Barbielino - Petrol-head unlashes the attack dogs!

This from the Birmingham Post...

Virgin, which runs West Coast Main Line services from London to Birmingham and Manchester, is refusing to use the trains or carriages....

A spokesman for the department said: “We would like any train company to come forward and use it.

“We would like Virgin to use it, but Virgin has said they wouldn’t want to do so unless they get a franchise extension.”

Blam! Splat! Kerpow!

UPDATE: This from the Mad Hatter...

The new train is in Virgin colours but without Virgin logos.

Will Beardie Rail cry ‘breach of intellectual copyright’ if anyone else tries to use it?

UPDATE: This from SN Barnes...

So the DfT would like "any train company to come forward and use it"?

Can it be long before Yoghurt Rail comes knocking at Marsham Street's door?

UPDATE: This from a Mr Tony Miles...

Theresa Villiers in Alstom's press release (06/12/10 re. the delivery of 11-car Pendolino 390054) said:

“From April 2012 it will form part of the rolling stock for the new West Coast Main Line franchise."

The Birmingham Post article to which Eye links says:

“...as a result, the train has been delivered - but will not be used. Instead, the Department for Transport has told other rail companies they are welcome to borrow the Pendolino for the next 18 months if they want it."

Alstom explained, as the train was being delivered to Edge Hill depot for commissioning, that it will take until the end of May or early June 2011 for the set to be fully tested and commissioned.

So that makes it available for only 10 or 11 months maximum.

Factor in testing on any route other than the WCML, signaling immunization, driver training etc. etc. and that might just give a new operator six months 'quiet enjoyment' with a good headwind!

An awful lot of money would need to be spent for such a short loan, a bill no doubt that will be picked up by the taxpayer.

Welcome to the Age of Austerity!

NatEx not interested in West Coast franchise?

This from The FT...

“We’re not interested in intercity franchises; we need to prove ourselves with c2c and East Anglia and use them to win back political confidence,” the [National Express] source said.

Eye wonders how long it will be before DafT implores NatEx to beef up bids for the new West Coast franchise that will run to 2025?

Pointless signs - Milton Keynes Central

This from a Mr Francis...

Milton Keynes Central Sunday Dec 5

A signal failure at Bletchley meant that nothing had moved moved southwards for about an hour yet the monitor displayed the following helpful instruction:


Note the red signal and stationary Pendo' with its doors open which had been sitting there for some considerable time before the photo was taken.

In a Blackfriars Court bunker...

This from a Mr William Dargen...

I thought that Eye readers might appreciate this:



A little bit sweary but amusing none the less.

UPDATE: This from Steve Strong...

Very droll.

But not nearly as funny as SouthEastern's PR being run over by a Ferrari last Monday...

One for the Black Book of PR?

Pointless signs - Cambridge

Pointless signs - Charing Cross

Trainy Speakibold - Petrol-head Hammond

This from our very own Secretary of State for Transport...

"A key focus of this audit will be the effectiveness of implementation of the Review recommendations and the extent to which additional measures are necessary to deliver the expected outcomes for them."

Perhaps worth reminding the SofS that a stream of words does not necessarily equate to useful information...

UPDATE: This from Captain Deltic...

If the SoS is concerned about 'real passengers' , there must be an opposite category of 'unreal' passengers.

Does he mean passengers on trains and at stations as opposed to people who are thinking about becoming passengers? Is there a single adjective? I rather like 'putative'.

Eye readers can no doubt help.

UPDATE: This from Our International Correspondent...

Real passengers are carbon-based, 80% water, have a valid ticket, and are sometimes invited to stay overnight in trains courtesy of Sir Herbert Walker's wrong-type-of-third-rail legacy.

Unreal passengers are smaller, made by Airfix and you have to cut them off a sprue and paint them.

UPDATE: This from Mr Tuppence Worth...

My commute is provided by one of two TOCs – one being Souter’s route to the capital, the other having moved into the hands of DB earlier this year.

The former have issued an emergency timetable the past two days and their usual website has been replaced with key information for would-be patrons including said timetable. This strategy has enabled them to cope with both fewer staff showing up and reduced rolling stock and network reliability/availability. To all intents and purposes they have kept to their revised plans.

The latter have been a little more optimistic and claimed to be able to run a full service south of the Antonine Wall. Needless to say, they haven’t kept to that for the past two days and made numerous cancellations and curtailments, and been subject to many a delay.

So which is more beneficial to passengers: bold ambition or humble realism?

UPDATE: This from a Lucas Skybanker...

After the pathetic availability of info this week I would have thought all the franchises and whoever it is who controls timetable and running info should make it freely available to developers and re-publishers.

Sadly ATOC appears to be determined to milk this data for all it's worth.

On the tube it is easy to see how things are going, you can simply look up a map showing train movements in real time.

Shouldn't all trains have GPS on them with real time info on their position available to all?

UPDATE: This from Steve Strong...

I see that Petrol-head has asked David Quarmby to audit the performance of various transport modes during the recent severe weather.

Perhaps a strange choice as Quarmby just happens to be Chairman of road lobby group the RAC Foundation.

Of course Quarmby is welcome to audit the railways, providing Hammond asks Swampy to do the same for the road network.

UPDATE: This from The Archer and numerous others...

I suspect this is a simple typo and should have read Rail Passengers, the audit will after all look into various transport modes.

Still, pretty shocking that this typo wasn’t picked up, particularly given the increased importance of information during periods of disruption!

My message to the SoS is clear: dictated letters must be proof-read.

Eye salutes those keeping the railway open

The Network Rail press office is doing a sterling job showing what the industry is doing to keep the railway moving.

And providing hardened hacks and picture desks with some great pictures...


NR's media mastermind Kevin Groves offered the following helpful caption for the picture above:

Great picture of an MPV (multi-purpose vehicle) de-icer / snowplough, clearing the route to East Grinstead at lunchtime today (1pm, 02/12/10, taken from the rear).

Perhaps just as well the last bit was in parenthesis.

Trainy Speakibold - FCC

This from a Mr Sim Harris...


In spite of the snow, it's good to see that Professor Unwin has reported for duty.

Social media heroes and villians in the snow

This from SN Barnes...

With lessons obviously learned from last year, Eurostar has outshone most domestic TOC's with their immediate and steady use of twitter to give frequent updates on a service that was doing a lot better than cross channel flights.

Aside from the wonderfully boring Nicola @chilternrailway telling us nothing was out of order, the efforts of South Eastern's ("the trains are all fecked") @Train_Driver has proven to be the most accurate, honest, and reliable when compared to the fault line slips between what the TOC's were putting on line, what NRES published and the train information displays at the point of delivery.

Passengers, of course, are no longer surprised by kafka-esque relationship between 'official information' and the actual presence of the trains they purport to describe.

Pointless signs - Ashford International (Domestic)

Hack praises hack - Shocker!

This from Captain Deltic...

Hats off to Nigel Harris for achieving the difficult task of getting a positive message about railway safety into the Daily Telegraph letters column today.

Those who have tried will know that when it comes to railways most letter columns prefer Mr Irrational Greene-Ink to the measured views of professional observers.

UPDATE: This from a Mr I Greene-Ink

Dear Sir

Might I take the opportunity afforded by your blog to criticise the performance of the railways during the current inclem... (No. Ed)

Network Rail misplaces new chief exec?

Exciting news from Transport Times Events!

TTE is led by the well connected transport guru Professor David Begg, a man with his fingers firmly on the industry's pulse !

So an event in January asking "Is the North missing out on Transport?" should be packed to the rafters with heavy weights.

According to a TTE email and their website the following are 'Confirmed Speakers'

• Rt Hon Philip Hammond, Secretary of State for Transport
• Cllr Richard Leese, Leader, Manchester City Council
• Richard Eccles, Chief Executive, Network Rail
• Julie Mills, Director, Greengauge 21
• Adam Marshall, Director of Policy, British Chamber of Commerce
• Prof Michael Parkinson, Director, European Institute of Urban Affairs, Liverpool John Moores University
• Alexandra Jones, Chief Executive, Centre for Cities

Let Eye be the first to congratulate Richard Eccles on his promotion.

Presumably David Higgins has been told?

NR lays it on with a trowel...

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?

WCML Upgrade suffers whiteout

Our man on the Pendolino reports...

Conductors on WCML Glasgow to London route have been told to announce over the intercom that:

"trains are not allowed to travel at over 100mph because of adverse weather conditions."

Why?

If this is an engineering or design problem, we should know.

Or is it just another 'wrong kind of snow' excuse for general slackness and lateness?

My 13.53 from Preston is over an hour late yet barely a flake has fallen on entire journey...

UPDATE: This from a Mr Tony Miles...

Ice thrown up is breaking outer skin of windows.

I gather 100mph avoids it being thrown up as much in the first place.

I think all 125mph trains are restricted to 100mph when this happens & 'tilt mode' is deactivated on Pendos.

Sensible really.

UPDATE: This from Sunny South...

You will find that NR have written into the rule book that speed restrictions apply in any case where disc-braked stock and drifting snow are concerned, so VWC are merely being good boys & girls and looking after both rules & regs and keeping Joe Public informed.

Yours watching South Eastern self-destruct with growing concern...

MacPorkies?

This from the The Herald...

Thomas Docherty, a former head of media relations for major projects at Network Rail between 2006 and 2007 and, since May, the Labour MP for Dunfermline and West Fife, said:

“My recollection from my time at Network Rail is that both Network Rail and Transport Scotland knew that a 24-hour operation would be required. My understanding is that Transport Scotland did not share that knowledge with Clackmannanshire Council,”

“The way that the Scottish Government behaved is bordering on the criminal. Even when there were FoI documents that showed its involvement in planning a 24-hour railway, it still won’t admit the truth.”

Good to see that the Jockanese Transport Monkeys are rivaling our beloved Marsham Street for transparency.

FREE POSTER for every Eye reader!

Please feel free to download, print and display prominently...


Why not involve the whole family?

Ask the the kids to print off a version so you can send it to your MP as a postcard.

Ask Granny to lick the stamps.

This is an Eye gift that just keeps on giving!

Readers in the following constituencies are particularly encouraged to adopt this approach:

• Aylesbury - David Lidington MP

• Beaconsfield - Dominic Grieve MP

• Buckingham - John Bercow MP

• Chesham and Amersham - Cheryl Gillan MP

• Kenilworth - Jeremy Wright MP

• Lichfield - Michael Fabricant MP

Usual address: House of Commons, Westminster, London SW1W 0AA

Remember, vote early, vote often!

UPDATE: This from Biggles...

This one spotted in Warwickshire...


Good effort!

UPDATE: This from Poster Boy...

And here a version of the poster for those in the northern home counties concerned about defenestration...


Apparently Nimbys have no sense of humour.

Wolmarballs on new rolling stock

Telegrammed by Our Man at 222 Marylebone Road
Britain's self styled greatest living transport expert, quoting from the Grauniad's Peter Preston, says in his latest blogpost:

Peter Preston, a normally utterly impenetrable Guardian columnist, for once makes a good point in today's paper. Writing about the £8bn worth of rolling stock investment promised by the government last week - forget whether the actual figures add up - he asked the DfT how many of the new 2,100 carriages would be first or second class.

Those who can divide £8billion by 2,100 will know that the numbers definitely don't add up.

Perhaps the prolific Wolmar, surely the O.S. Nock de nos jours, should have consulted the soi disant 'veteran observer' whose expertise is currently being 'rested' by the FT?

UPDATE: This from a Mr Robert Wright...

I was intrigued by the idea of Wolmar as an 'OS Nock de nos jours' and checked the great man's Wikipedia entry for parallels.

Sadly, it summarises his career thus:

"Nock authored more than 140 books and 1000 magazine articles, which are often considered to be less than authoritative because of his voluminous output. He tended to re-use data, text and anecdotes in different books, including paragraphs culled in their entirety."

Perhaps Wolmar should get himself a canal boat and make a pitch to be the modern era's LTC Rolt instead.

Christmas Railway Garden - Durham

With a bowler tip to Ricdea, via Twitter...


Very festive!

Lesser spotted Eagle threatended with extinction?

Looks like Ed Milibean is not alone in having his leadership skills questioned.

Maria the Eagle may also want to watch her back.

This from the North West Evening Mail...

A RAIL lobby group is backing Furness MP and Shadow Transport Secretary John Woodcock’s call for Barrow not to lose its direct train services to Manchester Airport.

Down boy!