This from Rob Roy…
Good to see that VT East Coast has their finger on the pulse in this information age.
One would have thought that someone might have noticed that the warning about Cross Country industrial action on Sunday the 19th is no longer current today?
This from Bernie the Bolt...
With this morning's PPM languishing at just over 60% expect lots of huffing and puffing from ministers on delivery and the importance of correct information.
So time to look at the DafT website - which apparently contains an exciting announcement on High Speed Rail, published on the 17th January 2013...
This from Henry Trumpet...
A big welcome to Whitehall's brand spanking new interwebby - just gone live today!
A single Whitehall website in which the DfT is the first enlightened member to join, along with Pickles' DCLG (only 22 more Departments to follow!).
Click on the link and then click to go to the new “gov/dft” site to find a beggar's muddle of DfT-DCLG info (Eye thought DafT was cosying up to BIS? Ed).
And what is the headline story on this exciting new window into the non micro-managing department?
Additional 'Santa Specials' from that nice man Stormin' Norman!
Make it up you could not.
This from Bloomburg...
Arcapita, formerly known as First Islamic Investment Bank, filed for Chapter 11 March 19 along with five affiliates, listing assets of $3.06 billion and liabilities of $2.55 billion. Arcapita Investment Holdings Ltd., already in U.S. bankruptcy, has also filed a bankruptcy in the Cayman Islands in aid of the Chapter 11 proceeding.
Arcapita acquired Freightliner in 2008.
Freightliner's website was unavailable for comment, or indeed anything...
UPDATE: Happy Friday! Freightliner now back on-line...
Good to see that Abellio is on top of all this timekeeping stuff.
This screen grab from their Greater Anglia website taken at 12:10 today:
By Eye's reckoning the start of the franchise is now a mere five days away, give or take a couple of hours..
No matter.
On the plus side, if Clog Rail use the same widget for their timetables then services will arrive almost a full month before booked time.
This from Percy Kilometer...
ATOC's "Nationalrail" website appears unaware that Cambridge now has TWO more platforms - which opened a month ago at the timetable change in mid-December.
Perhaps Eye should remind ATOC that the franchise also changes hands at midnight on February the 4th?
Hopefully they will be ready to update their site accordingly?
UPDATE: This from a Mr Layt...
When NRES has done with Cambridge can you send their station plan makers in the direction of Reading which saw major changes including new platform numbers at Christmas?
Well there's a surprise!
The DfT's High Speed Rail website has crashed.
Yet again the Department for Transport shows just how good it is at anticipating and meeting actual demand.
Exciting news from Network Rail!
Good to see that the Infrastructure Controller is being careful with the pennies by recycling assets.
Note the use of a very dated BR crest...
No doubt when Thandi counted BR amongst its clients they supplied 'Charabancs for the Gentry'.
Oh dear!
A little knowledge is a dangerous thing.
This from Rail.co...
Should someone tell them that Select Committees are there to hold the Government to account?
UPDATE: This from Gricer Queen...
It's also nice to see that HS2 will have none of that untidy electric knitting.
Diseasels all the way!
UPDATE: This, dementedly, from McIvatt, Thane of Pride...
Is this a loco which I see before me,
The cab toward my hand? Come, let me lease thee.
I have thee not, and yet I see thee still.
Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible
To traction as to sight? or art thou but
A loco of the mind, a false creation,
Proceeding from the IEP-oppressed brain?
I see thee yet, in form as palpable
As this which now I draw.
Enough Dead Poets. Ed.
Eye salutes Arlington Fleet Services!
Clearly there are no limits to the engineering skills of the Eastleigh based company.
Under a section on their website headed Notable Projects there are pictures showing overhaul work undertaken on an Inspection Saloon for London Underground.
What a transformation!
Eye looks forward to seeing this particular 'GM' Saloon on the Circle line.
This from a Resident of Grub Street...
Despite last week's arrival of 'Huggable Higgins' NR still appears unable to shake off the ghost of its former Chief Exec.
This from Network Rail's media website today...
Perhaps updates to this site are still pend'ing approval?
Oh dear!
The new, improved, caring, sharing and feminised Network Rail is starting to emerge from under the Coucher shadow.
This 'icky making nonsense in an email sent to NR's Safety Central subscribers...
Click on the image to see it in all it's ghastliness!
"Check out the list of David-friendly improvements"
And the pièce de résistance...
"It’s more stylish, like you David"
Has NR recruited the former editor of Just 17 to run Safety Central?
Exciting news from the National Rail Enquiries website!
Regular Eye readers will recollect that ATOC was less than transparent when it announced the scale of fare increases last week.
A Mr Fergy-Lee has discovered the reason why...
And here in close-up...
Good to see the railway doing its bit to address the national debt.
This from a Captain Nolan...
I grabbed this screenshot after booking tickets on East Coast's site yesterday:
It was nice to see the both NXEC and East Coast have ensured that the money spent on re-branding the booking system has resulted in a thorough job being done.
This from the South West Trains website, with a bowler tip to a Mr Poobah...
And here in close up:
SWT treating customers as suckers etc... (make-up your own weak pun here) etc...
Telegrammed by our International Correspondent
What has happened to Rail Champions?
Set up by the fragrant "BBC Legend" Maggie Philbin, with help from Messrs Marshall and Harris of Railnews fame, Rail Champions claims to be a business that is:
"dedicated to strengthening your company's brand. We provide creative solutions to your advertising and marketing challenges, increasing your company's presence in the UK Rail Sector."
Alas.
You won't be able to find out about them on anything as fancy-dan as the internet, because their website is suffering from Error 404 syndrome.
But if you use the Google cached facility you can still find it... just.
No wonder their portfolio of renowned clients is password protected.
This from the Raver....
Good to see ATOC has its fingers well and truly on the political pulse!
For the politically illiterate, or those who have been asleep for the last year, Gordon leads Labour and Nick the LibDems.
Looks like it's not just railway knowledge that is missing from the TOC lobby group.
What on earth is going on over at London Midland?
Industry jungle drums suggest that Captain Permatan's second worst performing TOC (No1 South Eastern) is busy shedding staff.
Meanwhile, beleagured passengers actually trying to find out how the doomed franchise is operating its piss-poor train services have to negotiate a list of impertinent questions; including a request that they divulge their age and 'gender'.
Quite what that has to do with how trains are running is anyones guess.
Alas - the overactive web-monkey who designed the form has dropped a clanger.
In the Age of Change the options male and female are only appropriate to a question demanding details of a person's 'sex' - as any fule kno.
But a question on Gender must include at least the following options: Straight, Gay, Bi, Harperson or Permatan (below the rank of Captain).
Hopefully at least one p45 will be winging its way to the originator of this distasteful example of politically incorrect passenger profiling.
Good news for the worthy burghers of Milton Keynes!
Evidently the town's 1980s built railway station just isn't smart enough for the new home of Network Rail and a much grander edifice is set to replace it.
Or so it would seem judging by this page on ATOC's website (with a bowler tip to A Frog): 
Of course there is no surprise that the ATOC sleepy heads haven't yet noticed this pictoral howler.
What with their depressing habit of defenestating anyone with even a scintilla of railway knowledge...
UPDATE: This from swlines via Twitter...
Moved further north than that actually... it's moved all the way up the Far North to delightful Wick!
UPDATE: This from cbuchanancubed via Twitter...
Every station on the network is Waterloo on this website - station investment fund is making good progress!
UPDATE: This from Driver Potter...
See as the third rail advances into the howling wastes of the North.
Spread the Holy Word to The Heathens, My Son.
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