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Abellio wins West Midlands franchise
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Tim R-T-C
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Sounds like management trying to shift the blame to me...!
700007
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These aren't my words but unfortunately this seems to be the harsh reaction to this and it is exactly as I have been told by LNWR management.
Bletchleyite
Veteran Member
The WMR livery is not their design, it's designed by whatever the PTE is called this week.
You took the words right out of my mouth.
700007
Established Member
Yeah, this wasn't done by WMT but they still don't like it.
Not *quite* compliant. To go yellow-less they need to be able to illuminate both headlights at the same time, and to be able to switch them between full beam and dimmed, so they'd need some mods
brick60000
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Interesting hearing that management are not fond of the designs. It seems to me that the West Midlands Railway brand has seen more work & refinement than LNR's, perhaps as a result of it being specified by the WMCA. I'll be interested to see what happens now to the LNR branding - surely a rebrand at this very early stage would set the company off on a very bad foot and make the brand seem really weak? I can appreciate the concerns of it looking similar to Southern, though - it was my first thought when I saw the livery. Perhaps an alteration to the colour scheme could resolve this issue? I've been thinking maroon in the style of (not LNWR, I know!) LMS for a while....!!
Bletchleyite
Veteran Member
I suspect the modifications would not be expensive (by railway standards), but as having a yellow front costs nowt probably not good value for money even if they cost £0.01.
700007
Established Member
No no no no I had been waiting the whole day for this train and I gave up!
trash80
Established Member
I dunno i find it hard to buy management not liking the designs to the extent stated, i work in the design industry and stuff like this is worked on and finally signed off months in advance of even the publically released mock-ups so there would have been ample time to modify it.
I wonder if it is a case of the bid team signing off and liking it, but now that the franchise has begun the actual management team in place don't?
trash80
Established Member
Possibly, or the reaction has been adverse from "up high" and they need an excuse 
The (Siemens) class 360 used in East Anglia is very similar to the 350, except for the corridor, yet it manages to look much more 'railway' at the front if you get my drift.
Can't work out whether it's because of the square split windscreen and the fact the yellow front is only at the bottom of the windscreen in a square. And the Matt black above the windscreen. And also to the left and right of the front windscreen is Matt black.
Looks much more front of a loco ish. More 'mainline'.
The use of dark green on the front of the LNR class 350 seems to make the head lamps stand out a bit less than on the yellow fronted 350, which is nice. But still I am thinking full green front, perhaps darker green would make it look more 'loco'.
Or half green (bottom), half black (top) end corridor - to follow the line of the windscreen. And black to the left and right hand side of the windscreen, as on a 360.
Anyone got time to attempt a mock up?
If they could achieve a look closer to the 360 front I think it would look excellent.
Can't work out whether it's because of the square split windscreen and the fact the yellow front is only at the bottom of the windscreen in a square. And the Matt black above the windscreen. And also to the left and right of the front windscreen is Matt black.
Looks much more front of a loco ish. More 'mainline'.
The use of dark green on the front of the LNR class 350 seems to make the head lamps stand out a bit less than on the yellow fronted 350, which is nice. But still I am thinking full green front, perhaps darker green would make it look more 'loco'.
Or half green (bottom), half black (top) end corridor - to follow the line of the windscreen. And black to the left and right hand side of the windscreen, as on a 360.
Anyone got time to attempt a mock up?
If they could achieve a look closer to the 360 front I think it would look excellent.
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700007
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A lot of the management was only 'officially' brought in recently, though. Wasn't the Managing Director's appointment only announced last week or the week before, as an example?
I do really like the LNWR logo though, it is quite smart.
I do really like the LNWR logo though, it is quite smart.
Check out the front of this TPE class 350.
Now imagine the yellow strip which runs along the left hand side (and also the right hand side) of the windscreen is black, like on the 360.
And imagine the yellow below the windscreen is more of a perfect square. With black slightly above the 'buffers', where there is currently a little bit of yellow, so that the yellow that is left is a perfect square.
I think that would achieve a look closer to that of the class 360 front (second photo below). More loco ish. More mainline ish.
Now imagine the yellow strip which runs along the left hand side (and also the right hand side) of the windscreen is black, like on the 360.
And imagine the yellow below the windscreen is more of a perfect square. With black slightly above the 'buffers', where there is currently a little bit of yellow, so that the yellow that is left is a perfect square.
I think that would achieve a look closer to that of the class 360 front (second photo below). More loco ish. More mainline ish.
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trash80
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Yes though with high level appointments their involvement begins months before they officially start.
Tim R-T-C
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A million, billion thanks. Saw it at Euston. Loads of LNW staff had come down to see it.
A wonder how long the livery will last. It was very very dark, certainly compared to the light LM colours. Not the most inviting.
A: It has been. B: It wasn’t.
Their Twitter team doesn’t say it’s a work in progress, they say:
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morgainelive
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Well they've had a difficult start, silly weather. One thing i'm not happy about the loss of my account as I had a 21.50 voucher, so I'm having to complain to them as i can't log into my account despite a LM E-mail saying all accounts would transfer but it tells me that it's non existant so more admin for me. grrr not what I need.
londonmidland
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700007
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Been proven wrong on this front, apologies. This was something I was told from someone higher up, but I didn't mean to misguide you guys. Very sorry about this.
Now those photos look superb.
Just needs someone to tweet to ask whether the LNR design is final now then.
dvboy
Established Member
Are the rest of the fleet getting stickers with the new logos on or are they just going to go round un/debranded for a while?
All Line Rover
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London Midland was, until yesterday, advertising various vacancies on its careers website (a seperate domain to the main London Midland website) with a deadline for applications of 31 Dec 2017. This website has since been deleted and the vacancies in question do not appear on LNR's careers website. That nicely sums up London Midland's approach to staffing.
andyfrommk
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Is this what you were talking about?
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XCTurbostar
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They won’t say that the livery is a work in progress on their own public twitter feed. That’s like publically admitting there’s a fault with a car and then fixing it later on.. The way I see this is that the base livery is unlikely to change now so get used to the jagged edges and diamonds because that’s here to stay. What is more likely to change however is the minor items such as the front colours and bits that show wear easily. VTEC launched its 91s with a grey roof before changing to white and South West Trains also launched (a long time ago) a 455 with a black front so I’ll be perfected overtime.
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