This from Captain Deltic...
Today, 11 June, is the 800th day since the last rolling stock order was placed.
Note, placed, not preferred bidder selected.
Altogether now, and perhaps ATOC, Network Rail, Passenger Focus, RIA and Sir Roy McNulty might care to join in...
Why are we waiting, why are we waiting...?
This from GJ Churchward...
So Network Rail has published a Rolling Stock RUS!
Eye readers can discover the salient points here:
We have published the draft for consultation of the Network Route Utilisation Strategy: Passenger Rolling Stock.
The Network RUS: Passenger Rolling Stock focuses on the opportunities and efficiencies which arise when purchasing new rolling stock. It considers the requirements of passengers in each market sector. It then demonstrates how planning the rolling stock and infrastructure together can enable the network to become more inter-operable to enable rolling stock to go anywhere it is needed to serve its nominated market sector.
Given the cost of purchasing new rolling stock, opportunities, to exploit economies of scale which could be achieved from simplifying the types of vehicles available and smoothing the profile of procurement are particularly important.
The emerging strategy of the RUS draft for consultation recommends:
For the avoidance of doubt...
Despite all today's fine words and column inches it remains 602 days since the last order for new trains was placed.
And tomorrow it will be 603 days, and on Saturday 604 days, and on Sunday 605 days, and on Monday 606 days, etc...
So Secretary of State, when will the first of the 2,100 new vehicles that you have promised actually be ordered?
This from Captain Deltic...
So busy proof reading Rail Business Intelligence that I overlooked that yesterday was the 600th day without a new train order. (Eye doesn't normally allow such blatant plugs, but just this once. Ed)
But luckily I remembered just now as I was assembling the trophies for this Friday's Golden Spanner Awa... (Oi! I've warned you Deltic, you're barred! Ed)
UPDATE: This from Ithuriel...
Is it not odd that those local representatives pressing for more capacity haven't latched onto the good Captain's latest ticking time bomb and used it to their own ends?
UPDATE: This from Steve Strong...
Perhaps tomorrow's announcement by the Secretary of State will address this problem?
Oh no, now I remember.
Mr Hammond is due to announce the wrong train that nobody actually wants.
Apart that is from Mr Kipling, obviously.
UPDATE: This from Captain Deltic...
But any order won't count until the contract has been signed, not to mention the protests from other manufacturers being heard in court.
So, no change tomorrow, I suspect.
Compare and contrast:
This from the FT:
The French authorities have been accused of trying to block the first-ever order by an affiliate of SNCF, France’s national train operator, for non-French high-speed trains, after Eurostar named Germany’s Siemens preferred bidder for a new train fleet.
With this from Rail Business Intelligence...
Bombardier insiders continue to express their frustration at the lack of progress in developing a bi-mode version of the Class 22X DEMU... According to Bombardier, the company has held numerous meetings over the past three years with DfT...
So in France you can have whatever you want, as long as it is built by Alstom. Whilst in the UK you just can't.
UPDATE: This from Bill Hoole...
Why do drivers need a large plaque in the cab telling them the sort of train they are driving?
So long as you can find the Regulator and the brake when you get in the cab, that's all you need to know.
UPDATE: This from Sir Humphrey Beeching...
As some of my departmental colleagues might quip - it's the regulator that's the problem.
If Pollyanna would only get out of the cab the railway would run so much better...
This from our man at 222 Marylebone Road
Compare and contrast, as they say.
Northern and EMT get 16 vintage DMU vehicles between them and the Government pulls out the PR stops boosting this £17.8 million deal.
Potty old Passenger Focus hails 'new trains'.
Now consider this routine statement from Bombardier.
BERLIN, GERMANY--(Marketwire - March 24, 2010) - Bombardier Transportation received an order for 49 additional Regio2N regional double-deck trains, as an option from the "Regio2N" contract signed with SNCF on behalf of the French Regions, on 24 February 2010. This additional order for 49 trains, which will be financed by the Regions, amounts to approximately 350 million euros ($ 474 million US).
And while so called experts say that the French Regions have been starved to pay for TGV, these really are very nice trains.
And it's going to get worse...
Eye hears that there are to be quite a few HLOS rolling stock deals to be signed over the next 10 days.
First Great Western, as speculated in Modern Railways, is to get 30 class 150 vehicles from LooRoll and London Midland in late summer 2010
Northern loses the 180s to East Coast but gain seven 142 sets from First Great Western and quite a significant number of Class 150s (sources suggest up to 20)
EMT gets four more 156 units from Northern so that all Nottingham - Liverpool services become four car throughout the day.
So a great victory for Manchester, Liverpool, and Leeds (prop Gordon Brown) but not so good for the Tory Shires.
Could there be an election in the offing?
Quite possibly - but even Labour's strategists can't speed up Bombardier's production lines.
Testing of the first of eight two Car 172s for LooRoll has only just begun.
These units are followed by four for the Chiltern Gau of the Reichsbahn.
Which could push the LM deliveries into next year!
Wasn't there supposed to have been a Rolling Stock Plan published last autumn?
UPDATE: This from Ithuriel...
Doesn't 'shuffling the deckchairs' give a misleading impression of purposeful activity?
Isn't it more the case that DfT is trying to find enough beach towels so that those in the unshuffled deckchairs can share two between three?
The Fact Compiler wonders if there is a measure for Deckchairs in Excess of Capacity?
UPDATE: This from Leo Pink...
That would be DIXC as in 'Whistling Dixie'.
Which is all that passengers on capacity starved TOCs can do...
This from Lord Adonis yesterday...
In July I undertook to review the Department’s rolling stock plan in the light of the electrification announcements and other developments. The Government remains committed to providing an additional 1300 carriages by mid-2014.
Until commercial negotiations on the Thameslink programme are completed, I am not in a position to update the rolling stock plan, which is critically dependent on the determination of the Thameslink rolling stock contract.
No shit Sherlock (see Eye passim)
UPDATE: This from a Mr Chips with Everything...
The ex Thameslink Class 319 units appear to be the answer to all Lord Adonis’ prayers.
According to various sources, following:
This written answer given on the 2nd December by Moley...
David Ruffley (- Shadow Minister, Home Affairs; Bury St Edmunds, Conservative)
To ask the Minister of State, Department for Transport what the average age of rolling stock used on the Norwich to London railway line was during (a) 2007, (b) 2008 and (c) to date in 2009.
Chris Mole (Parliamentary Under-Secretary, Department for Transport; Ipswich, Labour)
The Department for Transport does not hold the information requested in relation to the average age of rolling stock used on the Norwich to London railway line.
The Eye is still struggling to understand how the Department can produce a meaningful Rolling Stock Plan if they don't have access to such basic data.
As regular Eye readers will be aware Ministers have been assuring Parliament that such a thing will be published in the "Autumn".
As it is now winter perhaps Marsham Street has finally admitted it's just not up to the task?
UPDATE:
Just thought I'd pause from welding up a Pacer underframe to point out the DfT Rail doesn't need to know the age of rolling stock because it is assumed that all ex-BR stock will run forever.
UPDATE: This from J Alfred Prufrock...
The Autumn ends with the winter Equinox, which falls on 21 December.
Mr Mole has also said that the Plan is proving to be a major challenge and he hopes to get it out by Christmas, which this year falls on 25th December...
But note that he did not say Autumn of which year.
UPDATE: This from Trailer Second...
Captain Deltic welding a Pacer underframe?
Their underframes will outlast us all.
In fact the MOD want them for the next version of the AFV, expected to be built by a "British led Consortium" of Krupp, Mitsubishi and Fiat...
UPDATE: This via North Pole depot...
Every year my delivery Plan is a challenge, but I usually manage to achieve it on the night.
However this year I have had to find a new piece of "sliding stock" myself.
Despite promises of a re-worked underframe from a "surplus" Oldham Loop unit (thanks for trying Captain D!), I have had to resort to a short term lease arrangement on a flatrol from a Heritage Line in return for some guest appearances before the big night itself... as if I didn't have enough to do.
So tell DafT they'll be very lucky to get any Plan in their stockings from me!
Père Noel
Gare du Pôle Nord
It's late.
The Department for Transport originally promised it in Autumn.
It now admits it will be published at the 'end of the year'.
Shadow Transport Minister Stephen Hammond is unconvinced.
At a conference in Manchester today he said he expected it to emerge in March next year!
Hammond is clearly realistic about his future Department's ability to deliver.
When does winter start?
The Fact Compiler likes the old ways and thus marks the start of Autumn from Lammas Day (1st August).
Which means that there are just over two weeks till the start of Winter.
Eye wonders if Moley knew this when he provided the following written answer in Parliament yesterday:
On
The clock's ticking.
This just in from a Mr Saltaire...
I wondered if Eye readers might appreciate a quick and dirty breakdown of what today's announcement means in rolling stock terms?
This taken from the Departments 'The Case for Electrification' published today:
This just in from yesterday's Anglo-sino trade bilateral.
UK Government signals unconditional acceptance of terms for Chinese trains.
Rumours of further changes to HSBC's rail division.
Having shot both the MD and Head of Customer Services the banking group is apparently looking to dispense with the Rosco's 'New Business Team'.
This is the team which only this July won £180m worth of business financing the new Siemens trains for Scotrail.
Looks like HSBC is supremely confident about DafT's promise of 1,300 new vehicles.
The Fact Compiler has an apology to make. He has in the past accused DafT of being clueless. He accepts that this is not true.
They are in fact completely clueless.
Railway Eye readers may recollect an amusing Parliamentary exchange on the 19th June when Tom Harris 'fessed-up that his civil servants have no idea how much rolling stock there is on the network and are reliant upon a Roger Ford crib.
Now of course this could not possibly be true because in January of this year DafT published a Rolling Stock Plan which said where new trains should go. So they must know where the existing trains are.
To help clear the matter up Shadow Transport Minister Stephen Hammond MP tabled a further question along the same lines asking the Secretary of State "on what date her Department ceased to hold and collate this information?"
Yesterday Tom Harris gave the written answer: "I refer the hon. Member to my answer of 19 June. This information has never been routinely collected in the Department."
Rail Minister Tom Harris had a difficult end to his week on Friday when there was quite a media brouhaha over his blog question demanding why Britons are "so bloody miserable".
The Fact Compiler fears that he must add to his woes by drawing attention to an extraordinary written reply he gave last Thursday to a Parliamentary question on rolling stock.Stephen Hammond (Shadow Minister, Transport; Wimbledon, Conservative): To ask the Secretary of State for Transport how many (a) locomotives, (b) multiple units, (c) freight wagons and (d)carriages were in use on the rail network in the most recent period for which figures are available, broken down by (i) train operating company and (ii) class.
Tom Harris (Parliamentary Under-Secretary, Department for Transport; Glasgow South, Labour): This information is not held by the Department for Transport, but is widely available in the specialist press.
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