Parry People Mover in trouble?

[Shimbleshanks]

According to the Express & Star newspaper, the firm that makes the Parry People Mover is on the brink of being wound up. It blames the West Coast franchising fiasco, indirectly.

http://www.expressandstar.com/news/2013/03/30/west-coast-fiasco-hits-parry-rail-firm/

West Coast fiasco hits Parry rail firm

The fiasco over the West Coast rail franchise has left a small transport company with a £70,000 VAT debt and on on the brink of being wound up by the High Court.

The company behind the Parry People Movers rail cars – which are used on the shuttle service between Stourbridge Junction and Stourbridge Town stations – has appeared in the High Court to contest the HM Revenue & Customs order.

Chairman John Parry blamed their financial difficulties on the botched West Coast Main Line franchise, which he claimed had caused a “knock-on effect”. The Department for Transport put all franchise deals on hold after being forced to tear up plans to strip Virgin Trains of the West Coast line. Errors were found to have been made by civil servants, and the Government faces a £100 million compensation bill. Even though the deals on which Mr Parry and colleagues were working had nothing to do with the Virgin franchise, they were still held up while the Department for Transport reassessed all franchise bidding processes.

Mr Parry said the firm was chasing a contract in southern England which would generate vital cashflow but the deal had failed to materialise due to the West Coast problems. Cradley Heath-based JPM Parry and Associates secured a 56-day reprieve from the court to allow them time to attempt to raise cash through its shareholders to pay the bill before the May deadline.

Mr Parry said today that the future of services on the Stourbridge shuttle, run by train operator London Midland, would be unaffected by the uncertainty bought by the legal action.

Mr Parry said: “This has adversely affected Parry’s, and we have hit lean times. Orders worth millions of pounds are in prospect, once the new 120-passenger vehicle is ready for the market. The collapse of the rail franchising has resulted in the market not being ready to accept such vehicles until the franchise mess is sorted out.

“We would have been in serious trouble were it not for the assistance of a number of Parry People Movers shareholders who were alerted to the situation and have provided lifeline funds.”

Parry People Movers has managed the Stourbridge branch Line since 2009. Ten people work for the design and engineering innovation firm which created the Parry People Mover rail car.

 

[starrymarkb]

IMO their elastic band powered contraptions were a solution looking for a problem

 

[tbtc]

Chairman John Parry blamed their financial difficulties on the botched West Coast Main Line franchise, which he claimed had caused a “knock-on effect”. The Department for Transport put all franchise deals on hold after being forced to tear up plans to strip Virgin Trains of the West Coast line

Poor journalism - Virgin weren't going to be "stripped" of anything - they had a contract to provide something, that contract lasted until December 2012, the new contract would always be tendered - it wasn't "Virgin's".

Mr Parry said: “This has adversely affected Parry’s, and we have hit lean times. Orders worth millions of pounds are in prospect, once the new 120-passenger vehicle is ready for the market

120 passengers sounds like a lot of capacity for the type of routes that PPMs are generally suggested for - 120 seats is almost what you'd get from a two coach DMU (given wheelchair spaces, disabled toilet etc), which makes me wonder whether there's really much need for a small fleet of non-standard units like these (does that make sense?).

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

Sounds like this was part of one of the bids for Greater Western, now canned.
I wonder what lines they planned to convert to PPM operation?
The Greenford branch? (all the other London-end branches will be electric).
Tamar Valley? St Ives?
It's a clever solution for Stourbridge Town (1 mile of segregated track, limited to 20mph), but I'm not sure it would work on a "bigger" line.
But a 120-passenger version would take it up into the small DMU bracket.

 

[pemma]

I think they believed they would have built vehicles for a Helsby-Ellesmere Port service as they gave a presentation to the local RUG on how they could operate a regular service on that line for a low cost.

 

[jopsuk]

They did have designs for larger vehicles- I think with the option of more conventional power trains too.

 

[Rhydgaled]

120 passengers sounds like a lot of capacity for the type of routes that PPMs are generally suggested for - 120 seats is almost what you'd get from a two coach DMU (given wheelchair spaces, disabled toilet etc), which makes me wonder whether there's really much need for a small fleet of non-standard units like these (does that make sense?).

How would they compare to a DMU though? Running costs? Acceleration? Speed? Greenhouse Gas Emmisions?

If the new A477 goes ahead, I wonder if Parry Pepole Movers (maybe not 120 seat ones though, how big are the London Midland ones?) would be a good option to take over the Pembroke Dock - Tenby stretch of railway.

 

[W-on-Sea]

The cynical (hmm, perhaps realistic) side of me says "120 passenger vehicle" might well mean...as few as 30 seats, potentially, and 90 standees. Probably not quite that low a proportion of seats to total passengers, but it would be reasonable to expect under half of that number of passengers to be seated (40, 50 max), perhaps even well under half.

And,unless they were a very major step forward from the 139s, frankly they would be unbearable to travel on for any journey longer than Stourbridge Junction to Stourbridge Town...

 

[tbtc]

How would they compare to a DMU though? Running costs? Acceleration? Speed? Greenhouse Gas Emmisions?

I've not used the 139s and don't know a great deal about the physical attributes that they have, but I think that if there's a gap in the market for a "bottom of the market" DMU to take over marginal services then having over a hundred seats on it doesn't really provide a big enough gap to differentiate it from a proper DMU.

Whilst it may be marginally cheaper for something like 139s on the Pembroke Dock line (or jcollins suggestion of Helsby-Ellesmere Port), there are then the problems of having a tiny number of these units at a depot.

 

[WatcherZero]

Theyve designed a lot of variants in the product range, only the PPM30 (retro heritage tram), PPM50 (Class 139 prototype) and PPM60 (Class 139 production model) have been built.

PPM30: 15 seats 15 standing
PPM50: 20 seats 30 standing
PPM60: 23 seats 37 standing
PPM80: 41 seats 39 standing
PPM100: 40 seats 60 standing
PPM120: 80 seats 40 standing
PPM175: 80/90 seats 90/80 standing

 

[W-on-Sea]

Hmm, 80 seats, 40 standing. I stand (or sit) corrected then. Clearly on a substantively different scale, at least, than the 139s.

 

[rebmcr]

I seem to recall that the newer, bigger designs are two-carriage units.

 

[tom1649]

Whilst it may be marginally cheaper for something like 139s on the Pembroke Dock line (or jcollins suggestion of Helsby-Ellesmere Port), there are then the problems of having a tiny number of these units at a depot.

Their inability to work in multiple could cause problems if there was a sudden surge in demand on a particular line.

 

[pemma]

Whilst it may be marginally cheaper for something like 139s on the Pembroke Dock line (or jcollins suggestion of Helsby-Ellesmere Port), there are then the problems of having a tiny number of these units at a depot.

The logical place for a couple of designated Helsby-Ellesmere Port vehicles would seem to be the Chester depot which also usually has a backup 153 sitting around but that would put it under the ATW franchise, which had years left on it anyway so has the delay to the new Northern franchise really affected any possible PPM vehicles for Helsby-Ellesmere Port?
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

Their inability to work in multiple could cause problems if there was a sudden surge in demand on a particular line.

Well if there was an unexpected increase in demand there wouldn't be spare units available even if it was operated by brand new DMUs that could be doubled up. We have plenty of routes already with conventional DMUs and EMUs that have seen a steady increase in demand but have seen capacity remain pretty constant.

I imagine the manufacturer's argument would be if they are used on branches where PPMs are usually the only vehicle operating on it then a frequency enhancement would be more beneficial than a capacity enhancement on existing services.

 

[tom1649]

Maybe they'd be better off saving the money and putting it towards electrification to Helsby. At least you'd be working towards providing the line with some sort of useful service.

Alternatively, perhaps the low running costs of PPMs would finally allow an all day shuttle service to run.

Start introducing larger PPMs to longer routes and you'd end up with a glorified Pacer!

 

[tbtc]

The logical place for a couple of designated Helsby-Ellesmere Port vehicles would seem to be the Chester depot which also usually has a backup 153 sitting around but that would put it under the ATW franchise, which had years left on it anyway so has the delay to the new Northern franchise really affected any possible PPM vehicles for Helsby-Ellesmere Port?

If there are going to be two units specifically built for a Helsby-Ellesmere Port shuttle, then yes I'd agree - though that's going to be huge overprovision for a ten minute journey that sees little traffic at the moment - if we have spare resources then there are a lot of other better places for them.

 

[pemma]

If there are going to be two units specifically built for a Helsby-Ellesmere Port shuttle, then yes I'd agree - though that's going to be huge overprovision for a ten minute journey that sees little traffic at the moment - if we have spare resources then there are a lot of other better places for them.

There's two for Stourbridge and I think if there's one then it mean a 153 or similar will have to regularly fill in and longer term the small 1980s trains are likely to be replaced by larger trains.

 

[90sWereBetter]

On the subject of PPMs, whatever happened to this one?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Bristol_Electric_Railbus.jpg

http://www.flickr.com/photos/brizzlebornandbred/6132779354/

 

[Temple Meads]

On the subject of PPMs, whatever happened to this one?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Bristol_Electric_Railbus.jpg

http://www.flickr.com/photos/brizzlebornandbred/6132779354/

Probably either scrapped, or parts donated to the other PPM's.

 

[Royston Vasey]

I think the link to the West Coast tendering and subsequent logjam is disingenuous. It hasn't pushed back the other franchises significantly. If the business is failing I think they have to look further than some prospective orders they may or may not have got for franchises that may not have had their timelines changed anyway.

At the end of the day they've sold two units on one of the most singular niches on the network, FIVE years ago. If they've sold nothing since, they can't blame only the government.

 

[DDB]

Would some sort of PPM have been under consideration for a Bere Alston to Gunnislake shuttle once the line is extended to Tavistock?

I thought I read somewhere that a class 153 was proposed but I've also read they will be reformed into two coach trains and upgraded to comply with the persons of restricted mobility rules.

DDB