Wyvern Rail in one and a quarter minutes

A bit of Friday night easy viewing via Raildate:




Lovely.

McLoughlin signals end to micro-management!

Yesterday the Secretary of State visited NR's Western Route to look at flood damage. 

Here Patrick is being interviewed by the Beeb at the site of the Westerleigh landslip between Swindon and Bristol, where a falling away of part of the track’s foundations is resulting in service alterations and delay.

 
And here the Route Managing Director, Patrick Hallgate, describes mitigation measures and plans to restore full service, as well as pointing out that this site is one of dozens his team are currently dealing with across the Route.

Note that the SoS has resisted the urge to dress up as a member of railway staff!

An encouraging sign for the future?

Melbourne Metro: Dumb ways to die

This Australian safety video has gone viral...



Not sure why Boris Johnson features at the end though!

Macquarie enters Rosco market

This from Macquarie

Macquarie Acquires Rolling Stock Business From Lloyds, Launches New Rail Business

Macquarie Group has launched a new rail business, Macquarie European Rail, and agreed to acquire a European rolling stock leasing business from Lloyds Banking Group.

It has acquired from Lloyds a fleet of rolling stock leased to the franchisee of the Stansted Express airport rail service, and also a rail freight portfolio of locomotives and wagons under operating lease to two operators in the United Kingdom.

The deal also involves the acquisition of a continental European rail freight and passenger portfolio of locomotives, passenger trains and wagons on operating lease to operators in Europe.

For those interested in such things this involves CB Rail (the continental rolling stock lessor), the Stansted Express Electrostar (cl379) fleet and some UK freight assets (including some 66s, the Class 70s and wagons).

What is unclear at the moment is whether this deal includes the Cross Country and West Coast Voyager fleets?

Siemens buy Invensys

This from the Graun...

Engineering group Invensys shocked the City on Wednesday night when it sold its rail business to German rival Siemens for £1.74bn, in the latest foreign takeover of a British technology firm.

If you can't beat them, buy them!

Dods tells it like it is!

This, surprisingly, from the 'Tash of Dickie Davis...

Trust you saw the influence of Freud in this recent email from Dods!

Highlighted for ease of reading…

'Laidlow' indeed!

RDG: They were only playing leapfrog!

Exciting news from the latest minutes of the Rail Delivery Group! 
 
‘The working group continues to discuss how to help inform DfT’s response to the consultation on the role of the ORR.’.

Hmmmm!

So an RDG Working Group (staffed from NR and TOCs) is telling DfT how to respond to a consultation (which was co-written by DfT and ORR, and has now closed) on what ORR might, or might not, do in the future.

Cosy.

Altogether now: "One staff officer jumped right over another staff officer's back. And another staff officer jumped right over that other staff officer's back..."

Grand Central abolishes Christmas!

Oh dear.

It looks like Grand Central is about to fail the Daily Mail test!

The Arriva owned company is offering a 'Festive Timetable' covering the period between 22nd December and 1st January.

But of 'Christmas' and the 'New Year' not a word.

No doubt this one will run and run!

Open Access? Bah humbug!

Armitt to National Express

This from Sky News...

The former head of Network Rail, Sir John Armitt, is to become the new chairman of National Express, the bus and rail operator.

The smooth and urbane Armitt should compliment the more forthright style of NatEx's Chief Exec.

Come to think of it perhaps National Express should consider a rebrand to something more up-market?

Armitt & Finch has a nice ring to it!

UPDATE: This from the Internet Rapid Rebuttal Unit...

You may want to on-pass the following to National Express.

My spell checker always wanted to correct 'Armitt' to 'Armpit'.

Fortunately it never got into a press release...

Ticket simplification explained

This seen at St Pancras, with a bowler tip to @13milepost...

What could be simpler?

Will legal action delay Laidlaw report?

This from the Daily Telegraph...

Kate Mingay, one of the three civil servants suspended over the West Coast rail bid fiasco, has filed legal proceedings against the Department for Transport over the way she has been treated.

With the preliminary hearing due to take place in the High Court on Thursday Eye wonders if this will have an impact on the publication date of the Laidlaw Inquiry's findings, due out at the end of this month?
 
The involvement of m'learned friends may also mean that Sam Laidlaw's appearance at the Transport Select Committee next Tuesday will be rather less than illuminating.

Pointless signs - St Pancras

Good to see that nanny is alive and well at St Pancras...

Do we really need to treat passengers as if they are idiots?

Floodballs - Rail Freight to the rescue

This from the Oxford Mail's flooding update page...

Really?

Brown Review - update

Interesting.

Sources suggesting that Richard Brown was appointed directly by Patrick McLoughlin rather than being selected by Marsham Street mandarins.

Clearly, in Derbyshire at least, blood is thicker than water.

Indeed there is a growing view that Brown may even be prepared to rock the boat with his report.

We shall see.

Meanwhile those interested in making constructive contributions to the review may do so via: Brown.Review@dft.gsi.gov.uk

Alternatively, you can post correspondence to:

The Brown Review
Hercules House
Hercules Road
Lambeth
London
SE1 7DU

Eye readers will be reassured to see that the SE1 address means contributions are unlikely to be opened by purveyors of the failed franchising orthodoxy.

UPDATE: This from The Spirit of Dark and Lonely Water...

Mr Brown at Hercules House?

This used to be the home of the late lamented Central Office of Information – the body that once delivered government advice with less of nudge and more of a supportive hand on the shoulder, whilst the other was firmly clamped on the nads.

Meanwhile I greatly enjoyed Gwyn Topham's story in today’s Grauniad, which accurately reflects what the RDG 'privately told the man shaping the future of franchising'.

Does Eye have any idea qui bono?

Eye goes soft in Dead Tree Media - Shocker

A surprising encomium in the latest contribution to Passenger Transport published on the 16th November...

The next edition of Passenger Transport will be published on the 30th November.

Directive 91/440/EEC - Just fancy that!

This from Reuters...

The European Union's Transport Commissioner wants rail companies to separate their passenger and freight train business from their railway network management activities by 2023 to make it easier for new entrants to compete, a German newspaper reported.

So obviously not a requirement in 1993, eh Mr Major?
 

First for the new Third Class

This from Rover...

Charging a first class fare for standing or squatting in the vestibule?

Every penny counts!

UPDATE: This from Chionanthus Virginicus...

Presumably where it is necessary to use an external door of a First Class vestibule when joining/alighting at stations with short platforms, a punishable offence has been committed?

Better extend the dwell times then!!

UPDATE: This from Strawbrick...

The no standing in a 1st vestibule with a 2nd Class ticket rule has been in force for at least 57 years. I was 10 years old when I was so told by a Ticket Inspector (sic) when he found me standing in the Corridor (sic again). 

Happily my Mother was able to show him both our first class tickets.

Also, I think you will get short shrift on a flight if you went and stood in Upper/Business/Executive/Club/etc... class with an Economy Ticket ...

I also think something similar applies aboard ships.

The problem is that passengers get upset when they see empty 1st Class seats when Standard Class is full and standing and the train crew do not see fit to exercise the option to declassify the 1st sections. 

They do not do this for a number of reasons:

1. The possibility that passengers may ask for refunds of upgrades; and 
2. That 1st Class passengers might complain vociferously
3. Or more likely, that Control haven't autho!

And yes, I do travel 1st Class because... (err... so do many Eye readers! Ed) And yes, I do ask guards why they have not declassified. 

The answers include "I didn't know I could", I have been told not to" and (best of all) "I would have done, but i could not get through the train to check because it was too full"(!).

One final point, when I started commuting on 310's the 50% uplift in fare was matched by a 50% uplift in space (no knocking of knees) and much more comfortable seats. 

The uplift is still 50% (and some off-peak savings are not available) whilst the extra space has typically shrunk to something like 20% and on the Southern Trains to CLJ the seats appear to be exactly the same.

But of course I take your point on the unnecessary aggression in the notice.
There is no automatic "fine" as the notice would imply, as you have the option of moving or staying but paying for an upgrade.

Britain's Best Bridge Bashes - Bustitution

This from BB...

This is my particular favourite! 

Note the destination blind...

Pointless signs - Essex Road

The Case of the Silent Committee

Telegrammed by 221b Baker Street
Mornin' Holmes.

Good morning, Watson.  I observe you have been reading Mr Samuel Laidlaw's initial report into the strange case of the ICWC franchise competition cancellation

Indeed so, Holmes.  And given the limited time available it is an excellent piece of investigation.

You will, of course, have noted the significance of the section covering the deliberations of the Contract Award Committee?

But Holmes, dashed if I could see any reference to any deliberations by that Committee in the report.

That, Watson, is the significance.