British ICE3 and TGV Alantique concepts [Lost media]

[Class450/4DES]

[Please feel free to move this thread if its in the wrong place]

Back in my last thread I made, someone by the name of "Sad Sprinter" mentioned about the concept of TGV Atlantiques and ICE3's on the ECML. This has majorly got my intrest and I want to find this lost media. I am hoping others can help me find these images. Any information or help would be appreciated, thanks!

 

[Non Multi]

I remember those, they were usually mockups done by RAIL magazine to accompany a franchise bid cover story. Those images would have been published during the early 2000's which was the era of audacious bid proposals.

 

[Mollman]

I remember those, they were usually mockups done by RAIL magazine to accompany a franchise bid cover story. Those images would have been published during the early 2000's which was the era of audacious bid proposals.

That was the Virgin bid for East Coast which proposed new sections of high speed line. I remember the front cover was TGVs at Waverley.

 

[Sad Sprinter]

Ta-da!

Although the image I remember was a “front on” look at the station but it’s basically the same thing.

I have the image of the Virgin ICE but I must say it looks nothing like an ICE.

 

[Class450/4DES]

Ta-da!

Although the image I remember was a “front on” look at the station but it’s basically the same thing.

I have the image of the Virgin ICE but I must say it looks nothing like an ICE.

Thanks!

 

[Mogz]

Concept art very rarely ends up looking like the real thing.

See below re HS2 interior concept vs the selected interior…




vs

 

[Transilien]

They look ridiculously futuristic! What is the point of these concepts when the real thing is never going to look like that anyway?

 

[Mogz]

They look ridiculously futuristic! What is the point of these concepts when the real thing is never going to look like that anyway?

Totally agree.

The first one with its Swiss-style observation car windows and compartment like “meeting pods” would have been brilliant!

As it is, it looks like the real HS2 interiors will be very much “more of the same..”

 

[Class450/4DES]

Concept art very rarely ends up looking like the real thing.

See below re HS2 interior concept vs the selected interior…

View attachment 170790
View attachment 170791

vs

View attachment 170792

The former looks way better than the latter. We need double deck trains here.

 

[norbitonflyer]

The former looks way better than the latter. We need double deck trains here.

There isn't room for two decks anywhere in the UK except HS1 and HS2. The problem is our high platforms, which restricts the width available for a usable lower deck

 

[43096]

This was the piece inside Rail at the time... There must have been wires down somewhere on the East Coast for that photoshop image, as there's 5 sets in the station! In retrospect it was all a load of naive dreaming - something that Rail had form for at the time, with its fawning over EWS and Ed Burkhardt.

 

[Class450/4DES]

This was the piece inside Rail at the time... There must have been wires down somewhere on the East Coast for that photoshop image, as there's 5 sets in the station! In retrospect it was all a load of naive dreaming - something that Rail had form for at the time, with its fawning over EWS and Ed Burkhardt.
View attachment 170795

This is intresting. I wonder if they would of been mofidied for the loading gauge here or the loading gauge of the ECML upgraded to Berne? Which could allow for locomotives such as the Vectron to run on UK rails. What an intresting reality it could of been.

 

[Mogz]

This was the piece inside Rail at the time... There must have been wires down somewhere on the East Coast for that photoshop image, as there's 5 sets in the station! In retrospect it was all a load of naive dreaming - something that Rail had form for at the time, with its fawning over EWS and Ed Burkhardt.
View attachment 170795

Ah yes! I remember that very edition!

Come to think of it, didn’t GNER also end up running some GNER-liveried Eurostar sets up the East Coast in the early years of privatisation? Or did I imagine that?

 

[HYPODERMIC]

Wow! Those images are fascinating - thank you for sharing them!

Some quick thoughts:

1. Those Virgin ECML proposals are so ludicrously fanciful that I'm baffled that they appear to have been taken seriously by the rail press. Even by the hype standards of early privatisation, a 220mph-capable ECML is way out there. Surely that wasn't the basis of Virgin's actual bid for ICEC?

2. Looking at those old RAIL issues, I'm really struck by how much the mood music around the railways has soured in recent years. Even five years ago I remember a sense that the railways were booming and on the up. Between the HS2 debacle, years of strikes, discussion around modern ironing board seats, delays with GBR, and the financial vice-grip of the Treasury, the sense of a railway with a bright future seems to have ebbed away completely.

3. The proposed HS2 carriage interiors are deeply disappointing. Nothing about that render evokes any sense of comfort, speed, or premium - it does not look like a desirable or premium product that will entice customers. If you're going to spend umpteen billions on a flagship high-speed intercity railway, why would you not try to make it look attractive? This is the most charmless, dull, sterile interior they could possibly have come up with. I really miss the commercial / product development nous that the likes of InterCity, GNER, Virgin, Serco Caledonian Sleeper etc might have brought to this kind of project. Nobody in DfT or any of its commercial/delivery spin-offs seems to understand that the rail business might be anything other than a bitterly regrettable distress purchase.

 

[43096]

Ah yes! I remember that very edition!

Come to think of it, didn’t GNER also end up running some GNER-liveried Eurostar sets up the East Coast in the early years of privatisation? Or did I imagine that?

You didn’t imagine it. They had three sets re-liveried into GNER livery (373301-306) for use on London to York (initially), later Leeds workings. Two other NoL sets were used as cover (373309-312) for these, but retained Eurostar livery.

 

[Sad Sprinter]

Wow! Those images are fascinating - thank you for sharing them!

Some quick thoughts:

1. Those Virgin ECML proposals are so ludicrously fanciful that I'm baffled that they appear to have been taken seriously by the rail press. Even by the hype standards of early privatisation, a 220mph-capable ECML is way out there. Surely that wasn't the basis of Virgin's actual bid for ICEC?

2. Looking at those old RAIL issues, I'm really struck by how much the mood music around the railways has soured in recent years. Even five years ago I remember a sense that the railways were booming and on the up. Between the HS2 debacle, years of strikes, discussion around modern ironing board seats, delays with GBR, and the financial vice-grip of the Treasury, the sense of a railway with a bright future seems to have ebbed away completely.

3. The proposed HS2 carriage interiors are deeply disappointing. Nothing about that render evokes any sense of comfort, speed, or premium - it does not look like a desirable or premium product that will entice customers. If you're going to spend umpteen billions on a flagship high-speed intercity railway, why would you not try to make it look attractive? This is the most charmless, dull, sterile interior they could possibly have come up with. I really miss the commercial / product development nous that the likes of InterCity, GNER, Virgin, Serco Caledonian Sleeper etc might have brought to this kind of project. Nobody in DfT or any of its commercial/delivery spin-offs seems to understand that the rail business might be anything other than a bitterly regrettable distress purchase.

Yes, it was a period when the railways

Concept art very rarely ends up looking like the real thing.

See below re HS2 interior concept vs the selected interior…

View attachment 170790
View attachment 170791

vs

View attachment 170792

Yes I remember that train, it was going to be called The Mercury and have a little Union Jack on the front. October 2010 issue of rail. Complete with a fascinating map of Greenguage21s proposed high speed rail empire in the London area. I still have that knocking around too.

 

[superalbs]

Ta-da!

Although the image I remember was a “front on” look at the station but it’s basically the same thing.

I have the image of the Virgin ICE but I must say it looks nothing like an ICE.

I'd love to see that, if you wouldn't mind sharing.

 

[Sad Sprinter]

I'd love to see that, if you wouldn't mind sharing.

Sure when I visit my parents tomorrow I'll try and dig it out of my childhood bedroom!

In case anyone's interested, there's a great website called Fictious Liveries I used to look at when I was like, 12, that posts user-created pictures of photoshopped trains. Here's an old pic of a class 390 in GNER livery, which I think was a genuine possibility at some stage: http://www.25kv.uk/fictitiousliveries.php

 

[Indigo Soup]

Nobody in DfT or any of its commercial/delivery spin-offs seems to understand that the rail business might be anything other than a bitterly regrettable distress purchase.

They appear to have taken the view that what railways bring to the table is speed and capacity, and that therefore the ideal railway is a tube into which passengers can be fired at high speed. Since that isn't possible, the trains should instead resemble tubes into which as many passengers as possible will fit.

Somewhat ironically, the independent design house responsible for the concept graphics claimed that 'train travel needs to be as exciting as flying and as sexy as the latest car'. Since flying is deathly dull, and the latest cars are basically all identical, the official version seems to have achieved those goals.

 

[Royston Vasey]

They look ridiculously futuristic! What is the point of these concepts when the real thing is never going to look like that anyway?

I recall that was an attention grabbing PR stunt by a third party design agency at the time, just trying to get some free publicity! Nothing remotely official!

 

[Mogz]

Sure when I visit my parents tomorrow I'll try and dig it out of my childhood bedroom!

In case anyone's interested, there's a great website called Fictious Liveries I used to look at when I was like, 12, that posts user-created pictures of photoshopped trains. Here's an old pic of a class 390 in GNER livery, which I think was a genuine possibility at some stage: http://www.25kv.uk/fictitiousliveries.php

Gotta love those fictitious liveries!

Interesting to think that Intercity Swallow could well have made it onto some of the newer steam locos if they had been allowed to live out their natural lifespan on the mainline….

 

[sprinterguy]

Sure when I visit my parents tomorrow I'll try and dig it out of my childhood bedroom!

In case anyone's interested, there's a great website called Fictious Liveries I used to look at when I was like, 12, that posts user-created pictures of photoshopped trains. Here's an old pic of a class 390 in GNER livery, which I think was a genuine possibility at some stage: http://www.25kv.uk/fictitiousliveries.php

Yeah, GNER proposed ordering a small number of Pendolinos as additional capacity in the early days of the franchise - ultimately, the redundant NoL Eurostar sets became available instead.

 

[Class450/4DES]

Sure when I visit my parents tomorrow I'll try and dig it out of my childhood bedroom!

In case anyone's interested, there's a great website called Fictious Liveries I used to look at when I was like, 12, that posts user-created pictures of photoshopped trains. Here's an old pic of a class 390 in GNER livery, which I think was a genuine possibility at some stage: http://www.25kv.uk/fictitiousliveries.php

These edits look amazing!

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 10 Dec 2024 ==

Yeah, GNER proposed ordering a small number of Pendolinos as additional capacity in the early days of the franchise - ultimately, the redundant NoL Eurostar sets became available instead.
View attachment 170822

The front looks like a 373.

 

[OVS Flatbottom]

1. Those Virgin ECML proposals are so ludicrously fanciful that I'm baffled that they appear to have been taken seriously by the rail press. Even by the hype standards of early privatisation, a 220mph-capable ECML is way out there. Surely that wasn't the basis of Virgin's actual bid for ICEC?

There's one of Roger Ford's Informed Sources pieces (from April 2000) on this at https://web.archive.org/web/2006032...VE/INF SRCS 2000/Informed Sources 04 2000.htm (it took some digging to find).

Some quotes:

...the aim is to steamroller their rival's new trains and stations with 120 miles of 205mile/h high speed line, 55-60 high speed trains and extra capacity for all users of the route. Gulp.

[A]t the heart of the Virgin franchise bid is 105 miles of new high speed line, laid out for 330km/h (205mile/h), running parallel to the existing route between Connington south of Peterborough and Colton junction north of Doncaster...

A second, 14mile section of high speed line would run between Killingworth and Chevington , bypassing the curves around Morpeth.

[T]he Leamside line...becomes the new ECML, with a Washington Parkway station serving Durham and Sunderland.

Apparently the infrastructure was costed at £3.3 billion (!) in 2000. (Interesting also to see that the length of high-speed line proposed is coincidentally very close to HS2 phase 1.)

 

[Sad Sprinter]

As requested, Virgin’s ICE3 as seen in the August 2000 issue edition of Modern Railways, full article below



And going with the theme, an East Coast livered Pendolino from 2010

 

[Transilien]

View attachment 170889

As requested, Virgin’s ICE3 as seen in the August 2000 issue edition of Modern Railways, full article below

View attachment 170890

And going with the theme, an East Coast livered Pendolino from 2010

I always thought it would have been a good idea to replace the IC225 DVT with a diesel power car for services to Aberdeen and Inverness

 

[Class450/4DES]

View attachment 170889

As requested, Virgin’s ICE3 as seen in the August 2000 issue edition of Modern Railways, full article below

View attachment 170890

And going with the theme, an East Coast livered Pendolino from 2010

What a strange choice for a livery for the ICE's. Its like a hybrid of the VWC and GNER liveries.

 

[vuzzeho]

3. The proposed HS2 carriage interiors are deeply disappointing. Nothing about that render evokes any sense of comfort, speed, or premium - it does not look like a desirable or premium product that will entice customers. If you're going to spend umpteen billions on a flagship high-speed intercity railway, why would you not try to make it look attractive?

I know this is off-topic, but I have to say it. It's not a render, it's a physical mockup. Additionally, it isn't the final design but a test design, so things are going to change, and a completely neutral design at that. If you compare early IET interior mockups to the final (initial - LNER/GWR) product, they look quite different.

 

[eastwestdivide]

Nearly on topic, a representation of an ICE on a poster at Rotherham (artworks by local students make up a bunch of posters there):