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There is no conflict of interest. RDG is effectively a Government controlled body and that statement will have had huge input and final approval from the DfT. It is always chaired by a current senior exec from the industry but it isn’t ATOC, which was seen as too independent by the DfT. So RDG...

Snow 1964 - the problem is simple. The DfT will not allow GWR to have “enough” units in your eyes or “enough” staff or materials to maintain those extra units. You could give Bristol or Exeter all the units you want to give them but if they haven’t got the bits or the staff to maintain them...

The DfT do not want them on any of their TOCs. Abroad seems their most likely future.

There are other factors at play when you look at shopping locos. Firstly, you can advance or put back individual locos in the programme depending on condition, something that goes back to steam days. I spent a good deal of time in 1979 trying (without success) to get 47410 advanced in the HGO...

The prototype HST power cars were locos first - Class 41, 41001/2. The trailers were originally classed as ordinary LHCS.

It’s not about greed and arguably GWR is compliant with its contract. The lack of morality is with a DfT that pursues cost savings above passenger comfort and isn’t terribly fussed about the latter. It just cares about the money. This week has seen the cl.158 fleet availability take a nose...

Absolutely not. The renumbering process was strictly controlled by the CM&EE BRB - the Regions worked under their instructions and in those days you followed BRB orders, to the number in this case!

I went to Melbury Terrace (where the TOPS mainframe was) in the mid 1970’s and the Westerns were on TOPS - I made a point of testing that one out! However, TOPS maintenance for locos didn’t come in until the late 1970’s iirc when we (on ER, at least) switched from days in traffic to TOPS hours...

No, diversionary capability is a fundamental part of the Hull Trains business plan, always has been. It’s not a side effect and is quite deliberate, I can assure you of that. Hull doesn’t get Type 1 and 2 Schedule 4 money so it needs to divert when there is engineering work and it also helps...

This isn’t a political point but when Governments start to lose control of events and end up being in poor control of policy, execution and, most important of all, anticipating the next banana skin, they become reactive, focused on the short term and trying to get the max value out of minimum...

They are on a train supply agreement with Hitachi, specifying only GWR use. If an OA operator wants to hire a unit off a DfT operator, the DfT have to give permission, which is usually not granted. Given that GWR are short of units at the moment, I would be amazed if the permissions were...

Highly unlikely as it would be contractually impossible for them to do so. Those units are only contracted for use on GWR and it isn’t in GWR’s gift to loan them out to other operators.

It is a good earner. For those who want to know, it is about as half as much again as Wigan and Lancaster and about twice as much as Carlisle. I am very surprised that the figures in the report have been made publicly available. The DfT usually hate this - I wonder if someone at NR might be...

Just to be clear, electrification to Hull wouldn’t release the 802 sets. The need to have full diesel capability on all HT diversionary routes rules out going full electric. LHCS for GC would be too slow. They really need to get into 22x or 80x levels of acceleration for class 1 paths on the ECML.

No, it’s exactly the point. It wasn’t a tender - it was a PIN for a Direct Award (DA), in other words an extension. The procedure for a DA is that the existing operator has to price up what the DfT wants to operate over the lifetime of the DA contract period. To keep them honest, OLR usually...

When you hear a current very senior manager say that Hidden “went too far”, you shudder. One of the reasons Drivers have certain terms and conditions is that they need to be rested, alert and able to deal, in an instant, with anything that comes their way. The on board safety systems, such as...

They are just belatedly catching up with their admin - the competition was closed over 4 years ago!

Having gone through the whole West Turbo clearance saga, I wouldn’t fancy it as being an easy job. In general on the WR, where the IET units got cleared beforehand, the Turbos has an easier ride. It doesn’t quite work the other way around so, from experience, I would expect some issues...

It’s not as simple as that. The Governments effectively subsidises all operators because they pay Network Grant directly to NR and indirectly “laundered” through their TOCs to NR as “Fixed Track Access”, so all that Operators only effectively pay marginal costs. Recently, new OA entrants into...

Let’s face it, successive governments and BR in particular used business travel and commuters as a cash cow because they were in effect distress purchases with no available alternative. Now that bubble has been burst, probably for ever, the railway is financially struggling. As for rolling...