This from The Sleeper...
How civilised of NR to provide this pleasing vista for the delight of weary traincrew.
Hulleys’ Closure - My Thoughts
5 months ago
Tuesday, 7 September 2010
Pointless signs - LM goes the extra mile
This just in from BB...
Eye salutes the serious dedication shown by staff at Birmingham Snow Hill!
Monday, 6 September 2010
London Midland - committed to 'Elf & Safety
This with a bowler tip to @Swlines, via twitter...
To celebrate successfully completing his A Levels @Swlines is undertaking a Pilgrimage of Grice with a 14 day All Line Rover.
How to maximise driver hours - Explained
Exciting news from the road fleet world!
Eye has been sent these splendid images showing how Babcock's Network Division applied corporate branding to a road vehicle
And what a smart image it presents!
But what's this?
No doubt the amount of time it takes drivers to enter and exit vehicles is much reduced?
Publication praises Chairman - Shocker
Telegrammed by our International Correspondent
It contains a glowing account of the celebrations that Sir William McAlpine held to mark the 50 years he has lived in his agreeable stately pile at Fawley Hill, which also includes a one mile standard gauge railway.
Sir Bill is, of course, the Chairman of Railnews Limited. So good to see that the editorial team is already very clearly focused on meeting the needs of key stakeholders!
No matter.
The real meat is in the editorial, which does a manful and very moving job of analysing the Potter’s Bar Inquest proceedings – certainly good enough to cause consternation in the dead tree industry rags.
Focus is penned by Sim Harris, an ex-BBC man who keeps his ear very close to the ground.
Setting aside the curious launch timing – bang in the middle of the quietest week of the silly season when no-one of any consequence was at their desks, the new ePublication is a bid by Railnews for a new editorial beat.
Ever since it was conceived as the heir and successor to the old regional BR staff magazines it has stuck solidly to its blue collar audience. Now they are going after decision makers, a market targeted not wholly successfully by the erstwhile Rail Manager On Line.
But with only a small amount of lavish corporate advertising to go round in these straightened times, and great uncertainty about who our real decision makers actually are, it will be interesting to see if digital can trounce dead tree or if there will be tears before bedtime.
Meanwhile, Eye welcomes another member to the on-line Commentariat.
Exciting new design for the IEP?
Telegrammed by Ithuriel
According to everyone's favourite railway fortnightly this is the new name for the IEP
ボイジャー
Hitachi have made a five car EMU eliminated the power car and increased the number of underfloor 'donkey engines' to give enough power to match IC125 performance away from the wires.
That sounds like a diesel engine under the middle three cars with the electrical gubbins under the driving cars.
A design that appears to have much in common with the 子午線.
Great minds thinking alike or the Japanese perfecting yet another European design?
Friday, 20 August 2010
The Fact Compiler is on his hols...
So posting will be, at best, intermittent.
No doubt a source of relief to many.
Thursday, 19 August 2010
Railway Magazine changes ownership?
Eye understands that Mortons Media Group may be adding Railway Magazine to its growing portfolio of titles.
Regular Eye readers will recall that the Lincolnshire based specialist magazine publisher also snapped up Rail Express earlier this year.
The 2009 ABC audited figures showed Railway Magazine with a healthy circulation of 34,715 copies.
Health and safety spared the Age of Austerity
Hot on the heels of the Coucher Memorial Fencing which has been sprouting up around the network comes the latest in safety gold plating.
Welcome to the world of Stanchion Spikes!
Eyes correspondent Captain Biggles writes...
Has there been a sudden spate of stanchion climbers?
After all, the ac electrification seems to have managed without this 'protective' nonsense for 50 years.
Note that the stanchion in the background has not been treated...
Anyone any idea how much these new Elf'n'Safety features cost?
ATOC plans secret station opening - Shocker
Is ATOC secretly planning to open a new station?
Or does this page reflect its view of passengers?
Eye thinks we should be told?
UPDATE: This from Our Man in the Dark...
Since it's a Z code station it must be one of ours.
Are ATOC planning some kind of Underground takeover?
We should be told!
Railway Garden Competition - Wolverhampton
This from D0260...
Notice that this particular Railway Garden is safely under the watching eye of a CCTV camera.
Trolley Travels - Exciting new feature
Time for an exciting new feature focusing on the travels of platform trolleys!
This from Alex (13 years)...
Presumably this Yorkist trolley had hitched a lift on a passing Arriva Voyager (if it could have found any space!).
Anyhow, it looks happy enough with Wakefield Prison in the background.
Wednesday, 18 August 2010
WiFi on Arriva CrossCountry coming soon! Not.
Telegrammed by Wired William
Exciting news for Arriva CrossCountry passengers!
Regular readers will recollect that Arriva singularly failed to deliver on its CrossCountry franchise commitment to fit WiFi to their HST and Voyager fleets by the 11th November 2009.
So what has the supine DfT been doing to hold Arriva to account for breaching its franchise agreement?
A Freedom of Information request reveals errr.. not very much.
The released data contains myriad electronic and hard copy communications between DfT's Franchise Manager and Andy 'Duff' Cooper, the MD of CrossCountry.
Duff initially offered a range of excuses as to why Arriva should be able to shirk its franchise obligations, including offering up 3G as a jam tomorrow solution and then cheekily suggesting that the prevalence of dongles obviates any need for on-train WiFi.
A clearly exasperated DfT wrote to Arrive CrossCountry on the 2nd December 2009 instructing the franchise to implement WiFi by 31st January 2010.
Amusingly CrossCountry's Franchise and Internal Compliance Manager (sic) then penned the following to DfT:
"As it is not possible to install Wi-Fi in less than 2 months, we have been unable to meet that deadline."
This letter was dated the 26th February - almost a full month after the compliance date. Evidently Arriva holds the Department in high regard.
Finally DfT's Cross Country Franchise Manager wrote to Duff on the 7th May this year saying:
Franchise Agreement: Appendix 11 Part 1 paragraph 2.1 (b) (iii)
I refer to the above clause contained in the Franchise Agreement requiring CrossCountry to provide operational WiFI at all seats on its HST fleet by the revised delivery date of 31st January.
CrossCountry has failed to fulfil this Committed Obligation, and is in contravention of the Franchise Agreement. The DfT expects CrossCountry to meet all of its obligations to provide operational WiFi at all seats on both its HST and Voyager fleets.
Proposal
To enable realistic delivery of the HST and Voyager obligation and to include the obligations to offer complimentary WiFi to 1st class customers, the Department is prepared to agree to a revised delivery date of the 30th September 2010.
If CrossCountry would like to progress this proposal please advise me in writing so we can prepare the necessary documents.
Enforcement
The Department will take prompt enforcement action in respect of any future conravention. If Cross Country enters into this Contract Change and it appears likely at any time that you will not have complied with the relevant obligations by the new due date, the Department is currently minded to impose and enforcement order under section 55 of the Railways Act 1993, which may include a fine...
Fine words indeed!
But what's this?
As at the 6th August (the date of the last document released) the new date for WiFi fitment had still to be agreed by Arriva.
An email from Duff to DfT on that date contains yet more excuses as to why a date cannot be agreed, including:
- Consultants "applying for their own jobs" following a merger which prevented a technical workshop taking place until the end of August
- The need to secure a deal with REDACTED to secure better reception in Voyagers
- The need for a firm programme before agreeing a contract change
Meanwhile EMT has already started rolling out WiFi on its Meridians (Voyager derivatives).
With Deutsche Bahn due to complete its takeover of Arriva at the end of this month Eye wonders whether Teutonic efficiency can deliver where CrossCountry management couldn't?
UPDATE: This from Gricer Central...
Could you explain the link with Class 47 diesel locomotives that earns Andy Cooper the soubriquet "duff"?
The Fact Compiler being an old phart believes that Cross Country trains should always have a Duff leading!
The risks of portion working explained
This from the Daily Mail...
Tourists on a sleeper train from Spain to Italy woke up nearly 200 miles off course - after French railway signallers gaffed and sent them to Switzerland.
Technicians split the train as scheduled in the city of Lyon after it arrived from Barcelona in the early hours of Monday.
But they mixed up the carriages bound for Milan in northern Italy with those supposed to go to the Swiss city of Zurich 175 miles away.
Of course a complete surprise that the Frenchies managed to bugger up the services of another country's operator.
UPDATE: This from King Henry...
My correspondent in Crewe has telegraphed this to me:
A nice story from Switzerland, lifted from the Swiss Rail chat group...
"According to an item on the local radio something went wrong when the "Trenhotel" from Barcelona was separated in to its two sections in Lyon last night. The section for Milano was dispatched to Zürich and the Zürich section to Milan!
"When the train arrived in Zurich, it was full of bewildered passengers. The section for Zürich was stopped on its way to Milano on the French - Italian border and diverted back on to the right route, arriving in Zürich three hours late.
"Those travellers that arrived in Zürich by accident were transported to Milano by the SBB."
Embarrassing, but not quite as embarrassing as the night one of my namesakes on a Birmingham express took the wrong turn at Ashendon Junction and headed for the Great Central.
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