GWR stock shortage: potential solutions

[irish_rail]

Moderator note: Split from https://www.railforums.co.uk/threads/gwr-short-train-lengths.244744/

To be clear, I obviously believe that the 5 car short forms should not be happening, but I don't think lengthening to 9 cars is the solution for right now.

But surely if money was spent on lengthening some of the 5s to 9s then its a win win. We are not losing any sets, just adding much needed capacity. As I said before, if we don't do it now, it will soon be too late and the Western will be left with a legacy of pint sized intercity trains for the next 25 years.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 4 Aug 2023 ==

There is no breach of contract. Hitachi are contracted to supply a number of sets. But if one gets bent when it is in GWR’s hands and is unavailable the following day, Hitachi are entitled to supply one less. It’s called an “Excused Set” in the contract. The more that get bent and stay bent, the less they have to supply. They have to repair them in a timely manner but some units need more than a day or two to fix.

The Bristol superfasts sets don’t actually give you that much because they were nearly all off peak workings and mainly relied on units being split off from other services to run them. So GWR has had to reduce some planned formations to free up units but none from the West of England services.

This week the shortfall has been caused by the odd failure and the industrial action. The latter has also resulted in IET units being in the wrong place for start of service so you are constantly fighting imbalances. To an extent, the DMU fleet has suffered the same this week but pure driver shortages (as a result of the ASOS) have made more of a mess of those West services, especially on the Cornish branches.

There is no breach of contract. Hitachi are contracted to supply a number of sets. But if one gets bent when it is in GWR’s hands and is unavailable the following day, Hitachi are entitled to supply one less. It’s called an “Excused Set” in the contract. The more that get bent and stay bent, the less they have to supply. They have to repair them in a timely manner but some units need more than a day or two to fix.

The Bristol superfasts sets don’t actually give you that much because they were nearly all off peak workings and mainly relied on units being split off from other services to run them. So GWR has had to reduce some planned formations to free up units but none from the West of England services.

This week the shortfall has been caused by the odd failure and the industrial action. The latter has also resulted in IET units being in the wrong place for start of service so you are constantly fighting imbalances. To an extent, the DMU fleet has suffered the same this week but pure driver shortages (as a result of the ASOS) have made more of a mess of those West services, especially on the Cornish branches.

From a man on the inside, it is interesting to know that the union industrial action is having a big impact in many ways. I'm torn here, whilst I feel sorry for the passengers , I also recognise that the Dft are actively attempting to ruin train drivers lives with completely unrealistic changes to working conditions. From a purely Aslef point of view, it would seem that work to rule may be a more effective tool than striking going forward...

 

[HamworthyGoods]

The Bristol superfasts sets don’t actually give you that much because they were nearly all off peak workings and mainly relied on units being split off from other services to run them. So GWR has had to reduce some planned formations to free up units but none from the West of England services.

The peak Bristol super fasts (the hourly fast to Chippenhams) and the South Wales peak super-fasts are also not running since Covid, overall seems around 2tph less on the IET services from Paddington both peak and off-peak (3tph if you count the Bedwyns having gone).

 

[Energy]

But surely if money was spent on lengthening some of the 5s to 9s then its a win win. We are not losing any sets, just adding much needed capacity. As I said before, if we don't do it now, it will soon be too late and the Western will be left with a legacy of pint sized intercity trains for the next 25 years.

But you'd have a longer train so more vehicles to maintain? If they can't cope with 5 car sets the same quantity of 9 cars isn't going to be better.

 

[irish_rail]

But you'd have a longer train so more vehicles to maintain? If they can't cope with 5 car sets the same quantity of 9 cars isn't going to be better.

So we should give up then? The percentage of available trains planned in service could be reduced, like with LNER, if its good enough for the East, then why not for the West? Also I'm relatively sure a 9 car is more reliable than 2 x 5 cars operating as a pair.

 

[Energy]

So we should give up then? The percentage of available trains planned in service could be reduced, like with LNER, if its good enough for the East, then why not for the West? Also I'm relatively sure a 9 car is more reliable than 2 x 5 cars operating as a pair.

I don't know enough about rolling stock maintenance to further comment on 2x5 vs 9. An option to temporarily reduce usage might be additional ex TfW sprinters maintained elsewhere.

 

[HamworthyGoods]

So we should give up then? The percentage of available trains planned in service could be reduced, like with LNER, if its good enough for the East, then why not for the West? Also I'm relatively sure a 9 car is more reliable than 2 x 5 cars operating as a pair.

The only way to reduce the trains in traffic to a similar level as LNER would be to permanently plan to short form services, which means we are no better off sadly.

The Castle HSTs which can be retained beyond December are already doing so (The First Rail / GWR sets), the other sets already supposedly have a new lessor taking over (seemingly not necessarily in this country though).

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 4 Aug 2023 ==

I don't know enough about rolling stock maintenance to further comment on 2x5 vs 9. An option to temporarily reduce usage might be additional ex TfW sprinters maintained elsewhere.

No sprinters have yet to come off lease from TfW indeed they are already sub hiring sprinters from Northern to make up for their own shortfall.

 

[irish_rail]

I don't know enough about rolling stock maintenance to further comment on 2x5 vs 9. An option to temporarily reduce usage might be additional ex TfW sprinters maintained elsewhere.

There is also a potential environmental argument to be made. A 9 car has 5 GUs (engines essentially) whereas a 10 car has 6. Over the life of these trains, id imagine that one extra engine (for no real passenger benefit in terms of capacity as 10 cars basically hold same number of people as a 9) makes a difference. Not to mention additional moves to and from and within depots. In the environmentally aware times we live, you would have hoped that would be another factor to sway Governement into authorising some additional carriages to make up some 9s. But then you remember the current unelected PM takes a helicopter to fly down the road.......

 

[Krokodil]

But you'd have a longer train so more vehicles to maintain? If they can't cope with 5 car sets the same quantity of 9 cars isn't going to be better.

It's not necessarily about maintenance, some of the shortages are down to awaiting repairs. If you have 2 five coach sets, one of which hits a tree then you end up with five-vice-ten. If those sets were nine coaches long then one of those units would have been spare so no need to worry about tree damage.

 

[Master29]

the LNER comparison is ridiculous though. If trains are stripped from LNER and given to GWR there will be short forms on the East Coast instead. It is not a question of either or, it’s a question of the government funding GWR properly - I genuinely don’t understand what ‘but LNER’ is supposed to achieve.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 4 Aug 2023 ==


It is point scoring if the whole argument is ‘LNER has it better’. Why do conversations about the dire state of TfW not shift to ‘let’s take trains away from TPE?’ Yet on GWR some comparison has to be made to a totally different franchise.

If "LNER has it better" in your words why does it have to be point scoring based on your logic? This may well be true or not but it's not about scoring points. You can throw figures about greater population centres but it doesn't explain things like yearly population change in the South West. So far as bringing TfW into the situation it either may or may not be relevant but this thread is about short forming with GWR.

 

[GWVillager]

But surely if money was spent on lengthening some of the 5s to 9s then its a win win. We are not losing any sets, just adding much needed capacity. As I said before, if we don't do it now, it will soon be too late and the Western will be left with a legacy of pint sized intercity trains for the next 25 years.

I don’t think the IET product line will be out of production for some years fortunately, look how long the similarly ubiquitous 170s lasted on Bombardier’s list, for example.

 

[Snow1964]

It's not necessarily about maintenance, some of the shortages are down to awaiting repairs. If you have 2 five coach sets, one of which hits a tree then you end up with five-vice-ten. If those sets were nine coaches long then one of those units would have been spare so no need to worry about tree damage.

There is also a bit of a circular feedback

If more trains are awaiting repairs, the other (working) units have to be pushed into service more, so they wear quicker than planned and their planned maintenance is needed earlier. So more pressure on maintenance time, which means harder to repair the damaged ones.

Something that hasn't really been discussed is if there are enough swappable parts (spare diesel generator sets, spare bogies etc), or enough roads in the depots equipped to do these swaps. Not a lot of use having some fancy bogie drop, or engine change ramp, that can change one in a hour, or 10 overnight (or whatever rate is) if don't have enough fully fixed spares to slot back in.

My understanding was the fixed formation train was supposed to be able to have components swapped easily so as not disable whole train, or need to go back into service with isolated engines etc. So if it just one fault then in theory should be as quick to change unit and rectify train on both 5car and 9car sets

Didn't the IETs come with something like a 27.5 year usage agreement, would be a pretty dumb maintenance contract if not obliged to have provision for sufficient spare parts for the duration. But maybe that's what DfT did.

 

[Wilts Wanderer]

Another side issue to the suggestion of ‘build more sets for GWR’ - would the existing depots have capacity for them? AFAIK the IET depots specifically built for the fleets (North Pole, Stoke Gifford, Maliphant) were tailored to the fleet size, and North Pole in particular is full on a nightly basis. Laira probably does have capacity once the HSTs are retired.

 

[geordieblue]

So far as bringing TfW into the situation it either may or may not be relevant but this thread is about short forming with GWR.

So why bring LNER in?

 

[Benjwri]

Another side issue to the suggestion of ‘build more sets for GWR’ - would the existing depots have capacity for them? AFAIK the IET depots specifically built for the fleets (North Pole, Stoke Gifford, Maliphant) were tailored to the fleet size, and North Pole in particular is full on a nightly basis. Laira probably does have capacity once the HSTs are retired.

This is something people haven’t discussed here, building more carriages open a whole other can of worms.

Firstly there’s a shortage of parts for the current IETs. If Hitachi gets paid what will be an extremely large amount of money to build more they’re going to focus their efforts on making these parts towards the new units. In the meantime it’s highly likely we’d see a decrease in available units as even more at stopped for repairs, because the spares they can manufacture are going into new trains.

Secondly even if the depots have space, which they probably don’t, Hitachi is contracted to deliver a certain number of half sets. A 9 car counts as 2 half sets, so even in theory it doesn’t matter how much cheaper maintaining a 9 car should be, the costs of a 9 car are double a 5 car for the government. However you then have to remeber this isn’t in the contract, it would be a contract negotiation and Hitachi doesn’t seem to think the current one represents value. At the very best they will charge even more than the eye wateringly high prices they do now for the extra sets, so for every 5 car the maintenance price more than doubles. Worst case they say the government has to renegotiate the entire contract for one of many reason and the maintenance cost of the entire IET fleet grows by a huge amount per unit.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 5 Aug 2023 ==

In my opinion new IETs is not the solution. The government needs to press on with replacement of GWR’s aging diesel fleet, and deliver something that is suitable for Cardiff to Portsmouth, and is therefore suitable for Cardiff to Penzance and can replace the IETs operating that route. Or they could finish their electrification program and allow some of the many EMUs sitting around the country to replace the IETs running to Oxford and Bristol.

 

[Xavi]

In my opinion new IETs is not the solution. The government needs to press on with replacement of GWR’s aging diesel fleet, and deliver something that is suitable for Cardiff to Portsmouth, and is therefore suitable for Cardiff to Penzance and can replace the IETs operating that route. Or they could finish their electrification program and allow some of the many EMUs sitting around the country to replace the IETs running to Oxford and Bristol.

Totally agree and so does Hopwood. TfW 150s and 158s can alleviate a lot of problems in the interim. Then again Treasury may disagree.

 

[GWVillager]

In my opinion new IETs is not the solution. The government needs to press on with replacement of GWR’s aging diesel fleet, and deliver something that is suitable for Cardiff to Portsmouth, and is therefore suitable for Cardiff to Penzance and can replace the IETs operating that route. Or they could finish their electrification program and allow some of the many EMUs sitting around the country to replace the IETs running to Oxford and Bristol.

I agree completely, but there is the problem of procuring new stock. There don’t seem to be any designs currently available that would be particularly well suited to the role, and creating new ones may take too long, relative to the relatively straightforward process of purchasing some extra intermediate IET coaches.

 

[Benjwri]

I agree completely, but there is the problem of procuring new stock. There don’t seem to be any designs currently available that would be particularly well suited to the role, and creating new ones may take too long, relative to the relatively straightforward process of purchasing some extra intermediate IET coaches.

The question is how quickly would more IET coaches actually materialise. The production lines are stacked up producing the 805,7 and 10, and we won’t know how long it will be for a replacement for the DMUs to be manufactured until they actually tender and see what is offered.

 

[irish_rail]

Totally agree and so does Hopwood. TfW 150s and 158s can alleviate a lot of problems in the interim. Then again Treasury may disagree.

The trouble with never building new vehicles IET wise, is it means for the next 25 years we are going to operate pairs of IETs on a regular basis. This is inefficient and in the long run costly and wasteful. We should be aiming to reduce 10 car running as soon as possible in order to get value for money in terms of the savings of not having to double crew.
Also , should say 10x 5 car sets be lengthened to 9 car for GWR , then surely 10 x 5 car sets could be axed to go to another operator, say XC or TPE to replace loco hauled stuff, so surely the depots wouldn't be under any additional strain? So GWR would have 10 trains fewer, but 10 trains that are longer. Fewer cabs to maintain, and id imagine that would mean lower maintenance costs for GWR.

 

[Benjwri]

Also , should say 10x 5 car sets be lengthened to 9 car for GWR , then surely 10 x 5 car sets could be axed to go to another operator, say XC or TPE to replace loco hauled stuff, so surely the depots wouldn't be under any additional strain? So GWR would have 10 trains fewer, but 10 trains that are longer. Fewer cabs to maintain, and id imagine that would mean lower maintenance costs for GWR.

The majority of 10 car trains have to split and join throughout the day in the current timetable, so by fixing the formations you would also have to axe services, especially in the early morning and late evening.

Not to mention this would reduce fleet availability because now when you have a failure just before service that means the unit can’t be put into service, the entire service is called off.

I don’t think you’re going persuade the DfT to spend at least £2 million per vehicle (more now with the huge current inflation and a smaller unit), to decrease the amount of services GWR can run, and reduce the reliability of the fleet. The newspapers would have a field day.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 5 Aug 2023 ==

Not to mention if you’re only extending a 5 car rather than combining two that’s going to be £8 million per unit, so £80 million overall at original order prices.

 

[irish_rail]

The majority of 10 car trains have to split and join throughout the day in the current timetable, so by fixing the formations you would also have to axe services, especially in the early morning and late evening.

Not to mention this would reduce fleet availability because now when you have a failure just before service that means the unit can’t be put into service, the entire service is called off.

I don’t think you’re going persuade the DfT to spend at least £2 million per vehicle (more now with the huge current inflation and a smaller unit), to decrease the amount of services GWR can run, and reduce the reliability of the fleet. The newspapers would have a field day.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 5 Aug 2023 ==

Not to mention if you’re only extending a 5 car rather than combining two that’s going to be £8 million per unit, so £80 million overall at original order prices.

I take your points, though I'd argue, in the "bad" old days of HSTs , there were very few cancellations on the core service, and a short form meant 7 coaches not 8. A far happier position to be in frankly. The cancellations where concentrated where they would do least damage. Its debatable whether from a passenger point of view if its better to cancel a lightly used service and avoid a busy service being short formed, or do you run the full timetable but with some key trains short formed. I know what the Dft and GWR would plump for, but I don't necessarily think that's in the passengers best interest.

Re the splits and joins , they are not generally needed and the fleet re diagrammed accordingly. The exception i suppose is the Carmarthens which would continue to split and join. Yes perhaps running a 9 instead of a 5 through Cornwall at 6am is a little bit wasteful, BUT , you are saving on an additional driver to bring in the attachment from the depot, plus the performance risk of the attachment.

 

[Benjwri]

there were very few cancellations on the core service, and a short form meant 7 coaches not 8

But that was because there was more capacity unused in the HSTs, in your suggestion we would have the same amount of capacity spare, or less, but nothing to short form with, and therefore they would just be cancelled. Personally as a passenger I will see the railway for more unreliable if half the trains I try to use are cancelled, rather than I just may not be able to find a space.

Its debatable whether from a passenger point of view if its better to cancel a lightly used service and avoid a busy service being short formed, or do you run the full timetable but with some key trains short formed. I know what the Dft and GWR would plump for, but I don't necessarily think that's in the passengers best interest.

Is it though? Because I'd argue its better to have at least some of the passenger get on a shorter train, albeit a bit cramped, rather than all the passengers try to squeeze on the next train, having waited up to an hour, and it be even more cramped. I'm not sure what you mean by a 'lightly used service', I don't think I've ever been on a IET that has seemed 'lightly used', presumably you are just suggesting taking those services out the timetable effectively. One of the biggest factors in public transport, especially on short routes, which I assume is the kind you're talking about here with 'lightly used', is frequency. If you remove services people just won't travel, which is detrimental to the railways.

Re the splits and joins , they are not generally needed and the fleet re diagrammed accordingly. The exception i suppose is the Carmarthens which would continue to split and join. Yes perhaps running a 9 instead of a 5 through Cornwall at 6am is a little bit wasteful, BUT , you are saving on an additional driver to bring in the attachment from the depot, plus the performance risk of the attachment.

I more meant there are a number of early morning services which operate as 2 5 cars which then join at Paddington. With less 5 cars one would have to be cancelled. There are also a number of services diagramed to run as 5 cars. If you're just exchanging 2 5 cars for a 9 effectively obviously one of these has to be cancelled.

 

[Krokodil]

I'd argue its better to have at least some of the passenger get on a shorter train, albeit a bit cramped, rather than all the passengers try to squeeze on the next train, having waited up to an hour, and it be even more cramped.

And I'd argue that it's better to have sufficient rolling stock on-hand that a unit failure just means a short delay while a spare set is brought off-shed.

I never was a fan of sweating the assets...

 

[Benjwri]

And I'd argue that it's better to have sufficient rolling stock on-hand that a unit failure just means a short delay while a spare set is brought off-shed.

I never was a fan of sweating the assets...

Yes, and I wasn’t saying anything against this, however the only way to achieve that is to acquire a new diesel fleet, or electrify more areas, so IETs aren’t covering routes that those fleets should.
There isn’t depot space for more IETs right now, so we can’t expand the fleet, and by swapping two 5 car sets for a 9 that becomes even more unlikely because the 5 car that would’ve sat on the depot is now part of another 5 car running around.

 

[uglymonkey]

Devon Cornwall has always played "2nd fiddle" in London consciousness historically beside "more important" North south routes, regardless of patronage. It also seems to suffer from "boom and bust" over the summer/winter, causing mayhem to plan for. Like Beeching, you can't have stock just kept for the holiday peak, what does it do the rest of the time? Indeed where would you even store it?

The type of stock is better, although 2nd class stock (not the IET's) other regions cast offs and hand me downs is usually the norm,lasting decades until it to gets replaced by generously given other newer cast off stock from other regions.

We should not be fighting each other and comparing LNER to GWR etc, but fighting the government for more investment in the railways as patronage ramps up.

 

[Topological]

It seems to me that rather than extra carriages, extra 5-car would be better. However, that is definitely not going to happen.

GWR needs a plan for small electrification infills, additional DMUs and then ultimately a plan for battery units. There are threads discussing all of these things.

Meanwhile the possibility of a cosy 5-car remains, but that is definitely preferable to a cancelled train IMHO.

 

[dk1]

It seems to me that rather than extra carriages, extra 5-car would be better. However, that is definitely not going to happen.

GWR needs a plan for small electrification infills, additional DMUs and then ultimately a plan for battery units. There are threads discussing all of these things.

Meanwhile the possibility of a cosy 5-car remains, but that is definitely preferable to a cancelled train IMHO.

I agree but all these things are a long way off so got to make the best of a bad job for now.

 

[jimm]

Once again Jimm you ignore the fact of the population of Devon and Cornwall swelling by many times during the summer months not to mention all year round visiting as more the case than perhaps 20 years or so ago so you 20k population quip about Truro vanishes into thin air.

Indeed. Combined population of Devon and Cornwall is about 1.2 million. Thats without the large tourist swells from April to October , plus around Christmas and Easter. And ALL of those populations are within catchment area of a railway station served by the GWR WofE trains, making the far south west in many ways similar to a very large metropolitan city in terms of potential passengers. GWR generally does its best , but I guess the Dft isn't as enthusiastic about worrying about the south west compared with the North etc. Generally, in the north, users have more competition and someone living in say Huddersfield may choose to head to London via the WCML or ECML or even MML.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 30 Jul 2023 ==


Of course it would, but I think its a case of hindsight being a wonderful thing! We are stuck with this now, and as I said further up thread, we need to get used to the new norm of short trains, along with daft 10 car trains with two sets of crew! And yet the Dft like to blame the staff for being unproductive!!!!!!......

There I was thinking I was discussing the less than peripheral nature of some places that LNER serves. Just because there are lots of summer season visitors does not alter the fact that the permanent population of the South West is a lot smaller than the places that LNER serves, never mind that there is also tourist and seasonal traffic to a lot of those places.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 3 Aug 2023 ==



The resident population of Devon and Cornwall is 1.7 million but 11 million people visit every year

As noted above, York gets 8 million visitors a year, while Oxford gets 7 million, Bath gets 6 million, Edinburgh 4 million - we could play this game forever.

If "LNER has it better" in your words why does it have to be point scoring based on your logic? This may well be true or not but it's not about scoring points. You can throw figures about greater population centres but it doesn't explain things like yearly population change in the South West. So far as bringing TfW into the situation it either may or may not be relevant but this thread is about short forming with GWR.

Tourists are not 'population change' they are short-term visitors to an area. And whether you like it or not, other places have steadier year-round traffic flows - the kind of thing HM Treasury likes - than tourists in the South West deliver. Especially in the depths of winter, when there is a whole lot less swelling in visitor numbers going on than in July and August, no matter how many times you keep claiming people are flocking to Cornwall to get blown off their feet by an Atlantic gale at Porthleven.

I take your points, though I'd argue, in the "bad" old days of HSTs , there were very few cancellations on the core service, and a short form meant 7 coaches not 8. A far happier position to be in frankly. The cancellations where concentrated where they would do least damage. Its debatable whether from a passenger point of view if its better to cancel a lightly used service and avoid a busy service being short formed, or do you run the full timetable but with some key trains short formed. I know what the Dft and GWR would plump for, but I don't necessarily think that's in the passengers best interest.

Re the splits and joins , they are not generally needed and the fleet re diagrammed accordingly. The exception i suppose is the Carmarthens which would continue to split and join. Yes perhaps running a 9 instead of a 5 through Cornwall at 6am is a little bit wasteful, BUT , you are saving on an additional driver to bring in the attachment from the depot, plus the performance risk of the attachment.

As I keep telling you whernever you wax lyrical about the good old days, the knock-on effect of stock swaps at Paddington to get an HST on a Bristol, South Wales or West Country train could mean that an Oxford/Cotswold train went down to a 180 or a Turbo - even a two-car Turbo at times, all the way to Hereford. If that is your idea of things being in passengers' best interests, you have got to be joking - but as we know, so long as it's happening anywhere other than the route to Plymouth, it's not really a problem at all.

PS: has someone hacked your log-in?

First we had

In summer, more carriages can be added to Cornish and Scottish services, whilst in winter, fewer carriages may be used

And now we get

Yes perhaps running a 9 instead of a 5 through Cornwall at 6am is a little bit wasteful,

 

[GWVillager]

Tourists are not 'population change' they are short-term visitors to an area.

This is what's particularly unique about the South West though, tourists tend to spend a relatively long time there, and often travel around by train during their stay, acting almost as members of the ordinary population.

 

[Master29]

It seems to me that rather than extra carriages, extra 5-car would be better. However, that is definitely not going to happen.

GWR needs a plan for small electrification infills, additional DMUs and then ultimately a plan for battery units. There are threads discussing all of these things.

Meanwhile the possibility of a cosy 5-car remains, but that is definitely preferable to a cancelled train IMHO.

I wonder if the battery plan will ever happen.

There I was thinking I was discussing the less than peripheral nature of some places that LNER serves. Just because there are lots of summer season visitors does not alter the fact that the permanent population of the South West is a lot smaller than the places that LNER serves, never mind that there is also tourist and seasonal traffic to a lot of those plaAs I keep telling you whernever you wax lyrical about the good old days, the knock-on effect of stock swaps at Paddington to get an HST on a Bristol, South Wales or West Country train could mean that an Oxford/Cotswold train went down to a 180 or a Turbo - even a two-car Turbo at times, all the way to Hereford. If that is your idea of things being in passengers' best interests, you have got to be joking - but as we know, so long as it's happening anywhere other than the route to Plymouth, it's not really a problem at all.

So now who`s complaining of smaller units to Hereford? Why does it not matter about the swelling of the south wests population which is definitely more than just July and August? Incidentally. I wonder how many 2nd homes are in places like Hereford, Worcester and the Cities of the North compared to "resident populations" of Devon and Cornwall as you put it?

This is what's particularly unique about the South West though, tourists tend to spend a relatively long time there, and often travel around by train during their stay, acting almost as members of the ordinary population.

This is a very good point.

 

[Annetts key]

Yes, and I wasn’t saying anything against this, however the only way to achieve that is to acquire a new diesel fleet, or electrify more areas, so IETs aren’t covering routes that those fleets should.
There isn’t depot space for more IETs right now, so we can’t expand the fleet, and by swapping two 5 car sets for a 9 that becomes even more unlikely because the 5 car that would’ve sat on the depot is now part of another 5 car running around.

So this leads on to what the actual maintenance requirements, cleaning (inside and out, including emptying toilet tanks and refilling the fresh/clean water) and refuelling requirements actually are.

Not all trains go back to a depot every night. But I don’t know about the Hitachi stock.
Plus, some work into the early morning and some start work very early in the morning. These are not in the depots all night for maintenance/cleaning/etc.

Back when Intercity HST sets were the mainstay of GWR, they used to queue to enter the maintenance depot, queue to refuel etc. Of course, it was easier to take a loco out of service for heavy maintenance.

Not everywhere, granted, but on parts of the Western there are many (I can think of enough to stable at least ten nine car trains in the Bristol area alone) empty sidings where stock could be stabled while either awaiting to enter service or waiting before going to a depot. Yes, of course security would have to be improved to prevent vandalism.

The most worrying thing from my point of view is what is the DaFT going to do to try to cope with any increase in passenger numbers. Do they actually have any idea?

The long term solution if the 80X reliability does not improve is to buy brand new trains to improve capacity (and I don’t mean buy new Hitachi stock). But that’s going to be expensive. And something that the current government would not allow.

In the shorter term, taking currently operational stock out of service is a very bad idea. As said earlier, the passenger does not care about the reasons or the railway politics.

The number of trains that Hitachi make available to GWR is almost irrelevant, the important point is, do GWR have the required number of trains to run the timetabled service (including the required number of cars/coaches for each timetabled train)? If the answer is no, then the railway needs to find a solution.

Be that, GWR and Network Rail do something to reduce the number of trains being damaged. And GWR/DaFT find a way in the contract to force Hitachi to improve the number of trains (and the number of cars/carriages) being made available to GWR to be at least the minimum number specified in the contract.

If Hitachi have a lack of suitable spare parts now, what’s the situation going to like in five, ten, fifteen years?

If Hitachi, GWR and Network Rail can’t get their respective acts together, did the DaFT include any “get out” clause in the Hitachi contract?

Personally, I think the train length (number of seats and number of cars/carriages) should be specified in the public timetable. Said timetable must be valid for at least 12 months. If a railway operator fails to provide ANY part of the advertised service (train cancelled, short formed or less seats than planned, a car/carriage out of use, terminated short, started at a different origin, delayed by more than twenty minutes at ANY station that it’s scheduled/timetabled to stop at or where less than ⅔ of the toilets are working) every passenger should be entitled to a full refund or a voucher to the same value. No messing around with delay repay.

We need a railway fit for the twenty-first century, not the mess we currently have. And that goes for the whole shebang, not just the TOCs, but also Network Rail. Trying, as the current Conservative government are doing, to run the railway while squeezing the funding is not going to work. Yes, income from the selling of tickets may well be less than pre-pandemic. But inflation means that the operating and maintenance costs are higher than pre-pandemic.

Ultimately, the passenger wants a good experience. Especially if we are trying to attract more people to travel by train rather than by air or by road (yes I know the railways can get everyone out of aircraft and road vehicles).