I swear someone mentioned about some sort of leasing costs on here.
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Merseyrail Class 777 introduction updates
- Thread starter OneThirtyEight
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I was Just wondering if there's progress with the rmt getting an agreement with merseytravel regarding door operations etc
Merseytravel have stated there is no leasing agreement with the 777 units as they are expected to have a long lifespan, Merseytravel are playing the long game unlike some tocs with rolling stock procurement.
Bletchleyite
Veteran Member
Leasing costs on the existing fleet are money down the bog if the 777s are sat there doing nothing, though.
Yes but the more informed of us should be aware that they were wrong.
That of course is true, but at least they will never be paying leasing costs for 2 fleets at once.
Vespa
Established Member
You're probably thinking of this.
The Class 777 trainsets will therefore be owned by the regional public transport operator Merseytravel and leased to the franchise operator Merseyrail
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I was wondering about an agreement on door operations as well but you never seem to hear anything about one. The 777s are not only expected to have a long lifespan, but a long lifespan running on the same lines for their whole lives, as was proved by the 507/508 and 502/503 units before them. There’s a 0% chance of these trains transferring to any other operator at this point, 117 years in.
People think of Merseyrail and Merseyrail as a single entity but of course they are not. Merseytravel is the public transport authority of the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority which will own the Class 777 fleet and Merseyrail is the private TOC owned by Serco and the state railway of the Netherlands which will pay leasing costs to the public body Merseytravel instead of to the private ROSCO Angel Trains as it does now. It’s a completely different model, but until the first 777 enters service, no leasing whatsoever will be paid on them. Stadler have only received payment from Merseytravel for the first 3 units so far, so it’s hardly been a waste of public money.
Is the dispute with Merseytravel? If so, Merseyrail will hopefully be on their back to get the new units into service, which would hopefully speed up the dispute.
I think the despite is between the RMT Union and the operator Merseyrail isn’t it, because it is about how it intends to operate them in service? Merseytravel (in the form of Steve Rotheram) has offered an unlimited amount of money to pay guards wages for the next 40 years so that’s not it.
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Have they actually been given it yet? That is my conclusion exactly but for ROSCOs and leasing.
Leasing in the airline industry is a hallmark of false business. EasyJet does not lease a single plane. All are wholly owned and then sold off 2nd hand while still relatively new to other airlines, giving it an attractively young fleet. Thomas Cook on the other hand did not own a single plane. Every single one was leased and then upon realising that it had no valuable assets in its possession, duly went bust.
What Merseytravel have done is made the point that it is always cheaper to directly buy and own your own property and then found a way to make guaranteed income for the public sector by exploiting the otherwise privatised system.
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As for Merseytravel, technically it would be them paying themselves.....
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It wouldn’t be Merseytravel paying themselves. It would be the private operator of Merseyrail (who would otherwise be swindling Liverpool out of money) paying the public body Merseytravel the leasing costs that would otherwise be again swindled out of Liverpool by a private ROSCO.
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That rather assumes that you have the cash available up front to be able to pay for the assets. That's the advantage of leasing - someone else provides the lump sum of cash up front. Not surprisingly there is a cost to do that.
They are being fitted with guards panels at Crewe, but I still don’t think there’s an agreement with the RMT.
D821
Member
It's only the last week or two I've seen the guards moving about through the carriages. Nice to see them back.
Nicholas Lewis
Established Member
Easyjet has had to resort to selling planes and leasing them back over the last 18mths to raise capital although prior to this you are correct. Also as a reminder Tfl went down this route for 345's but were forced to sell them and lease back to raise capital
Anyhow LCA has borrowed the money from the European Investment Bank for the rolling stock which will attract interest and need to be paid back at some point which i can't establish so Merseytravel will need to contribute to that through fares although Merseytravel also receives grants for running the service so a bit of money ground.
In ideal times you shouldn’t be leasing at all because when there is a pandemic or other crisis, you do have some assets to sell to help with cashflow. If they didn’t have them they would have simply gone bust or had to take out loans. When/if demand returns if EasyJet wishes to retain its low fleet age, it may simply be able to terminate leases on planes it has sold and proceed to buy new ones again when capital permits. TfL shouldn’t have sold any 345s unless it intends for them to be cascaded to lines outside London and procure new stock (with level boarding!) for Crossrail within about 15-20 years.
I was going to suggest that conventional borrowing whilst owning the asset is better than leasing because there comes a time when you have paid off the interest and the payments cease, at which time you can revert to thinking about new fleet procurement with the money instead, rather than leasing costs continuing indefinitely over a 40+ year lifespan. British Rail once it had built rolling stock did not have to pay anything towards it other than maintenance. Rail fares are not Merseytravel’s sole form of income because it also presides over other forms of transport.
I don't think it had any choice given the financial state it is in and lack of willingness from Westminster to plug the holes (even though our current PM arguably helped to create them)
Merseytravels plan was sound a few years ago as a TOC would always be paying to lease the trains. But GBR and the changes with franchising might scupper it as a public body might question the need to lease publicly owned assets or any new franchisee might want to pay less given covid dented passenger numbers.
Latter point might be moot though as they are showing healthy leisure passenger numbers again.
Latter point might be moot though as they are showing healthy leisure passenger numbers again.
Definitely moot. Don't know the reasons for travel, but the trains are packed. Particularly the Ormskirk train but that might also have to do with it only ever being run as a 3 car....for some reason....
Do we know for certain that door control modifications are being carried out at Crewe? I asked this question directly to David Powell a few weeks ago and he replied that the units were only being sent to Crewe for storage. Perhaps he felt that he could not tell the full story and I did not have the opportunity to quiz him further as others were awaiting his attention. Perhaps someone with contacts at Arriva Traincare could enlighten us?
Sam 76
Member
It's really interesting at the moment. I believe looking at the timetables that trains are alternating between Ormskirk and Kirkby services. So a Kirkby- central becomes a central- Ormskirk. May explain why it's 3 cars only at the moment but looking at them it could do with changing at rush hour
They are also alternating between Platform 1 and Platform 2 at Central. Very interesting as they didn’t interwork at all pre-Covid they stayed on their own circuit.
MR-507508
Member
There are 6 car services on the Ormskirk line (& due to the interworking of the two lines, the Kirkby line) with 3 out of the 7 units coupling for morning and evening peak.
If the 20 min timetable continues for the foreseeable, the interworking may need to be removed to allow class 777 introduction to commence, and be restricted to solely the Kirkby line.
Then why have I only seen 3 car Ormskirks when the other lines are running 6 cars?
MR-507508
Member
The Ormskirks only have some peak services as 6 car, for instance the 1640, 1700 and 1720 from Liverpool Central to Ormskirk as scheduled 6 cars (Monday-Friday).
You can see on RTT how the peak 6 cars are coupled/uncoupled Realtime Trains - Departures from Ormskirk.
Where as the Southport-Hunts Cross line, all services are currently 6 car from start to end of service (Monday-Saturday).
D821
Member
Have they tried running any of the 777s in an 8 car formation yet?
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