Great Western Coffee Shop

My cousin lives on a narrow boat and is currently between Market Harborough and Loughborough. The Midalnd mainline passes close by the canal (they both follow the valley of the Soar) in several places. He's convinced he saw an Adelante between Market Harborough and Leicester earlier this week. HE thought it was in the new livery (EMT?). I lose track of which TOC is which.

Was he right? He knows Meridians/Voyagers and was adamant it had the pointy nose of a 180 which he would have seen at Reading.

If it wasn't a 180 or Meridian what could it have been?

If it was a 180 was it in service or crew training? I thought they going on the ECML.

Will have been a 222 if in EMT livery

Thanks tthat's what i thought. Have had it confirmed from other sources as well. EMT were one of the few TOCS not to bid for them.

If they are so popular makes you wonder why FGW got rid of them.

They are popular because they are available to be used by other operators and are 125mph-capable, which is an essential requirement for operating on the East Coast Main Line, where First Hull Trains, NXEC and Grand Central's owners all want to run new services.

Once the ORR has pronounced on who can run what extra services later in the year, it's fair to assume that the future of the 180s will be sorted out sharpish and the leasing company may then begin a remedial programme to deal with the design issues that are responsible for many of the reliability problems that led to FGW wanting rid of them.

Even with swapping around of the sets that are being used at the moment - 180104 and 105 have come back to FGW from store at Oxley but not sure which two out of 102, 108 and 109 they replaced - it still seems to be a struggle to turn out two for service each morning at the moment.

The diagram that starts with the 05.42 to Worcester and 08.37 return was a 180 on Monday, Wednesday and Thursday this week (I had to drive Tuesday, so don't know what ran then) and will be amazed if it isn't a 180 again this morning. On Thursday, FGW didn't even bother to post the set swap as a service alteration on the website.

This duty's allocated HST was, as ever, nicked for the 07.10 from Oxford instead of the booked 2x180, even though I bet this service does not need all those seats in August, due to the commuters taking their holidays.
In contrast, the 08.37 from Worcester needs every seat it can get at this time of the year, as it's the first train from the Cotswold Line and Oxford on which CDRs and Network railcards are valid, with passenger numbers topped up for the month with lots of holidaymakers and day trippers. A 180 is usually full from Charlbury onwards, so avoid this service if you're doing Oxford-London mid-morning until the schools have gone back.

I'm obviously getting far too cynical. We did get our HST back for 08.37 on Friday morning - typically on the quietest day of the week as a grey and soggy start in the Cotswolds and Oxfordshire put off the casual daytrippers - but did that mid-afternoon relief to Exeter run again, as a 180 later turned up on the 17.51 to Worcester?