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Not quite. The decision was made as it was a better use of resources given the nature of passenger demand. HSTs and 170s might have different overall speed capabilities, but on the ScotRail network they travel the same maximum speed (100mph) - so the decision to run via Stirling than via Fife...

Form a supplier point of view, the bold - because not neccesarily. The same reason why flats in Aberdeen sit empty at high rent rates for years (after the oil boom of decades gone by inflated house prices) or the 379s and 360s sat for so long in storage (and the ex-TPE Mk5s will continue to do...

Is it not just an illusion that Merseyrail is or should be light rail when they're run to the same 'heavy' rail standards and gauge as anywhere else? As in, just because it has an underground component and runs frequent stops, why should that make it any less of a heavy rail than light-rail? I...

I agree completely. My comment was more about the HSTs working such a service rather than the rationale for it in the first place. Changed times from their original purpose as built.

Try the 06:53 Perth to Glasgow Queen Street every weekday morning. It's booked a HST and calls all stops! Absolute overkill.

Technically yes, but only if you reduce the floor height.

Additionally with GU putting in for Edinburgh to Wales services, there is an element of trying to have a homogeneous fleet that can serve both to keep resourcing costs down to a minimum. Also it is worth noting that paths have only been granted for 5 years, so utilising any new builds or Mk5s...

You pretty much answered your own question with... Which has been stated is more of the purpose behind CS than the service itself being profitable. Since the Mk5s CS have embraced the luxury market rather than skirt in the middle ground between budget and luxury that the Mk2s/Mk3s provided -...

The platforms at Euston are not long enough to extend sets beyond 16 coaches, which is already the length of both Highlander and Lowlanders. So you would need to either invest in extending them, or remove a sleeping coach to compensate.

It is inevitable that Caledonian Sleeper will never be profit making, but it is an interesting one to see where it can gain more income. Personally I think the new trains could have been better designed to accommodate more rooms by maintaining the discrepancies in carriage lengths between the...

803s are longer and have more seats than a Voyager.

Depends where you identify the shortage. There isn't a mass shortage at the minute. Unless it is decided that the HSTs need binned, but there's no sign of that happening any time soon.

769s for ScotRail would be horrific in Leven's case. Just because you can squeeze in 5 or so miles of electric running on a 50 mile route, doesn't mean that you should if it is at the expense of sinking cash into an 80s built rust bucket that won't last the decade. Seems more like a principle...

As the title states, this is something that has me thinking for various reasons. I understand the basics of articulated carriage designed. But not being from an engineering background, I am unaware of the constraints faced by this approach when it comes to carriage length. Naturally I imagine -...

A 170 sandwiched between 2 x 158s working ScotRail's only booked 7-car DMU service, which ran from Aberdeen to Inverurie (dropping the rear set before continuing to Inverness) in the evening peaks until about 2017/2018.

Remember that the Caledonian Sleeper exists predominantly to spread wealth to remote areas where day services otherwise wouldn't, which indirectly pays off the subsidy of the initial service through regional economic growth. The economics of the service alone is brutal, but the wider economics...

Haymarket

I do wonder if we've hit the point in rolling stock replacements where we consider anything to be 'modern' if it doesn't have openable windows or isn't ex-BREL (I'll dub it 'the hopper window effect', 'BREL effect', or the 'modern appearance illusion'). First it was the Renatus 321s, and now the...

Reinstating Project Rio today would effectively just be a glorified Leicester to Manchester services with the London carrot thrown in to make the proposals sound viable without testing the actual demand for the rest (which I have no doubt would be well served by the way, but not worth the...

I certainly find it hard to believe that anyone for a moment thought it would ever be economically viable or that it was ever the original intention. The demand was there, and nevertheless the service was used. It's not huge demand, but demand nonetheless it was. That doesn't mean to say...