It would appear the 10:04 Preston-Barrow is going to continue through Barrow and up the coast to Carlisle, no idea why!
Interesting, if this has happened. Perhaps a fault on a coach on set 2 that requires it to be cut out or repaired in Barrow sidings? Itd have three hours before it had to go anywhere else at 14:37
Was on the 10:04 from Preston today (or rather the 10:25 from Carnforth), which then became the 11:38 BIF-CAR. The guard informed me before we arrived into Barrow there was a fault with one of the locomotives so the decision had been made just to continue running our train forward to Carlisle. Given how tight the connection, the fact the service from Preston was running about 10 minutes late and the fact most people on board would have been connecting to the Carlisle service anyway this seemed like a sensible thing to do. As we arrived into Barrow the set was sat in the platform opposite.
Anyway, a few observations from today's journey, if I may:
1. After we left Barrow we ran on time (give or take a couple of minutes) the whole journey - in fact I believe we arrived into Carlisle early!
2. I noticed no discernible difference in station dwell times compared to multiple units whatsoever. The fact we ran on time I guess is testament to that.
3. From what I observed, the fears many people have on here about the locals being unable to work the low-tech doors seemed unfounded. The only issue was passengers not closing the doors behind them. All it would have taken was a little notice over the PA to say "please close the doors behind you" in addition to the never ending announcements about minding the step onto the platform. That said this didn't seem to hinder our progress at all.
4. The Northern guard and on board DRS staff were working very hard indeed and were going stirling work running up and down the train dealing with doors and dispatch duties. However...
5. Because the guard was working so hard with this a ticket check was only carried out once from Barrow. This concerns me because the medium- to long-term viability for the extra capacity will be assessed based on the revenue and passenger numbers it carries (along with the other factors), and this in turn will be based on ticket sales. Many passengers boarded at unstaffed stations with no ticket issuing facilities, so many got a free ride (unless they already had a ticket) and consequently won't be counted for statistical purposes. With the set up the way it currently is the guard is too busy managing the actual train so there may be a case for another member of staff to work the train in a revenue capacity.
6. As others have stated the train was too long for many of the stations. However there was a rather inconsistent approach to which carriages passengers should disembark from at which stations. Sometimes it was A and B, sometime C and D (I should add the announcements were crystal clear). Perhaps it's to do with the location of signals or something, but if it were possible to just always use the front two or rear two carriages this would make things easier for the on board staff who were frantically pacing the train before each station, and also for the passengers who, despite the excellent announcements over the PA, would have a clearer idea about where they needed to get on or off. Either way - a lot of the 'short' platforms were actually long enough, but just had sections which were out of use. So if this arrangement is to continue in the medium- to long-term it might save a lot of door hassle to just bring these parts of the platforms back to into use - I guess that will depend on how much it costs!
7. The DRS carriages were very well turned out indeed: neat, clean and comfortable. I overheard the passenger opposite me on the phone stating "It's a really old train, but it's much nicer and in better nick than the usual rubbish we get."