Excuse me if this has already been discussed. I note from artist impressions, and photos of units in service on the Continent, that each car of the new Flirt EMUs and DEMUs will only have one door. Is this correct? If so, I must ensure that I do not travel in the section next to the driver in case a fire breaks out near the door and I cannot get out.
Do you think someone might not have thought of the - remote - possibility of a fire and provided for emergency passenger access to the cab area in order to use the driver's doors to get out?
You know, like there is to get into the guard's/bike compartment on a TGS on an HST, or the bike storage area and cab doors in the driving coach on a Class 180, which also only has passenger doors at one end.
On the Anglia bi-mode sets the biggest fire risk will, amazingly enough, be the diesel power pack, which is in the centre of the trains.
Nor are Flirts exactly noted for going up in flames. I have found references to a minor fire in Estonia three years ago, caused by a battery fault, which was put out by firefighters, with the train surviving pretty much unscathed.
Norwegian ones have two doors per car. Pretty awful to travel on mind.
The Norwegian sets' trailer cars have two pairs of doors, the driving cars just have one pair.
I'm not sure that there is a external driver's door:
The current edition of Modern Railways has both artist's impressions of the design of the sets for East Anglia, showing driving cab doors, but also side profiles and seating plans for both the 12-car Norwich intercity sets and a four-car regional bi-mode, which also clearly show driver's cab doors on both versions of the trains.
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Indeed, if the only passenger door is at the trailing end of the end vehicles, there will need to be an exit at the driving end. It will be interesting to see how thia is achieved; it would make sense for this to be available as a cab access door to the Driver, but I'm not sure how Aslef would feel about an emergency escape facility letting punters straight into the cab. A Class 180 for example has an area between the saloon and the cab, and then another locked door into the cab itself. Presumabltly such an arrangement would be deemed a poor use of much prized saloon space on these units, though. It might make more sense simply to add a second door for normal use.
There were some recent Rulebook changes relaxing the regs about doors being isolated, but it was more about how egress facilities operate than removing the need for a means of escape, so I assume the requirement for the extra door will still exist.
The plans in Modern Railways show approximately a full window-length of bodyshell between the passenger area and the cab doors, presumably for equipment/crumple zone space (rather like Siemens Desiro UK designs), so I don't think the issue of prized saloon space arises here. It looks as though the cab can't have a separate internal door though, as the driver looks to be sat between the cab doors.
Whatever the case, I'm sure someone will have worked it out, got the safety people to sign off on the design and have suitable cab door locking/security arrangements worked out.
Drivers might also like to have a way out of the cab into the body of the train if a collision is unavoidable.
