Caledonian Sleeper

[TimboM]

A few other considerations:

The Mk5s operate as if they are fixed-formation half-sets. The TMS is set up to 'recognise' coaches in the standard formation. Moving the lounge half-way down would probably cause all manner of upset to the TMS. That said, the stock stayed in the 'standard' formation with the Mk3s/Mk2s too.

The Aberdeen/FTW split isn't always the same - the six Sleeper cars split 2 FTW / 4 ABD; 3 / 3; or 4 FTW / 2 ABD depending on seasonal variations. The lounge car would need shunting about regularly.

The Highlander set swaps over at Wembley and becomes the Lowlander set - you then end up with the lounge on one of the northbound Lowlander portions (Glasgow possibly?) in the middle (unless there's a time-consuming shunt at Wembley every day).

I think someone's already mentioned, but I'm pretty sure only the end of the Club Car that's adjoining the Sleepers (in normal formation) is accessible - the other end that adjoins the seats (and allows access for seated passengers to visit a "hatch" to buy food) is unlikely to be; so having the Club Car central wouldn't help either accessibility (from one end) or seated passengers obtaining refreshments.

Whilst not insurmountable, having the seats and guard's accommodation alongside the Club Car where the bulk of the rest of the train crew is likely to have several operational advantages too.

Whilst not ideal, having the FTW PRM coach positioned so it's adjacent to the Club Car for the EBD-FTW / FTW-EDB legs of the journey means at least the stunning scenery of the West Highland Line can be enjoyed.


As an aside, the Caledonian Doubles are also in the PRM coach, meaning those 'guests' paying best part of £400 for the experience on the FTW Sleeper (arguably the most touristy one) have to walk/shuffle through the narrow corridors of five coaches at the southern end of their trip.

 

[VT 390]

Would it be possible to have the Fort William seated and lounge car be attached for the full journey instead of the Aberdeen one as I would have thought many more passengers would travel to Fort William on the sleeper rather than Aberdeen. Even if this was just in the summer when Fort William demand is highest would be good.

 

[ajrm]

Would it be possible to have the Fort William seated and lounge car be attached for the full journey instead of the Aberdeen one as I would have thought many more passengers would travel to Fort William on the sleeper rather than Aberdeen. Even if this was just in the summer when Fort William demand is highest would be good.

Certainly goes with my experience that the Aberdeen/ Fort William lounge car is very busy northbound, and the Aberdeen lounge is pretty dead southbound.

 

[Bletchleyite]

The Mk5s operate as if they are fixed-formation half-sets. The TMS is set up to 'recognise' coaches in the standard formation. Moving the lounge half-way down would probably cause all manner of upset to the TMS.

Well, that's a grossly incompetent piece of design, isn't it? If you're going to build LHCS (as distinct from TPE-style "unpowered single ended MUs"), why not build it so you can shove together any formation you like?

As to the actual issue, though, I noted that Canadian sleeper coaches put the accessible berths *in* the lounge car, avoiding the access issue. Wouldn't work for Fort Bill, though.

 

[BRX]

Would it be possible to have the Fort William seated and lounge car be attached for the full journey instead of the Aberdeen one as I would have thought many more passengers would travel to Fort William on the sleeper rather than Aberdeen. Even if this was just in the summer when Fort William demand is highest would be good.

That's a good question - I have wondered about this. I think the current arrangement dates from when there was more custom on the Aberdeen portion than the Fort William one; something that has changed just in the past few years.

It may be the case that even if there are now more sleeper passengers for Fort William than for Aberdeen, there are still more seated passengers for Aberdeen. Of course, it will be influenced by the fact that travelling to FTW in the seats is currently rather inconvenient, especially northbound, when you are chucked out onto the platform at Edinburgh at 4am.

(By the way, travelling last week, on the seats to Fort William, I was quite surprised to wake up somewhere around Loch Lomond to find the seated coach completely full - presumably mainly day passengers who had got on in Glasgow)

 

[Bletchleyite]

(By the way, travelling last week, on the seats to Fort William, I was quite surprised to wake up somewhere around Loch Lomond to find the seated coach completely full - presumably mainly day passengers who had got on in Glasgow)

I think it was a serious error not ordering two Mk5a TSOs in addition to what was ordered, allowing a dedicated couple of coaches for that purpose.

 

[BRX]

I think it was a serious error not ordering two Mk5a TSOs in addition to what was ordered, allowing a dedicated couple of coaches for that purpose.

It doesn't appear to be the case that CS are provided with any incentive to encourage use of the 'day' seats on the fort william service, in either direction.

 

[InOban]

The demand for the seats within Scotland will be very weather dependent. We've been enjoying great hill-walking weather.

 

[mde]

Issues on the southbound Lowlander from Glasgow Central tonight (left 23 late) - coaches had came from Polmadie with some faulty cabin doors.

 

[TimboM]

Well, that's a grossly incompetent piece of design, isn't it? If you're going to build LHCS (as distinct from TPE-style "unpowered single ended MUs"), why not build it so you can shove together any formation you like?

Why build in complexities for something that never happens? When was the last time you saw the Sleeper run in normal service with the lounge or seats anywhere other than at the end of their relevant half-set?

The Sleeper Mk5s can, in theory, be ordered in whatever formation, bar a couple of very specific scenarios (which don't involve where the lounge car is situated). It's a risk, though, that the TMS gets thrown out of kilter if the lounge/Club Car is moving around the set constantly.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Why build in complexities for something that never happens? When was the last time you saw the Sleeper run in normal service with the lounge or seats anywhere other than at the end of their relevant half-set?

It's not a "complexity", it's just keeping things generic for flexibility.

The Sleeper Mk5s can, in theory, be ordered in whatever formation, bar a couple of very specific scenarios (which don't involve where the lounge car is situated). It's a risk, though, that the TMS gets thrown out of kilter if the lounge/Club Car is moving around the set constantly.

Only if it's incompetently implemented and/or not tested properly.

 

[BRX]

Instructional video re northbound shunt operation courtesy of Cambria Junction/BRX:

Missing from that video is what happens at the 'other' end of the train where the Fort William coaches are added on (because it's not possible to film in several locations at once!).

I've now rectified this with an additional video (filmed a couple of weeks ago on my way up to Fort William) that shows the process:

 

[Highlandspring]

Quite apposite given recent discussions on this thread, the accessible coach on the Down Fort William portion has come from London wrong turned with the accessible berth at the opposite end from the lounge car. Not sure if this is a symptom of the East Coast diversion overnight but I'd imagine it must be very frustrating if you're a wheelchair user not to have any access to the lounge at all throughout the entire journey.

 

[marks87]

Quite apposite given recent discussions on this thread, the accessible coach on the Down Fort William portion has come from London wrong turned with the accessible berth at the opposite end from the lounge car. Not sure if this is a symptom of the East Coast diversion overnight but I'd imagine it must be very frustrating if you're a wheelchair user not to have any access to the lounge at all throughout the entire journey.

No, the East Coast diversion shouldn't have an impact on the order of the train. The reversal at Wembley is "undone" by arriving into the Edinburgh from the opposite direction.

 

[Indigo Soup]

Would it be possible to have the Fort William seated and lounge car be attached for the full journey instead of the Aberdeen one as I would have thought many more passengers would travel to Fort William on the sleeper rather than Aberdeen. Even if this was just in the summer when Fort William demand is highest would be good.

As I understand it, the operators are quite good at switching between the two flows as required with the sleeping cars. One of the advantages of having the PRM sleepers on the outer ends of their section is that you can (in theory at least) send any number between one and five sleeping cars to either destination. Or zero to six, if you really wanted to. Booking the 'wrong' ends would presumably be fairly straightforward. It would mean that portions leave Edinburgh in the wrong order, but I imagine that the Aberdeen portion could make up six minutes somewhere. The Fort WIlliam portion being early could of course easily be corrected by driving a bit slower.

Well, that's a grossly incompetent piece of design, isn't it? If you're going to build LHCS (as distinct from TPE-style "unpowered single ended MUs"), why not build it so you can shove together any formation you like?

If modern electronics mean that LHCS has to think it's an unpowered, cabless multiple unit, I'd have thought getting it's a one-car multipe unit was at least sensible.

It doesn't appear to be the case that CS are provided with any incentive to encourage use of the 'day' seats on the fort william service, in either direction.

I believe that Serco are pretty actively disinterested in day passengers on the Fort William portion. If they could, I think they'd love to lose the seated portion on all the trains for an extra luxury sleeping car, and go fully down the route of train-specific fares. They certainly don't seem interested in running a 'traditional' fare-plus-supplement sleeping car train for normal people to travel on.

You'd think it would be easier to run one long train straight to Inverness, and have the other one split between Stranraer and Fort William. No doubt there is a good reason for it being as it is though!

Presumably the Stranraer service is timed around the morning sailing to Northern Ireland, whilst the Fort William service will have been timed to provide the morning train from Glasgow. Running the two together would cause problems for one or both portions. Stick each on the back of an Inverness portion, and you've got two decent length trains, and can cater to slightly different markets for Inverness.

 

[kingqueen]

As an aside, the Caledonian Doubles are also in the PRM coach, meaning those 'guests' paying best part of £400 for the experience on the FTW Sleeper (arguably the most touristy one) have to walk/shuffle through the narrow corridors of five coaches at the southern end of their trip.

To reach the lounge car you mean? For a moment I thought you meant to exit the train at the destination.

 

[kingqueen]

I've now rectified this with an additional video (filmed a couple of weeks ago on my way up to Fort William) that shows the process:

Thanks for doing that, real dedication at 4 in the morning and very interesting.

What a lot of shunting. I wonder if I shall manage to sleep through it!

 

[Highlandspring]

If it’s anything like last night you won’t, that was the roughest shunt I’ve ever experienced on the sleeper. I woke up thinking we’d hit something as I rolled out of bed...

 

[kingqueen]

At the moment, if somebody needing the accessible cabin wants to travel to or from Fort William they have to do some shuffling around. They have just written to me.

On our Highlander Route, until later this summer, we have to operate with the historic design and limited number of accessible coaches of the mark 3 fleet. The result is we can't automatically ensure each
train has an accessible room available. To manage this "inherited" physical feature, each time an accessible room is requested, we instruct accessible coaches to be planned onto the train configuration for that journey. With no automated way to do this, regrettably, we must ask those booking accessible rooms to contact our Guest Services Centre.

One wonders where the accessible coach is when it hasn't been booked for the Fort William leg. On another leg? thus meaning that they can't have an accessible cabin on every leg at once?

 

[Highlandspring]

If every portion needed a mk3 SLED coach then there would be a need for ten every night. There were, before the introduction of the mk5s and the withdrawal of eight vehicles, a total of twelve in the fleet. That suggests to me that there should be sufficient to have six SLED vehicles in operation every night for the remaining mk3 portions (Up and Down Fort William, Inverness & Aberdeen). Coach swaps - if any - must be done on depot because I haven’t seen any evidence so far this year of them mixing the sets up with ad hoc moves.

 

[kingqueen]

If it’s anything like last night you won’t, that was the roughest shunt I’ve ever experienced on the sleeper. I woke up thinking we’d hit something as I rolled out of bed...

If I roll out of bed I'm stuffed, because there's no way I can get up off the floor!

 

[kingqueen]

They also warn me that it isn't guaranteed that there will be wheelchair access to the lounge car, even outside the Edinburgh to London portion.

(Due)to the number of accessible coaches configured onto the Highlander trains, such that, on the mark 3 trains on our Highlander Routes, (which have to be configured to cater for three diverse final destinations and differing platform lengths at various stops en-route), must split and rejoin at different parts of each journey. When the trains split and re-join it is not always physically possible to configure the accessible coach such that it is positioned adjacent to enable wheelchair access to the Club Car, although we always endeavour to achieve this.

 

[MrEd]

Heard a suggestion (although not from any official channel, so I’m not sure how reliable it is) over the weekend that the introduction of the Mk5s on the Highlander might be further delayed beyond 2nd June. Is there any truth in this, do you think, and how long will it be delayed? I’m booked in a Club room (with an en-suite) on the northbound Fort William portion on July 3rd. If the Mk5s aren’t ready by then, would my reservation still be honoured in a first class berth in the existing Mk3 stock, or would I need to make arrangements with CS to rebook? I’ll need to be travelling that night in any case. I’m quite excited to travel on the Mk5s actually, I wonder what the likelihood of the Highlander being Mk5s in early July is?

 

[kingqueen]

Heard a suggestion (although not from any official channel, so I’m not sure how reliable it is) over the weekend that the introduction of the Mk5s on the Highlander might be further delayed beyond 2nd June. Is there any truth in this, do you think

I've come across two "official" communications. First this tweet:

Hi - we plan to operate the new trains on the Highlander from mid June, although we do not have a fixed date as yet. Please DM me with your case number and I will look into your booking for you. Regards, Joe.

Though corrected by this tweet:

Please accept my apologies for the error above - you are correct - tickets are available to purchase for our new fleet for journeys on or after the 2nd of June. There have been no changes to this date. Regards, Joe.

Today, a senior manager wrote to me, saying inter alia

If your preference is for travel on a Highlander Route, then to make the most of the new fleet, this travel would need to be once they have come into service, later in the summer.

I thought "later in the summer" is an interesting way to describe the 2nd June given it's 17th May already.
She also told me it would be extremely unlikely that I would be on the new stock for a journey on the 28th May.
Like you, I strongly suspect that it is being delayed.

If the Mk5s aren’t ready by then, would my reservation still be honoured in a first class berth in the existing Mk3 stock

Yes. The rule has been that such is automatic.

I wonder
r what the likelihood of the Highlander being Mk5s in early July is?

Frankly, I suspect nobody knows, but also that it is becoming less likely as time goes on...

I wonder what is going to happen when me and a disabled friend are supposed to be travelling "together" (read: one in one accessible cabin on one end of the accessible sleeper coach, one in the other accessible cabin on the other end of the accessible sleeper coach, so traveling a few tens of meters apart!) There aren't two accessible cabins on the Mk3s, only one, and it wouldn't be possible to share a cabin. So if it is swapped for Mk3s I don't know what will happen

 

[ainsworth74]

Sadly the discussion around the introduction of Mk3 sleepers and some of the routes that have lost their sleeper service over the years whilst interesting was very off-topic so has had to be removed. Happily, however, it has been possible to relocate this to a new thread which can be found here. Let's try and keep this one for observations relating to the current service rather than the one of yesteryear!

Thanks,
ainsworth74

 

[WesternLancer]

Sadly the discussion around the introduction of Mk3 sleepers and some of the routes that have lost their sleeper service over the years whilst interesting was very off-topic so has had to be removed. Happily, however, it has been possible to relocate this to a new thread which can be found here. Let's try and keep this one for observations relating to the current service rather than the one of yesteryear!

Thanks,
ainsworth74

Thanks - at least in part my fault so apols, you are quite right, thanks for shifting the stuff. Kind of you to do so.

 

[Highlandspring]

Heard a suggestion (although not from any official channel, so I’m not sure how reliable it is) over the weekend that the introduction of the Mk5s on the Highlander might be further delayed beyond 2nd June.

I’ve heard similar now from two independent sources, three if you count your post...

 

[Essexman]

I’ve just received an email regarding my booking from fort William on 2nd june which refers to bookings until 7th July and says they will be ‘classic’ trains. It says I’ll get £20 refund but not sure how that will work with Flexipass.

 

[BRX]

They've adopted Scotrail's 'classic' euphemism then...

 

[kingqueen]

Mark Smith has confirmed on Twitter:

CALEDONIAN SLEEPER UPDATE: The new Caledonian sleeper trains (as already running to Edinburgh/Glasgow) will be introduced on the Highland sleeper London to Inverness/Aberdeen/Ft William from 7 July northbound & 8 July southbound.