Came out today for the 0550 to Reading but failed at Staines. Does that count as a day in service?
Basingstoke will no longer sign Weybridge, having lost booked work on the route in December, with the plan soon being no 450s on the route.Exactly so. The one fly in the (all suburban trains) 701 thinking that has crossed my mind, is the need for main line diversionary route knowledge for weekend engineering work, primarily via Chertsey. Basing depot has always played a large part in this, as the likes of Woking/Waterloo etc would not be able to cover everything on top of their own work.
Thus far a couple of Weybridge return trips have been covered by 450's worked by Basing for this very purpose.
To my mind it's completely unpracticable to train xx bodies at Basing on 701's (this is when someone with closer hands on tells me they are..!) both in cost terms and in traction knowledge retention, unless there is a plan to 'pass' crews between, Basing and (eg) Woking to give them a greater degree of 701 work.
Otherwise with 450's still visiting Clapham Yard between the peaks (off main line work) it may be that some of these be used for a couple of return trips to Weybridge via Chertsey, for the benefit of Basing depot's retention of route knowledge?
All crew at all three of those depots are currently in the process of being trained. I believe Woking is quite a bit ahead of the other two in terms of drivers though, but Woking drivers no longer sign 455s unlike the other two depots.
Good point. They were introduced after my time, so easy to forget how things have moved on!
Makes sense. It was always the plan under SWT to remove all 450's from the suburban routes, but that never quite panned out.
Bit of a senior moment afraid ref my Farnham comment. Was thinking only of the peak hour Farnham/Aldershot-Waterloo's via Ascot (as was), forgetting that FN did/(do?) have a percentage of work on the 2C's throughout the day.
Only if it ran in passenger service, however briefly.
www.realtimetrains.co.uk
Farnham do indeed still have a number of 2Cs, but also a few more 2F and 2G suburban services than they’ve had in years gone by as well. You can be easily forgiven though as previously they had two links where only Link 1 signed the Windsor side, but as the depot and its amount of work has expanded over the last 10 years or so, everyone now signs everything as there’s enough to go around.
Good to hear. Also gives Control a greater amount of flexibility on occasions when the s*** hits the fan. That's good news.
My apologies, I misread what it said on Live Rail Record. The failure at Staines was on Monday and it hasn't been seen since. However, 701039 is now allocated back out this afternoon.
www.realtimetrains.co.uk
It looks like the usual set of paths on Wednesday starting from Leicester:
www.realtimetrains.co.uk
www.realtimetrains.co.uk
www.realtimetrains.co.uk
That's an existing diagram (WM733) which looks a bit different today due to the cancellation of 5F82 - 2F82 at the start as above. You are correct the Kingston rounders on paper are all 701s during the week now along with Shepperton. Think it's been the case since the standard timetable started again after the engineering timetables stopped. Have been a few substitutes in that time so far.
Crew issues meant it has remained birthed. (lack of)
Thats more like it !. Was checking RTT a lot of today and was only seeing that ex Bascot !. I was getting too impatient !.It looks like the usual set of paths on Wednesday starting from Leicester:
Realtime Trains | 0V70 0851 Leicester L.I.P. to Long Marston Gbrf | 28/01/2026
Real-time train running information for 0V70 0851 departure from Leicester L.I.P. to Long Marston Gbrf on 28/01/2026. From Realtime Trains, an independent source of train running info for Great Britain.Realtime Trains | 5Q70 1440 Long Marston Gbrf to Wimbledon Park Depot Sdgs | 28/01/2026
Real-time train running information for 5Q70 1440 departure from Long Marston Gbrf to Wimbledon Park Depot Sdgs on 28/01/2026. From Realtime Trains, an independent source of train running info for Great Britain.Realtime Trains | 0M70 2150 Wimbledon Park Depot Sdgs to Wembley Loco Sidings P,q,r | 28/01/2026
Real-time train running information for 0M70 2150 departure from Wimbledon Park Depot Sdgs to Wembley Loco Sidings P,q,r on 28/01/2026. From Realtime Trains, an independent source of train running info for Great Britain.
Though as always probably worth looking at what is activated and allocated on the day.
..........
Good progress, each week taking one 701/0 back out from Long Marston, would be completed by mid FebruaryIt looks like the usual set of paths on Wednesday starting from Leicester:
Realtime Trains | 0V70 0851 Leicester L.I.P. to Long Marston Gbrf | 28/01/2026
Real-time train running information for 0V70 0851 departure from Leicester L.I.P. to Long Marston Gbrf on 28/01/2026. From Realtime Trains, an independent source of train running info for Great Britain.Realtime Trains | 5Q70 1440 Long Marston Gbrf to Wimbledon Park Depot Sdgs | 28/01/2026
Real-time train running information for 5Q70 1440 departure from Long Marston Gbrf to Wimbledon Park Depot Sdgs on 28/01/2026. From Realtime Trains, an independent source of train running info for Great Britain.Realtime Trains | 0M70 2150 Wimbledon Park Depot Sdgs to Wembley Loco Sidings P,q,r | 28/01/2026
Real-time train running information for 0M70 2150 departure from Wimbledon Park Depot Sdgs to Wembley Loco Sidings P,q,r on 28/01/2026. From Realtime Trains, an independent source of train running info for Great Britain.
The cab size has not changed or been moved. There was a redesign of the cab desk, that’s all.
So not involving major work then ?.
57306 allocated
it has left Leicester.
As indeed has been pointed out on many occasions over the past few years!
It looks like the two 701/5 units then join together in platform 18 at Waterloo and then depart as the:
A good sign is the drag appears to have been manually activated judging by the time.
could be 023 as the previous drags they tend to take the smaller number of units
