Recent content by jfowkes

They tend to mention existing DOO in general without referring to specific operators, and with respect to specific incidents E.g. this press release from 2025 makes reference to the Huntingdon stabbing incident and the fact that DOO Thameslink trains also run: Or with the 2018 Lewisham...

Cool thanks for confirming that. I do Nottingham-Grantham quite regularly so I guess I've just missed it up to now, maybe it's not that common on this route or something. I don't know how common the 4-car 158s are on Nottingham - Skegness.

I'm on a 4-car 158 from Nottingham to Skegness (2S23 if it's relevant). There was an announcement that passengers for Bingham and Aslockton should use the very front door of the train only due to short platforms. Not just "the front three carriages" or whatever, very explicitly just the front...

I'm on 1B69 (810018), Nottingham to London, terminating early at Leicester with an unspecified fault.

Yeah, Fereday Pollard were the architects for both, Abbey Wood as well. They love some laminated timber do Fereday Pollard.

The area in general is well served by buses but not many routes go particularly close to Cambridge South. A lot served the hospital but the main hospital bus stops are on the other side of the site, a good 15-20 minute walk from the station.

If Cambridge South were to become a railhead then the only realistic option is good bus routes in from the villages. But it's not really setup for being a "travel hub" either and there's already one at Trumpington and another planned at Foxton.

Honestly if people are close enough to Cambridge South that Royston/Whittlesford are "significant mileage" they can cycle to Cambridge South.

I can see that outwardly you're right. Having a large car park and good road access is the "default" for new stations. The general public perspective on first glance might be that it's a very stupid design. <Insert some complaint about car centric culture here> But it's not a stupid design. And...

Yeah but if it's crammed in more then airflow is worse, heat from the bits in the middle finds it harder to escape etc. The geometry and volume of a system is an important part of heat management. But also yeah I'm speculating wildly. It would also not surprise me if the HVAC was cheap and nasty.

As I said above, I'm going to make a guess this is a result of pushing the limits of thermal management. The 810s have crammed all the gubbins from a "normal" bi-mode 80x into a smaller space and so I'm thinking the fans have to work very hard to remove heat from the train (both from the AC and...

I was my understand that at least some issues with the 810s are due to heat (though not necessarily to do with the engines). But this is just something I've picked up from the forum (e.g. below quotes), not anything I really know...

Can they really gun the engines and get a decent speed up at Long Marston? I wonder if the issue is one that running at 50mph round the Long Marston loop just won't find and that you need to drive it like you would on the mainline. Especially since one known issue with the 810s is heat...

Thanks!

Good to see progress! Is there an actual timetable yet? I'm interested in what connection time there will be to/from Marston Vale services at Bletchley.