Yet people think the arrival of a few more class 701s will allow class 455s to go in the bin. I would argue that at least four are needed to have a reasonable chance of everything running with the booked formation.
How many class 455s are still in use? 10 stopped out of a fleet of approx 80 units is not dire. 70 out of 80 is 87.5% availabillty.
0652 Waterloo to Weybridge was a single 450 this morning. Left Clapham Junction full.
www.ft.com
Despite Steve Montgomery stating a few months ago that they hoped to have them all in service before handing over the keys in May.FirstGroup and MTR have (officially now) failed to achieve their franchise promise of getting 90 new trains into service as it's been announced SWR will be the first to be nationalised in May.
South Western Railway set to be first train operator nationalised by Labour
Next companies to return to public control will be c2c and Greater Anglia under UK government plans
I believe this is booked a 4 car currently.
You would also have thought they could have named one of the regulars instead of a unit only seen in service once.
thank you
Do you get them from the road?
Indeed I was hoping that naming 031 might lead to it seeing more passenger use, evidently not
That’s definitely not how the passenger allocations work.
So hopefully of the 7 units ready for carrying passengers, 017, 028 and 031 will see more use soon, before other units are introduced (next batch of 10?) later this month or 2025?.
Are there more services booked for 701s from the mid December timetable change.
Is that percentage of total drivers or drivers who need training?
I reckon even under GBR, liveries may stay the same? To help passengers differentiate between regions?
IIRC the SWR livery was mandated by DfT anyway as a standardised base, in response to public complaints about the cost of repainting trains when franchisees changed. I would imagine the bit about "A First Group company" will be removed fairly quickly though, even if the logo stays.
Why would they need to? Passengers want to know where the train is going, not which division of GBR is operating it. If you're at Epsom and want to go to Dorking, it shouldn't matter whether the train is SWR or Southern - and simply knowing who is operating the train won't be enough information.
I simply think the DFT will look at it on a cost basis and keep it as it is, only changing when new rolling stock orders go out as required.
031 has only been in passenger service once, (in October), and 028 hasn't been seen since February. But 017 did briefly come out to play today.
In the NSE days, there was still differentiation. Your class 455 would either have had a South Western Lines or South London Lines logo on, depending on the division.
Yes, but there was no actual differentiation in fares, delivery or passenger use depending on the division.
May was always the date as soon as Labour won the GE because that's when the contract expires and can't be extended, so won't come as any surprise to SWR management. No doubt why SWR still has an acting MD rather than a permanent post holder.
As a long suffering Waterloo-Reading line user we can but hope that Labour will throw some resource at SWR for it to become a poster child for nationalisation. For a start when 701's are in full service it will be good to have 4 tph on the peak services - the demand is there on this route.
Thanks,
which is going to long marston thx?
701504/503 5Q87
It seems SWR are stretched currently running the service they are now with the current staffing levels.
It's a wonder then that other TOCs are managing to increase service levels then. Wonder how they do it... Easy to blame the DfT for the recruitment freeze, but it takes two to tango as the saying goes.
