Class 769 for London Gateway freight trial

[Bringback309s]

https://www.railmagazine.com/news/n...ateway-liverpool-street-freight-trial-planned

I can't find anything on here about this, I thought London Gateway is containers only. What would a 769 bring in to Liverpool Street? Does anyone know any more about this?

 

[Clip]

No idea as havent got the magazine but i would imagine parcels or something? Theres not much room at liverpool street for any else

 

[rebmcr]

I thought London Gateway is containers only.

Ship-side it is, but land-side there are on-site processing facilities and warehouses.

 

[bastien]

I got something delivered from Germany a few months ago and according to the UPS tracking it came via 'Stanford le Hope'. So, parcels basically.

 

[Fincra5]

It would seem to be a much better way of getting Parcels into the centre of London vs a Truck. Then onto Delivery Bikes (for example). A Greener way of transporting Parcels into London.

 

[306024]

Assuming the times and platforms quoted are accurate, (would have thought platforms 10 and 11 would be better at Liverpool St) I wonder if anyone has told NR engineering access planners they will have a train wandering through what is currently a no trains period at Liverpool St at 2 o’clock in the morning. That aside, co-incidentally 02.42 used to be the time of the Liverpool St to Norwich newspaper train.

 

[anthony263]

Supposed to be 319365 and 319366 as the donors

 

[swt_passenger]

It would seem to be a much better way of getting Parcels into the centre of London vs a Truck. Then onto Delivery Bikes (for example). A Greener way of transporting Parcels into London.

Also, a “drop in the ocean” compared to the number of parcels being delivered in London. I’ll bet it never gets beyond a short trial, like every other recent attempt...

 

[Fincra5]

Also, a “drop in the ocean” compared to the number of parcels being delivered in London. I’ll bet it never gets beyond a short trial, like every other recent attempt...

I do love a bit of pessimism on a Sunday afternoon. Lets just see what happens. Its better to try something like this than add more road traffic into London.

 

[TheEdge]

Also, a “drop in the ocean” compared to the number of parcels being delivered in London. I’ll bet it never gets beyond a short trial, like every other recent attempt...

Frankly with the huge amount of delivery traffic that's now been generated by the likes of Amazon and online shopping in general any attempt to get some of that off roads and onto rail is worthy of investigation.

One wonders how many large urban stations still have their parcels bay intact and could be reactivated to that use fairly easily.

 

[Snow1964]

Bit of a shame the mail/parcels version of 319 (the 325s) cannot do this sort of work

Also a shame the old freight curves under Snow Hill to Barbican /Moorgate cannot be reopened as a parcel transshipment point to cargo bikes. The City of London really needs less vans blocking its streets all day, and reopening some of the former sidings to be served by electric freight shuttles must be worth considering.

 

[Roast Veg]

If the 325 is as similar to a 319 as is often touted, could a 769-style conversion be done on them?

 

[Shimbleshanks]

I got something delivered from Germany a few months ago and according to the UPS tracking it came via 'Stanford le Hope'. So, parcels basically.

There is indeed a big UPS hub at London Gateway, near Stanford le Hope. I suspect that might be the main user though I believe there are some other internet fulfillment-type operations in the port's logistics park.

 

[Bertie the bus]

April or May? I'm pretty certain ROG were the last operator to order 769s so have one of the TOCs agreed to delay their units so ROG's can be converted first or are Wabtec going to go from 5 conversions per year to 5 per month?

 

[Bald Rick]

UPS are also a big user of electric vehicles in London, and have been for a while. I suspect this may be driven by them, to demonstrate the concept and what needs to be overcome to make it work (financially and physically).

There will need to be some form of facility at Liverpool Street for the cages to be stored, as there’s no way that they can all be distributed onwards, or arrive, at the time of the train.

 

[pdeaves]

If the 325 is as similar to a 319 as is often touted, could a 769-style conversion be done on them?

I expect it could. However, they are Royal Mail assets, I believe, and would need their agreement to spend money (and, for this application, an agreement for a competitor to use them).

 

[Fincra5]

UPS are also a big user of electric vehicles in London, and have been for a while. I suspect this may be driven by them, to demonstrate the concept and what needs to be overcome to make it work (financially and physically).

There will need to be some form of facility at Liverpool Street for the cages to be stored, as there’s no way that they can all be distributed onwards, or arrive, at the time of the train.

It would be a good bit of PR for UPS of they can combine a fairly eco friendly method of getting parcels into London onto their Electric Vehicles rather than big old trucks and lorries.

 

[thenorthern]

One thing to remember is that because not everywhere is electrified the Class 325s are rather limited in where they can go in that many major cities such as Bristol, Southampton, Nottingham, Sheffield, Plymouth, Cardiff and others are completely off limits to the trains.

Having bi-mode trains will greatly increase the area where the trains can go.

 

[Bertie the bus]

Why would a 325 go to Nottingham or Plymouth? They were built as EMUs for a reason. That reason was to carry mail on electrified lines. They did that when they were built and they do it now. Fitting a diesel engine to a Pendolino would allow it to go to Whitby but no one is going to do that.

 

[markymark2000]

How will this work in Liverpool Street? Is it big and open like Euston where trucks can drive in off the main road into the station so the cargo can move between train and road? Cargo bikes similarly need to be able to get into the station not via ticket gates.

 

[TheEdge]

How will this work in Liverpool Street? Is it big and open like Euston where trucks can drive in off the main road into the station so the cargo can move between train and road? Cargo bikes similarly need to be able to get into the station not via ticket gates.

There is an internal taxi rank between 10 and 11, assume that's where any loading will be done

 

[pdeaves]

(class 325s)

They were built as EMUs for a reason. That reason was to carry mail on electrified lines.

Agreed, but remember that they are also designed to be loco-hauled so they do have a bit more flexibility than being 'just' EMUs. Granted, whether anyone wants to faff attaching/detaching locos is a different issue.

 

[vinnym70]

Does anyone else here see the potential for a private company to re-open the Post Office railway in London? I'm guessing the load/unload facilities for it are accessible from the area between platforms 10 and 11 at Liverpool Street.
Ambitious and probably very unlikely, I agree but it feels like something that really could contribute to a cross-London distribution plan, feeding into localised fleets of EVs to do the final miles of the deliveries.

 

[Shimbleshanks]

Does anyone else here see the potential for a private company to re-open the Post Office railway in London? I'm guessing the load/unload facilities for it are accessible from the area between platforms 10 and 11 at Liverpool Street.
Ambitious and probably very unlikely, I agree but it feels like something that really could contribute to a cross-London distribution plan, feeding into localised fleets of EVs to do the final miles of the deliveries.

They'd have to do something about the Postal Museum operation at Mount Pleasant for a start. (It offers a short ride over a portion of the route. I can recommend it.)

I think someone did look at repurposing the system, but the problem is getting stuff up and down to the system. You could ask the Post Office nicely if you could use the old mail lifts, I suppose, but there would be a lot of transhipment and handling just to put goods onto the system for a few miles. I suspect that if anyone in the Post Office had done a proper cost-benefit analysis it would probably never have been built.

 

[swt_passenger]

They'd have to do something about the Postal Museum operation at Mount Pleasant for a start. (It offers a short ride over a portion of the route. I can recommend it.)

I think someone did look at repurposing the system, but the problem is getting stuff up and down to the system. You could ask the Post Office nicely if you could use the old mail lifts, I suppose, but there would be a lot of transhipment and handling just to put goods onto the system for a few miles. I suspect that if anyone in the Post Office had done a proper cost-benefit analysis it would probably never have been built.

I expect it was designed for vast quantities of letters and very few parcels, at a time when people sent letters around London expecting them to be delivered in the next post, whereas nowadays it’s mostly parcels that Royal Mail’s competitors are handling.

Funny that there’s a discussion going on in the nostalgia section about why Red Star parcels eventually gave up...

 

[Islineclear3_1]

I’ll bet it never gets beyond a short trial, like every other recent attempt...

Will be interesting ...

Wouldn't it just be easier to take the seats out of 319.365/66 and equip them for parcels use rather than the expense of converting them to Class 769s?

 

[hwl]

Will be interesting ...

Wouldn't it just be easier to take the seats out of 319.365/66 and equip them for parcels use rather than the expense of converting them to Class 769s?

How would 319s do the last km into the port?

Hence 769

 

[Shimbleshanks]

I expect it was designed for vast quantities of letters and very few parcels, at a time when people sent letters around London expecting them to be delivered in the next post, whereas nowadays it’s mostly parcels that Royal Mail’s competitors are handling.

The end of mail being carried on passenger trains didn't help its fortunes either as it was essentially designed to link the London post offices with the main line rail terminii.
CL

 

[PeterC]

How will this work in Liverpool Street? Is it big and open like Euston where trucks can drive in off the main road into the station so the cargo can move between train and road? Cargo bikes similarly need to be able to get into the station not via ticket gates.

The redevelopment of former mail and parcel handling facilities is a major physical obstical in bringing parcel traffic back to the railway in any volumes. I haven't looked at the station layout by the taxi road for a couple of decades and don't know how easy it would be to transfer parcels there. The degree of double handling required at the Stanford-le-Hope end would be a significant factor as well.

 

[Meerkat]

Cynically I agree that it is likely to be UPS offering up a bit of greenwash for adverts and corporate publications though looking at the spread of times would it be for the ultra-quick deliveries where you get the stuff within hours?
I understood that rail wasn’t as competitive as superficially thought as most deliveries are overnight/early morning when traffic isn’t an issue.