'adding on' a few units for the North Downs. However, their requirements aren't particularly similar, and I can see features like end doors that could be chosen for the former routes being unsuitable for the North Downs.
I think that 1/3-2/3 doors would be fine for the Cardiff-Portsmouth route as well, - it serves as a local line to many passengers, (but that's for another thread). When in the future, the NDL stands out even more as a route that has two unelectrified 'islands', new bimodes might well be part of the strategy for incrementally electrifying the whole region. The experience of operating the 769s for a few years would be valuable experience. It would be far better than rushing to buy ththe cheapest old technology diesel because they are the cheapest option (e.g. classes 195,196 & 197).
Bob Price
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Total logic however you are against the background of a DfT who doesn't care about electrification. I can see units from TfW cascading to GWR in the west and the Turbos staying on the North Downs unless a clear introduction plan for the 769's start to happen. When they were ordered they were the cheap and available solution. Now there are a bit pile of options about to show and GWR may just push to cut their losses. Anyway back to the topic.
Deepgreen
Established Member
All fair points, but it was (or should have been) known at the design stage that the units would be slower than the Turbos (i.e. not a hindsight issue), and that services would suffer as a result. I'm not specifically advocating new stock for the route, just a type that doesn't send it backwards (and I do value the bi-mode capability). I'm concerned by what you term "general shortfalls" and you also say "they will continue for the forseeable future" - the point is that they still haven't started yet! BTW, I imagine the coming autumn will see their adhesion characteristics tested on the NDL - it will be interesting to see the results.
Invincible
Member
From reading about the 769s they were aiming for a better performance then the 150s and Pacers, rather than the lighter aluminium bodied165s.
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They are wary of electrification cost spiralling like the GWR main line, the NDL may be easier for the hops train as less underground cables?
Don't forget that there is a whole run of steel sleepers that will need to be replaced if electrification ever happens, and very basic signalling.
Deepgreen
Established Member
Indeed, but that would be a relatively small cost. With infill 3rd rail, cost-spiralling is far less of a risk than, for example, the GWML fiasco. Re-signalling would add significantly but the 6 mile sections between Guildford and Reading now are quite startlingly archaic!
That's correct, although they were part a quick replacement for the Pacers, they were also intended to match class 150 times which they do pretty well, even on unelectrified sections because the electric transmission gives a more consistent acceleration at low speeds, despite them having a lower power to weight ratio. As for top speeds, they are quite capable of running at their authorised top speed.
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Minstral25
Established Member
First thing they would need to do is create a decent enough power supply for Reigate to Redhill. Hear that it is only capable of powering a 4-car unit at any one time. One of the main blocks on P3 at Reigate (or 12 car platform) is that power supply cannot cope with longer trains. Someone with better technical expertise may be able to explain why.
I wasn't aware of this restriction, is it relatively new?
AFAIK there's no Conductor rail index listed in NESA, although it's possible I've missed something.
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