BBQ season again

Looks like EMT's Aslef members will be having another barbecue this Sunday, the second in as many weeks.

This from the Nottingham Evening Post...

Tim Shoveller, managing director of East Midlands Trains, said: "For the second week running, it appears that the majority of our drivers have made themselves unavailable for work on Sunday. As we have had no indication otherwise, we can only assume that this is linked to the on-going drivers' pay negotiations."

Presumably the first one wasn't fighty enough?

First for getting DafT to bail out franchises

Good news for First Group.

Although profits from its rail operations fell by a whopping 20% last year, The Evening Standard today reveled that First Great Western has received "a secret £50 million bailout from the taxpayer".


Should be just enough to buy back all those remaindered copies of Moir's lovely book.

Public fury at Euston station

Who would be a DafT press officer?

At this morning's press junket to celebrate the opening of the West Coast Main line an irate member of the public raced up to the assembled hacks and accused one of them of being Geoff Hoon.

Witnessing the commotion a brave PR thrust himself into the line of fire, assuring the agitated lady that the hack was neither Hoon, nor indeed any other member of the political class.

Alas.

For this selfless act of bravery the poor PR received both barrels from the disgruntled voter, who had a word or two to say on the wickedness of our beloved Secretary of State.

Geoff, if you can take your nose out the trough for long enough, perhaps a word of thanks to this bruised PR.

Can DafT deliver anything on time?

Are DafT undertakings worth the paper they are written on?

In the South Central Franchise consultation document Daft glibly asserts that:

In London, the Oyster smartcard is already accepted for season tickets, and from 2009 Oyster pay as you go (PAYG) will be valid on all national rail services in London.

Alas.

The delivery deficient department has now made it clear that this won't happen till 2010.

Provoking predictable fury from London's TravelWatch:

“Passengers at railway stations around the capital are walking past covered up, unused Oyster machines every day, and have been for months. The lack of an integrated system and any joined-up thinking is ridiculous in a modern city like London. Another delay is simply unacceptable, and it is time for the Department for Transport to hold the transport providers to account.”

To paraphrase Reginald Perrin: "Why don't you re-time all your announcements to arrive a year late? - then they will all be on time."

Angel to cut staff?

***18 jobs 'at risk' at Angel Trains***

Bombardier cuts staff

This from the Crewe and Nantwich Guardian...

Bombardier Transportation UK has announced further redundancies at Crewe - 75 from the shop floor and 11 office staff.

Lucky Gwyneth wasn't around to see this.

Sir Humphrey on Pacers

Our man in Marsham Street, top civil servant Sir Humphrey Beeching, tells Eye over an after work G&T that the on-going delay to the announcement of the preferred bidder for the 202 DMU vehicles is due to the dramatic improvement in the reliability of the Pacer fleets.

With three fleets over 6000 miles per casualty and only one under 4000, the operating and engineering chappies reckon they can now get by with fewer new, and expensive, DMUs which, in any event are generally used by provincial people for whom Pacers are more than sufficient.

Suggestions that DfT Rail can't raise the funding, or find an independent expert willing to undercut Porterbrook on lease rentals are officially deprecated.

An humble submission to The High Court of Parliament

This chap seems okay.

The cheapest MP in the House.

Any chance you can make him Speaker?

Unless there is someone else who claims less.

That would be good.

Ta.

Eye names the railway hoons

Telegrammed by our man at 222 Marylebone Road.
Tonight's London Evening Standard names three ministers who could face police inquiries over the expenses revelations.

Darling, McNulty and Hoon (obviously)

All three have 'served' in the Department for Transport.

Cameron stamps on hoons

***Cameron to instruct Tory MPs to repay any allowances not in the 'spirit' of the rules***

Over to you Gordon...

UPDATE: Iain Dale has the details.

Railway Children Mad Day

Anyone know what happened to Mad Day on the railways?

Just wondered, that's all.

Oh, and Mr Maidment is asking for your support again this year.

If you are doing something to support the Railway Children let us know.

UPDATE: Captain Deltic observes...

Surely, as Eye demonstrates with unfailing reliability, every day is Mad Day on Britain's railways.

And has been since 1 April 1994.

Top 10 railway cafes

This from the Grauniad...

The good news is that, despite Lord Adonis's damning criticisms, there are decent places to eat and drink on British stations.

View the top ten here.

Every penny counts

Good to see that the dead-tree media have finally caught up.

There is predictable press fury today over the decision by National Express to levy a £2.50 charge on standard class reservations.

Shame the story is being slightly occluded by the scandal of our troughing MPs - who of course won't have to pay the charge as they travel first class.

They said six years. Is this it?

So Network Rail have confirmed that they won't make their Control Period 3 efficiency targets.

According to the FT...

The company that owns Britain's rail network has missed its target to cut costs over the past five years, according to preliminary estimates, fuelling calls for rail bosses to forgo their six-figure bonuses.

But what's this?

Naughty Network Rail says the reason it missed its efficiency targets was "largely because of track renewals".

However, there is good news.

"We are aware of the challenges ahead on track renewals and are working on a number of initiatives to reduce the cost of carrying them out."

What could this mean?

Surely not bringing renewals back in-house.

UPDATE: This from our man at 222 Marylebone Road...

Old news is bad news?

What is the Pink 'un on about today, treating Network Rail's failure to meet efficiency targets as some new revelation?

Full details of the shortfalls were published on Page 114 of the the ORR Determination of Network Rail's outputs and funding for 2009-14' published in... October 2008!

Still it provided a timely peg on which to hang another NR bonus story.

Hoon for Tory Transport Secretary

Oh dear.

It appears that the Shadow Secretary of State for Transport, Theresa Villiers, is also a hoon.

This from the Daily Telegraph...

Theresa Villiers claimed almost £16,000 in stamp duty and professional fees on expenses when she bought a London flat, even though she already had a house in the capital.

Who is left to trust?

Which is the very question asked in our latest, exciting, Eye survey...

Gordon's Chinese take-away?

So Gordon Brown is meeting the Chinese Vice Premier today.

Is this a sign of movement on the 200 new DMU vehicles?

Probably not.

In the current climate it's more likely he's seeking political asylum...

Whitsun engineering works

This from the Northants Evening Telegraph....

The route proposed by East Midlands Trains ticket website:

Set off from Kettering Rail Station at 1.35pm on Saturday

Arrive at Derby Station at 2.50pm and leave at 3.42pm

Arrive at Blythe Bridge at 4.21pm and leave at 4.26pm on a bus

Arrive at Crewe at 5.51pm and leave at 6.02pm on a bus

Arrive at Stafford at 7.26pm and leave at 7.37pm on a bus

Arrive at Rugby at 10.03pm and leave at 10.10pm on a bus

Arrive at Milton Keynes at 11.20pm and leave at 4.53am on Sunday

Arrive at London Euston station at 7.41am

Take the tube from Euston station to St Pancras and arrive at 8.01am.

That's an 18 hour journey to cover approximately 70 miles. Good effort.

Tautology

Pictured at Crewe yesterday...


The bucket is a nice touch!

Please can somone buy Railnews a combi?

What has happened to the industry's in-house magazine Railnews?

Standards are slipping!

This image from an article on WSMR on the Railnews website:

Mind you, if they can't tell the difference between a 57 and a 67 then a seat in The Commons surely awaits.

UPDATE: A pedant writes...

57/67 confusion aside, the Railnews piece uses the wrong conjugation of the verb "go" in its intro:

"WREXHAM and Shropshire has said it fears for its survival if Arriva Trains Wales proposals for a direct Aberystwyth to London service goes ahead."

Proposals... goes: what kind of English do these people speak?

Huskisson - a politician for our times

More from 'Eleven Minutes Late', Matthew Engel's new book on the history of the railways.

With a bowler tip to Roger Cox in The Scotsman:

Huskisson's fate, argues Engel, is symptomatic of the disastrous relationship that has always existed in this country between railways and politicians.

"Confronted by the need to take a decision involving transport," writes Engel, "Huskisson suffered precisely the same mental block that was to afflict just about every British politician from that day to this. He dithered, he panicked, he got it spectacularly wrong."

Aye, that about sums it up - amateurs the lot of 'em.

And it might be almost forgivable if they weren't so damned fond of troughing at our expense.