Worst Decision by a TOC?

[313103]

NEG having not spent a penny on their Silverlink Metro Franchise and letting the services fall apart without care, a time when Customer Service was the least of their priorities.
Amazing what can be done when a different Management and different attitudes change. Since LO have taken over No strikes have taken place, industrial relations whilst sometimes dificult tend to get resolved, New Trains, New services etc, Most importantly passengers having a high satisfation rate.

Yet look at Silverlink it was beset with Industrial relation problems, strange how when the Managers have despersed to other companies their Industrial relations fell apart, East Midland Trains and NEG East Anglia are two that i can think off.

 

[tbtc]

East Anglia has lost DMUs since Anglia days, when there were 10 150s and 7 153s, now we have 9 156s and 5 153s, which is a shame

...and the dozen 170s?

Anglia had them also, but used them to London and Norwich-Cambridge only.

And their Crossrail service along the NLL and to rent out to Hull Trains.

Yup - the DMUs now spend much more time running diesel routes in East Anglia (rather than to London, Basingstoke etc), meaning a generally improved service on the branch lines (with longer EMUs on the main line services).

I'd put that down as a *good* decision by TOCs.

 

[ert47]

To be fair though, the 373/3s were limited to 110 on the EC, and were probably a bit longer than was really necessary, or convenient, and SNCf could probably make better use of them..

Also there was the issue with the 373's pantographs causing damage to the OHLE

 

[387star]

Upon scrutiny of my Platform 5 pocket book, I've only just realised that ATW have got two different types of interior on their 150s I believe that I've only travelled on ATW refurbished units, and not the other sort. The ones I've travelled on have all been exceedingly pleasant. Especially compared to examples operated by Northern, and formerly London Midland. But as I say, I can't judge the quality of ATWs' "other type" of 150.

Yeah this has confused me. Am I correct both ex Anglia and ScotRail units were heavily refurbished? The Anglia units already had chapman seating so I presume this was a more minor job (?) but the Scotrail units had all the seats ripped out and new ones put in?

The wessex ones have only had new seat covers.

Have ATW done much to the units refurbished by Valley Lines. Am I right they still have the green and red upholstery on the seats?

 

[Failed Unit]

Yeah this has confused me. Am I correct both ex Anglia and ScotRail units were heavily refurbished? The Anglia units already had chapman seating so I presume this was a more minor job (?) but the Scotrail units had all the seats ripped out and new ones put in?

The wessex ones have only had new seat covers.

Have ATW done much to the units refurbished by Valley Lines. Am I right they still have the green and red upholstery on the seats?

The Scotrail units arrived with the ex-BR seats (re-covered)

 

[Schnellzug]

Weren't the Wessex and Wales & Borders units done more or less the same, only with different colour schemes? They both had 2+2 seating installed, the Wessex ones in purple and the W&B in green.

 

[Tomonthetrain]

Not letting national express have the london midland franchise was a bad decision by DafT!

 

[fgwrich]

Weren't the Wessex and Wales & Borders units done more or less the same, only with different colour schemes? They both had 2+2 seating installed, the Wessex ones in purple and the W&B in green.

Yes, although Wessex's 150s felt as if they were done more on the cheap - and only had grey with pink flecks with Pink grab handles as opposed to the dark green and maroon with green and red flecks and green grab handles as used by Valley Lines...

Valley lines interior (albiet in a 143 but the seats are the same)
http://shed83a.smugmug.com/Railway-...87622_s974nw#!i=1721392538&k=XrpVs8r&lb=1&s=A

One way to tell an ex Scotrail 150 is that they were refurbished by ATW, and for once done not that bad with new Chapman seating and repainted interior panels.

ATW Refurbished ex Scotrail Class 150
http://shed83a.smugmug.com/Railway-...44388_zjXjRb#!i=1394341741&k=9WbQ7M4&lb=1&s=A

 

[hooky3]

Virgin Trains for getting rid of HST's and loco-hauls and replacing them with Voyagers

 

[WillPS]

I will remember CT - as the way not to operate a railway!

Over in the East things were much better under CT. In the West you're lucky to have pretty much the only outside London operator in England & Wales to see investment.

 

[Failed Unit]

Over in the East things were much better under CT. In the West you're lucky to have pretty much the only outside London operator in England & Wales to see investment.

I can assure you they were not, I lived in Lincolnshire at the times and CT ruined rail travel in the area. EMT were a vast improvement! The best recent thing to happen to rail travel in Lincolnshire was the death of CT!

 

[WillPS]

Well, I very much miss having 3/4-car Turbostars on Liverpool - Norwich. There used to be some great value advances as well which have all but disappeared under EMT and XC.

 

[Failed Unit]

Well, I very much miss having 3/4-car Turbostars on Liverpool - Norwich. There used to be some great value advances as well which have all but disappeared under EMT and XC.

I prefer 4 coach 158s myself. But I put the blame of that on DfT. why have APs when you can fill you trains without them.

For the record I liked the franchise just not national express running it. Lincoln - Birmingham was a useful route! I am sure many other miss routes lost in the breakup of CT both east and west.

 

[sprinterguy]

Virgin Trains for getting rid of HST's and loco-hauls and replacing them with Voyagers

I miss the HSTs and loco hauled formations, but at the same time I also enjoy nowadays reliably getting to where I want to be on time, and having more frequent options to do so. My issue is with the trains that replaced the HSTs and 47s; the Voyagers.

Put it this way, in basically the same train length as a five carriage class 221, you can fit a five carriage mark 2 rake...AND A LOCO. That would be exactly the same number of seats for the loco hauled rakes as for the 221s as delivered: 26 first class, and 220 standard class. EXCEPT that in the loco hauled formation, in that same amount of space you also get a heck of a lot more tables, perfect seat to window alignment, a proper buffet and absolutely loads of luggage space. Oh, yeah, and a thwacking great lump of locomotive at one end of the train that makes the passenger environment nice and quiet (no underfloor engines) and gives the enthusiasts something to get excited about.

So yeah, I would have to advocate the introduction of the Voyagers, tied with Operation Princess, as the worst decision made by a TOC. Though largely because the design of the Voyagers is CRAP.
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Not letting national express have the london midland franchise was a bad decision by DafT!

Why on earth would you want that? I get the impression that the Nat-Ex operated Silverlink that preceded LM were not well liked by passengers, and the exterior image left something to be desired.
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I prefer 4 coach 158s myself. But I put the blame of that on DfT. why have APs when you can fill you trains without them.

For the record I liked the franchise just not national express running it. Lincoln - Birmingham was a useful route! I am sure many other miss routes lost in the breakup of CT both east and west.

Agreed, more seats on a four carriage 158 than a four carriage 170 formation, and the 158s are better suited to a long distance regional route in my opinion.

And I also agree that the Birmingham to Lincoln route would be a very useful one to still have. It's a real shame that it was split.

 

[Aictos]

Regarding the Voyagers, if they were introduced as 9 car Class 222s, it would have been better even more so if a 10th carriage could be inserted into the formation at a later date.

 

[TEW]

Yeah this has confused me. Am I correct both ex Anglia and ScotRail units were heavily refurbished? The Anglia units already had chapman seating so I presume this was a more minor job (?) but the Scotrail units had all the seats ripped out and new ones put in?

The wessex ones have only had new seat covers.

Have ATW done much to the units refurbished by Valley Lines. Am I right they still have the green and red upholstery on the seats?

The Anglia and ScotRail ones were both refurbished. All ATW 150s have 2+2 Chapman seating, but some are still in the Valley Lines green and red interior scheme. Some of the Anglia ones originally went to FGW on sub-hire when the moved from CT, but as they went for refurbishment they were replaced at FGW by units with Valley Lines interiors. FGW of course don't hire in any ATW 150s any more.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

Hadn't FGW just received some 158s from TPE at the time?

And didn't they have 4 ex-CT units which were subleased from Northern?

It was part of the unit merry-go-round at the time, FGW received a lot ex TPE 158s, but it then lost a lot of the ex-Wessex and CT 158s to Northern and EMT. This gave FGW the advantage of a common fleet of 158s with Cummins engines whereas previously it had a mix of all types of 158 engine.

 

[ainsworth74]

Regarding the Voyagers, if they were introduced as 9 car Class 222s

Of course though seeing as 222s are something of an evolution of 220/221 it would be tough to go straight to 222s

 

[YorkshireBear]

Of course though seeing as 222s are something of an evolution of 220/221 it would be tough to go straight to 222s

Unfortunately so, however i am just thinking how happy i would be if a 9 car Meridian showed up on my trip to Newcastle at the beignning of June... i think it would be a better moment than a HST to be honest.

Imagine how reduced the bashing of XC would be if every voyager was a 9 car Meridian. And i mean every single one, thus any that are doubled up free a unit to re-introduce some lost services.

 

[387star]

True also the longer the unit the more chance of unpowered coaches?

 

[dosxuk]

Well, I very much miss having 3/4-car Turbostars on Liverpool - Norwich. There used to be some great value advances as well which have all but disappeared under EMT and XC.

Although both ultimately are CT's fault for not providing DfT with accurate passenger figures. Had the correct numbers have been handed over, EMT would have had more stock, meaning less overcrowding and more advance ticket availability.

One thing I don't miss about that route under CT was their love of terminating services at Ely and Nottingham. Under EMT if they have to terminate at Nottingham, they get another train out of the depot for onward travel, under CT it was a case of waiting for the next timetabled service, even if that was two hours away.

I also don't miss the scarily regular 156 appearances on that route. 4 hours on a rattly unrefurbished 156 in original RR livery is not fun.

 

[Schnellzug]

Unfortunately so, however i am just thinking how happy i would be if a 9 car Meridian showed up on my trip to Newcastle at the beignning of June... i think it would be a better moment than a HST to be honest.

Imagine how reduced the bashing of XC would be if every voyager was a 9 car Meridian. And i mean every single one, thus any that are doubled up free a unit to re-introduce some lost services.

Do you mean that there'd be fewer bashers (i.e. enthusiasts), or fewer bashers (i.e. critics)?

Actually, that's part of my long term plan; re-form all the 220s to 8 car, and replace the 221s with new hauled stock on the northeast-southwest corridor, thereby cascading the 221s to SWT for Waterloo-Exeter. I've been trying to seel it to the DfT, but so far they haven't replied to my emails. I expect they're just busy.

 

[Yew]

Crosscountry going with 220's instead of 67's and new coaches?

 

[Zoe]

NEG having not spent a penny on their Silverlink Metro Franchise

Silverlink Metro wasn't a franchise itself, it was part of the North London Railways franchise that also included the routes later known as Silverlink County although I believe within Silverlink the two were kept separate.

 

[tbtc]

Regarding the Voyagers, if they were introduced as 9 car Class 222s, it would have been better even more so if a 10th carriage could be inserted into the formation at a later date.

Imagine how reduced the bashing of XC would be if every voyager was a 9 car Meridian. And i mean every single one, thus any that are doubled up free a unit to re-introduce some lost services.

I've said it before, but a nine coach Voyager would eliminate almost all of the complaints about them (e.g. many modern classes have seats that don't line up with windows, but people complain about Voyagers having that issue because they have other gripes about them...)

True also the longer the unit the more chance of unpowered coaches?

If TPE can run a three coach 185 with a coach unpowered then a nine coach Voyager should be able to cope with a few unpowered coaches

Although both ultimately are CT's fault for not providing DfT with accurate passenger figures. Had the correct numbers have been handed over, EMT would have had more stock, meaning less overcrowding and more advance ticket availability

That's how I understand it too, but I'm not sure how the stock would have been differently allocated (EMT got all of the 156/158s from Central, LM for the 150 and some 170s, XC got the remaining 170s) - giving EMT a couple of 170s would have made for an uneconomically small fleet.

Maybe you could tinker around with the 153 distribution but they aren't the kind of stock suited to longer distance services.

 

[Zoe]

I've said it before, but a nine coach Voyager would eliminate almost all of the complaints about them (e.g. many modern classes have seats that don't line up with windows, but people complain about Voyagers having that issue because they have other gripes about them...)

At the time though, nine coach Voyagers would have been overkill considering Cross Country services were not as busy as they are now and I don't think anyone back then would have predicted just how much demand for rail travel there would be these days. Even in the late 1990s and early 2000s the private car was still seen by many as the primary form of transport and this has only changed in recent years. Nine coach Voyagers would also have been unable to reverse in the bays at Reading.

 

[tbtc]

At the time though, nine coach Voyagers would have been overkill considering Cross Country services were not as busy as they are now and I don't think anyone back then would have predicted just how much demand for rail travel there would be these days. Even in the late 1990s and early 2000s the private car was still seen by many as the primary form of transport and this has only changed in recent years. Nine coach Voyagers would also have been unable to reverse in the bays at Reading.

I appreciate that - a half hourly nine coach Voyager replacing an hourly seven coach HST would have been a crazy increase in capacity (at a time when we were seeing short units like 170s doing routes like London - Nottingham/ Hull).

But there appears to have been no contingency for growth on the XC franchise, something which we are paying for now.

 

[Schnellzug]

Going back a bit, I think another of the worst decisions was that by the LNER to rebuild the P2s as remarkably ugly Pacifics.

:x

 

[northwichcat]

A Voyager lengthening option is something which could have been taken up but hasn't been.

If DfT had thought logically in 2004 when the TPE franchise was let they should have ordered around 55 new 7 car 222s for XC and cascaded all of the 220s and around 20 of the 221s to TPE.

 

[sprinterguy]

Going back a bit, I think another of the worst decisions was that by the LNER to rebuild the P2s as remarkably ugly Pacifics.

:x

There were a lot to things carried out during Thompsons' tenure of the LNER that I don't agree with. It would seem to be starkly apparent that Thompson was at odds with Gresley's ideas and went to great lengths to deface some of Gresley's greatest achievements. I wouldn't say that the P2s even represents the worst of these acts of vandalism, they at least did have their faults, not least of which was issues with their 2-8-2 wheel arrangement. Converting the seminal A1/A3, Gresley's first Pacific and one of only two Pacifics to be delivered to the GNR prior to amalgamation into the LNER, "Great Northern", into a similarly ugly format and thereby robbing the loco of its' historical significance and it's rightful place in preservation strikes me as a greater crime.

 

[aspierail]

I would say running a class 170 under the wires between London Liverpool Street to Lowestoft including Peterborough was a terrible decision.