Brissle Girl
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Interesting and thanks. I wonder can you give any insight as to why these improvements are not being announced concurrent with the DA announcement, as is usually the case.
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Great Western Franchise Extension 2020 to?
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It would be fair to assume they're running ok a skeleton staff and are rather busy with more pressing matters.
irish_rail
Established Member
Might explain the crazy numbers of "west" drivers taken on at present and over past couple of years. Glad there will be extra work for them.
3141
Established Member
"The direct awards will allow services to be stepped up when the rail network returns to normal following disruption from COVID-19....Major improvements to be delivered by GWR include the planned introduction of additional new capacity in the Bristol and Exeter areas."
That doesn't necessarily mean any extra stock. "The planned introduction of additional new capacity" probably means introducing what was already planned to happen.
That doesn't necessarily mean any extra stock. "The planned introduction of additional new capacity" probably means introducing what was already planned to happen.
Have you not read the thread? 'Clarence Yard' has confirmed that the uplift in stock is 16 165/1s that were already coming west and 10 150/2s that were going to elsewhere. The 10 150/2s are effectively 'extra stock'.
theironroad
Established Member
Excellent news. Possibility of a 4 year extension too
It may not have been the intention, but that can be read as a 4 year extension to the 3 year Direct award.
The direct award is from 1.4.20 to 31.3.20 (EMA for at least first 6 months ) with possibility of a1 year extension.
3141
Established Member
Thank you, JonathonH.
dk1
Veteran Member
Yeah I meant 4 in total but worded it poorly. Still very good news in my opinion.
fgwrich
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I wonder if that 10 includes the Angel 3 - 202/207/216? Sadly that won't include the two /0s with their move to Newton Heath imminent.
theironroad
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Certainly provides a little stability for staff and passengers in an very unstable world right now.
dk1
Veteran Member
It sure does my friend.
PHILIPE
Veteran Member
Scheduled to go to Newton Heath Wednesday
Well me and my other half work in two different cities, so that wouldn't work.
And then I know a couple with no car at all, who both use the train currently and neither have worked from home until covid-19.
But rather than guess at a 'typical' couple, I based my forecast on work that has been previously done on the effect of home-working. I cannot see any reason why the post-C19 uplift will behave any differently.
Trainfan061193
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Yes the Angel 150/2s are now staying. There were rumours for a while that they were going to Northern some point this year but Clarence Yard confirmed via WNXX ages ago that they are going nowhere.
Well me and my other half work in two different cities, so that wouldn't work.
And then I know a couple with no car at all, who both use the train currently and neither have worked from home until covid-19.
But rather than guess at a 'typical' couple, I based my forecast on work that has been previously done on the effect of home-working. I cannot see any reason why the post-C19 uplift will behave any differently.
If you work from home (say) Monday & Tuesday and your other half works from home Thursday and Friday then what's it matter that the car is driven to different cities and one of you uses the train to get to work on a Wednesday whilst the other drivers the car?
I'm not denying that the number of people who use rail 5 days a week will go down, the point is that there could well be others who replace them as owning a car mostly for getting to and from work becomes less justifiable.
Likewise it could well be that a family with kids with a stay at home patent needs to have two cars because there's two days a week when there's clubs/lessons (say swimming) where they have to travel to get to them. If the WFH days are those two days then there's no need for a second car. Whilst that may result in some limits on what the stay at home patent can do (such as only being able to see friends a fair way away on certain days or having to car share with others to do so) it's likely to be fairly limited.
Conversely it could free the stay at home patent to do other things, in that the worker could start work at 8am and finish at 3pm (6.5 hours with an extra hour in the evening) to allow the stay at home patent to go out for a longer day trip.
Given that rail is about 10% of distance traveled (with the rate being much smaller for number of trips) any increase in home working is going to impact road travel much more than rail. However, as I said some of the rail decrease could be offset by increases from the drop in car usage.
father_jack
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The passengers will always get something but there are going to be grave consequences for some staff in the very short term.
A lot of our contractors have been laid off at work - permanent staff are protected by the no redundancies/full pay agreement between RDG/NR/DfT but our contract onboard caterers, cleaners and security at various locations are in limbo at the moment despite the agreement that they would continue to receive 80% pay.
Since we are apparently not allowed to mention your agenda here, perhaps you could explain why it is that GW operations should have been retendered by means of a franchise contest at this point?
Since the last completed GW contest, there have been two for the East Coast. In both cases it has ended in tears with the government taking back the keys, despite this being the one franchise out of the whole lot that really ought to be a licence to print money - nice simple operational model, with limited-stop fast trains whizzing up and down between London, Yorkshire, the North East and Scotland, and a near-captive target market.
The factors affecting the GW area in the past decade are well known, with electrification and resignalling, wholesale changes to rolling stock and so on.
It has then run into the Williams Report, which is widely expected to come up with an alternative model for operating passenger services, so something had to be done to ensure continued GW operations, whether you like it or not.
And as a testbed for a new approach, I would suggest that what is arguably the single most complicated franchise area of all, encompassing everything from London suburban services, via long-distance expresses, to lightly-used rural branch lines, with a sleeper service on top, is about the last place to start trying out that new model - whoever the existing operator may be and whatever anyone's opinions of the said company may be.
father_jack
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LL, it was booking office staff to which my worry is directed. It is reported that ticket purchasing is down 98% !!! And that refunds are in the region of a 7 figure amount.
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Unless they're contractors they shouldn't worry - an NR/TOC/DfT agreement has been produced for no compulsory redundancies and full pay for all railway staff until 30/06/20 or the end of the crisis whichever is later - they'll either carry on being bored at work, assigned other duties or be sent home with full pay and appropriate contractual allowances.
theironroad
Established Member
It's a pity that's it's not easier to match up the two as ticket office staff are able to process refunds but most ticket offices are closed.
You only have to look at the swr twitter feed to see that 99% of tweets are about refunds and the logjam being caused by the customer service centre being temporarily shut down (may have re opened in a limited form).
Some ticket offices could be used by a sole member of staff to only process batches of refund applications delivered by courier from customer service centre. (Ticket office would remain closed to public). I believe refunds over a certain amount have to be signed off by the finance dept, so a additional centre could be set up to aid that, all while observing social distancing etc.
While for some commuters, it may not be a issue, I'd imagine that there are a fair few who could do with that money back in their bank accounts now to help get through next few months, especially self employed.
re
father_jack
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Alas they want the contact centres to do everything. A cynic might say there's an agenda there.
3141
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The trouble with some cynics and their supposed agendas is that other people don't know what they mean.
Flinn Reed
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Does the capacity increases around Bristol/Exeter refer to longer train formations, or more frequent services?
Clarence Yard
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Both.
In that case can we still cautiously expect a positive commitment for the introduction of a regular Okehampton to Exeter rail service, with details of of infrastructure etc works required and a target date for introduction ?
Clarence Yard
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Infrastructure works on track and signalling are not part of the DA, or of any franchise nowadays.
You will have to wait for the official news on Okehampton, I'm afraid.
You will have to wait for the official news on Okehampton, I'm afraid.
father_jack
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A ticket office I know of had 4 staff in today who sold 15 tickets between them in 10 hours. And passengers will wait months for people who have no experience of refunds to miscalculate their refunds.....
According to May Modern Railways the potential extra carriages include:
- Using trailers from 365s (and other redundant Networkers) to extend 2 coach 165s to 3 coaches and 3 coach 165/166s to 5 coaches
- Investigate converting more HSTs to GTI sets
- Investigate replacing 150s and 158s - presumably with the above two (5 coach 166s would replace the current 3+2 so gives more space 165s)
- Using trailers from 365s (and other redundant Networkers) to extend 2 coach 165s to 3 coaches and 3 coach 165/166s to 5 coaches
- Investigate converting more HSTs to GTI sets
- Investigate replacing 150s and 158s - presumably with the above two (5 coach 166s would replace the current 3+2 so gives more space 165s)
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