London Midland at Shepherd's Bush

[theorangeone]

When looking at the layout maps of Shepherd's Bush station on the West London Line, this came up as one of the pictures of the southbound platform.

Does anyone know how what I'm guessing is a London Midland Class 350 came to appear at Shepherd's Bush? Especially in LM livery, and seemingly in public service? Because that picture cannot be very old.

 

[Nym]

I believe that some of the 350/1 units where subleased to Southern to cover stock shortages at some point.

 

[swt_passenger]

It was when a planned increase in Thameslink capacity became stalled due to late delivery of some stock or other, possibly 377/5s?

The solution was that Southern loaned a few extra 377/2s to Thameslink for a few months, and LM units operated the Southern WLL service, because they were in a position to do so as their 350/2 order was just coming into service.

About half a dozen 350/1s were allocated, (i.e. more were checked out as DC capable than actually needed on a day to day basis) and IIRC one of the FOCs might have even provided the drivers.

The unit's side displays showed the words 'Southern' underneath the destination. I've attached a picture I took at Milton Keynes (in June 2009) that I originally took to show how difficult the shoe gear is to see when it is in the raised position.

 

[MK Tom]

Three 350s and one 377/2 operated MK-Croydon for about a year during 2009-2010 time.

 

[33056]

IIRC one of the FOCs might have even provided the drivers.

You remember correctly, they were DBS drivers mostly based at Wembley though I do recollect at least one Rugby driver who did them.

 

[Crossover]

Yeah - you can no doubt imagine my disappointment to take my first trip from Harrow and Wealdstone to Sherherds Bush hoping for a new train (i.e. a class I had never travelled on) and got one of the ruddy 350/1's on loan (having just come from Stafford to London on one not long before!)

 

[Class377/5]

In 2009 the 23 new 377/5 were running very late (turned out to be a year late in the end) so a massive cascade was planned across the industry.

FCC got 8x 377/2 (and a ton of short forms)
Southern got 5x 350/1 and 3x 375s
LM used the 350/2 arrivals to cover for the missing 350/1
Southeastern got 319/377s on its routes

Whole thing kicked in for the 21 March 2009 timetable change when Blackfriars bays closed for rebuilding.