Is anyone able to explain this train on a suburban road?

[Nottingham59]

I wonder what the "Flex..." logo is on the side?

The "Flex" is to help the lorry driver negotiate any sharp bends .....

 

[Philip Phlopp]

in fact do track access charges have a place anymore

Yes - remember the railway hasn't been fully renationalised. The majority of freight operations and some passenger operations remain private enterprises which need to be billed in some way for their use of the railway infrastructure.

The important part of track access charges isn't the financial part, but the wear modelling that's undertaken for each class or item of rolling stock - the same is true for delay attribution, it's not the money-go-round that's important there either, but finding out what is causing delays and fixing them.

If the railway doesn't have that data, it's difficult to do basic operational activities, and whilst there's certainly an argument that some of the monetary aspects can be eliminated in the coming year, the underlying track usage and delay attribution data sets really are vital.

 

[hobbm013]

The latest 769 delivered to Cardiff carries Northern livery as they repaint them at Canton.

They were originally transferred to Cardiff by rail but apparently a gauging issue has been discovered en-route meaning the last 3 or 4 have had to come down via road. I presume the issue is somewhere that prevents a diversion.

Transport for Wales are recieving 769 units - made from 319s. They have received 8.75 of them so far but due to delays one of the end carriages is yet to be delivered and won’t be for a while.

The other 3/4s of the unit have been delivered but couldn’t be moved from the Brickyard sidings to Canton Depot without the driving unit. As a result this 319 car has been supplied to allow the unit to move across to the depot whilst the 769 end unit is completed.

 

[StripeyNick]

Transport for Wales are recieving 769 units - made from 319s. They have received 8.75 of them so far but due to delays one of the end carriages is yet to be delivered and won’t be for a while.

The other 3/4s of the unit have been delivered but couldn’t be moved from the Brickyard sidings to Canton Depot without the driving unit. As a result this 319 car has been supplied to allow the unit to move across to the depot whilst the 769 end unit is completed.

Yes but at least 3 or 4 769/319s came down by rail before something changed en-route to prevent any more doing so

 

[Spartacus]

There not standard loads they need clearance from the police and often have restricted times for movement and routing issues so need plenty of planning and specialist knowledge like a rail movement.

All the other issues are ones the industry needs to deal with but i don't buy like traction knowledge there are plenty of private hauliers that would have moved this by rail ie ROG. Track access charges should be waived for movements like this in fact do track access charges have a place anymore it was driven by EU deregulation and with direct award/concessions being bank rolled by the taxpayer why have an unnecessary money go around.

Finally if your saying road haulage is more efficient then we are lost.

Road haulage IS more efficient than rail for small loads (which as far as rail is concerned one vehicle is), and that’s been the case for around 100 years. Trains do trainloads well, not wagonloads.

Track access charges: get rid of those and operators are more likely to plump for cheap and nasty stock that does a lot of damage to the PW and costs more in maintenance

Regardless of forward planning as these aren’t out of normal road gauging they need very little, it’s perfectly normal to see ones during peak times. They’re still not immune from cock ups, it wasn’t so long ago a 222 had a close encounter with a low bridge!

 

[Pete_uk]

People moan that trains dont take them from door to door so this must be the solution

 

[Twingo37175]

I have seen this on facebook elsewhere (Skipton?). Would something like this go to Broughton Road?

 

[DB]

I have seen this on facebook elsewhere (Skipton?). Would something like this go to Broughton Road?

Not aware of any road deliveries there, but that's not to say there haven't been any.

Wouldn't be 769s though - they don't work this side of the Pennines.

 

[skyhigh]

I have seen this on facebook elsewhere (Skipton?). Would something like this go to Broughton Road?

I can say with 100% certainty a 769 has never been to Broughton Road, by rail, road or any other means.

 

[Twingo37175]

I can say with 100% certainty a 769 has never been to Broughton Road, by rail, road or any other means.

That's fair enough - only posting from where I first saw the same picture, 2 & 2 don't always make 5 - oops mean 4

 

[6Gman]

I despair of the rail industry that it doesn't fix this its absolute madness and negative press for the railway. Why don't RDG take the bull by the horns to get it sorted with industry groups. r

How would you suggest sorting it? It simply is easier to do the move by road.

And, outside enthusiast circles, is there really "negative press"?

 

[b0b]

those 319s can go anywhere

 

[Mikey C]

Thank god Chris Grayling is no longer involved, he'd see the photo and propose a radical new scheme where trains no longer have to run on tracks and can instead go anywhere on the back of trucks!

 

[Nicholas Lewis]

How would you suggest sorting it? It simply is easier to do the move by road.

And, outside enthusiast circles, is there really "negative press"?

As i said in my initial response this is an area where the RDG ("a leadership body established to take responsibility for coordinating and leading on cross-industry initiatives" there motto not mine) if it was any use, which it isn't apart from staff travel, would get the underlying issues sorted.

Wont be top of the wish list of the Williams Review but hopefully the various disparate bodies of RDG and RSSB will get assimilated into the controlling mind organisation so its all pulling in the same direction in future.

 

[Philip Phlopp]

As i said in my initial response this is an area where the RDG ("a leadership body established to take responsibility for coordinating and leading on cross-industry initiatives" there motto not mine) if it was any use, which it isn't apart from staff travel, would get the underlying issues sorted.

Wont be top of the wish list of the Williams Review but hopefully the various disparate bodies of RDG and RSSB will get assimilated into the controlling mind organisation so its all pulling in the same direction in future.

And what do you think the underlying issues are for the movement of a single vehicle with two different couplers ?

What do you understand concerning brake force, coupling constraints and possible requirements (and issues) with translator vehicles ?

 

[Spartacus]

And what do you think the underlying issues are for the movement of a single vehicle with two different couplers ?

What do you understand concerning brake force, coupling constraints and possible requirements (and issues) with translator vehicles ?

He doesn’t understand therefore assumes the current situation is wrong or easily overcome. What’s not going to change is road being at least 5x more fuel efficient than rail for a single vehicle move, which is always going to throw the economic balance.

 

[Philip Phlopp]

He doesn’t understand therefore assumes the current situation is wrong or easily overcome. What’s not going to change is road being at least 5x more fuel efficient than rail for a single vehicle move, which is always going to throw the economic balance.

I must say, the increasing hostility to knowledgable industry personnel on this forum and the intransigent belief amongst the arm chair 'enthusiasts' that they know best is making this site much less fun than it used to be.

 

[Bletchleyite]

He doesn’t understand therefore assumes the current situation is wrong or easily overcome. What’s not going to change is road being at least 5x more fuel efficient than rail for a single vehicle move, which is always going to throw the economic balance.

Why's that? Is it because a locomotive and translator vehicle put together are much heavier than the lorry?

I must say, the increasing hostility to knowledgable industry personnel on this forum and the intransigent belief amongst the arm chair 'enthusiasts' that they know best is making this site much less fun than it used to be.

I think this is two-sided - it always helps when the experts explain to us non-experts why we have misunderstood.

 

[43096]

I must say, the increasing hostility to knowledgable industry personnel on this forum and the intransigent belief amongst the arm chair 'enthusiasts' that they know best is making this site much less fun than it used to be.

On the flip side there’s plenty from within the industry who come across as know-it-alls when actually they don’t.

The point is the same, though; it’s the arm chair experts.

 

[CBlue]

As i said in my initial response this is an area where the RDG ("a leadership body established to take responsibility for coordinating and leading on cross-industry initiatives" there motto not mine) if it was any use, which it isn't apart from staff travel, would get the underlying issues sorted.

Wont be top of the wish list of the Williams Review but hopefully the various disparate bodies of RDG and RSSB will get assimilated into the controlling mind organisation so its all pulling in the same direction in future.

Unfortunately your original argument is very much akin to the view that a train service *must* exist from, say, Grimsby to Cirencester, simply because once a year Granny Smith and Grandpa Joe make the journey to go on holiday.


Railways are designed for and indeed work best with consistent mass movements - I thought enthusiasts and so on would be "in the know" enough to realise that's how it works. Evidently armchair fantasy takes precidence.

 

[6Gman]

Why's that? Is it because a locomotive and translator vehicle put together are much heavier than the lorry?



I think this is two-sided - it always helps when the experts explain to us non-experts why we have misunderstood.

Without knowing exactly what was happening in this case it's difficult to be specific, but the following may explain it in more general terms.

There's a single vehicle in (say) Liverpool which you want to move to (say) Cardiff.

To move it by rail you need a loco, a translator vehicle, and perhaps a further vehicle (or more) for brake force.

The loco is in (say) Crewe, the translator vehicle in (say) Manchester. (Let's assume the further vehicles are readily available)

You now need to arrange pathing and traincrew for Crewe - Manchester - Liverpool - Cardiff. There are bits of that where pathing will be challenging, especially if you're restricted on speed. And I have a horrible feeling you'd end up with some very unproductive traincrew diagrams.

And do it all again afterwards to get the translator and loco home.

Or you can hire a lorry to do the job.

[I'm a bit rusty by now but I used to plan exactly this sort of move.]

 

[Bletchleyite]

Without knowing exactly what was happening in this case it's difficult to be specific, but the following may explain it in more general terms.

Thanks, that does make sense.

 

[Spartacus]

Why's that? Is it because a locomotive and translator vehicle put together are much heavier than the lorry?



I think this is two-sided - it always helps when the experts explain to us non-experts why we have misunderstood.

Take the engines. The lorry might have a modern 16.2 litre V8 producing up to 800hp. A 47s got an engine dating to the 50s, 264 litres producing 2580hp.

 

[Philip Phlopp]

Without knowing exactly what was happening in this case it's difficult to be specific, but the following may explain it in more general terms.

There's a single vehicle in (say) Liverpool which you want to move to (say) Cardiff.

To move it by rail you need a loco, a translator vehicle, and perhaps a further vehicle (or more) for brake force.

The loco is in (say) Crewe, the translator vehicle in (say) Manchester. (Let's assume the further vehicles are readily available)

You now need to arrange pathing and traincrew for Crewe - Manchester - Liverpool - Cardiff. There are bits of that where pathing will be challenging, especially if you're restricted on speed. And I have a horrible feeling you'd end up with some very unproductive traincrew diagrams.

And do it all again afterwards to get the translator and loco home.

Or you can hire a lorry to do the job.

[I'm a bit rusty by now but I used to plan exactly this sort of move.]

And that's supposing you can avoid having reversals or having to run round the stock, route conductors and so on, so could need more than one locomotive and quite a lot of traincrew to handle the traction knowledge, route knowledge and any shunting movements enroute. Which is, I hear, a bit difficult in the times of COVID-19, with the days of these sorts of moves being undertaken, Jolly Boys style, with a half dozen staff in the lead loco now rather banned.

I don't know what the craic is these days on movements of single vehicles with different couplers at either end either, particularly the often thorny problem of the internal bar coupler on an EMU vehicle. What's available in terms of coupling adapters and translator vehicles to stick on the inside end of a Class 319/769 DTSO vehicle ?

 

[MotCO]

Whilst I can see the reasons for moving trains by road, I think that from my non-rail perspective, it looks incredibly difficult to load a train from a rail system onto the back of a lorry and back on to rails, and also the fact that a train is also around 23 metres long plus lorry tractor unit so it makes for a long and difficult-to-manoeuvre vehicle. This difficulty must ( ) make it easier to transfer by rail rather than road.

 

[52290]

If there were cars parked on the other side of the road I hope they had their wing mirrors tucked in.

 

[Mikey C]

Whilst I can see the reasons for moving trains by road, I think that from my non-rail perspective, it looks incredibly difficult to load a train from a rail system onto the back of a lorry and back on to rails, and also the fact that a train is also around 23 metres long plus lorry tractor unit so it makes for a long and difficult-to-manoeuvre vehicle. This difficulty must ( ) make it easier to transfer by rail rather than road.

And while the enthusiast in me would love to see a train going past my front door, it's hardly ideal to have such a massive load crawling through narrow residential streets

 

[coppercapped]

Whilst I can see the reasons for moving trains by road, I think that from my non-rail perspective, it looks incredibly difficult to load a train from a rail system onto the back of a lorry and back on to rails, and also the fact that a train is also around 23 metres long plus lorry tractor unit so it makes for a long and difficult-to-manoeuvre vehicle. This difficulty must ( ) make it easier to transfer by rail rather than road.

It is really very easy to move railway vehicles onto and off low loaders - I've seen it done on a heritage railway. The road trailer lines up with a length of railway track and some sloping beams are laid from the rear of the trailer to the rails. The rail vehicle is hauled up the ramp with a wire rope running to a winch at the front of the trailer and then scotched into position. The ramps are removed. The whole process took something more than a hour.

From the GOV.UK website concerning vehicle lengths:

No maximum length for such trailers is specified in Regulation 7. However, Regulation 82 of the Construction and Use Regulations (restrictions on the use of vehicles carrying wide or long loads or having fixed appliances or apparatus) states that the maximum overall length of a trailer carrying a load of exceptional length, together with any forward or rearward projections, shall not exceed 27.4m.

The rail vehicle in question - it's not a 'train' as it is not one of two or more coupled vehicles [1] - is 20 metres long and so falls within the limit of the Government document quoted above. How do you think other long items, such as bridge beams, are moved?

There are a number of road haulage companies which deal with such loads - it's their daily bread and butter. It really isn't difficult.

[1] Cue for railUKforums members to debate - again - the case of single coach trains...

 

[eMeS]

And while the enthusiast in me would love to see a train going past my front door, it's hardly ideal to have such a massive load crawling through narrow residential streets

But it's what makes several TV programmes. Once you've seen two, you've seen all of them.

 

[DelW]

As eMeS alludes to, there is (or was until recently) a TV series following the crews from one of the companies that does this kind of work. While I wouldn't call it easy, it was evident that is was quite routine and straightforward to these crews.

If everything was ready for them and the haul not too long, they could arrive at the collection point, load the vehicle, deliver it, unload and be heading back to base within a day. That's just a two man crew, a tractor unit and trailer, and some head office staff time.

With the need for the resources mentioned in posts above, it would be very hard for an on-rail move to compete using one or more 3000hp locos and other vehicles, moving around a congested network* and keeping out of the way of passenger services. Why not use the easier and cheaper method?

(*in normal times)