Great Western Coffee Shop

Why do we actually need to build this? whats actually wrong with an HST,that dictates total replacement? and would it not be easier to build MK5 coaches and new self propelled power cars that could either be reengineered for electric ,or be replaced with new electric power cars

Whilst I am a huge fan of the HST, they are getting on a bit and I'm told that they only have about 10 - 15 years...? more life in them before they expire.

It would be better to build MK5 carriages similar to the MK4 design because they are proven to be reliable and comfortable. When I say that what we don't want is engines underneath each carriage for long distance services, I think the majority would agree with me ;D

Indeed, Mk5 stock would be flexible, like the most succesful coach design ever. (Mk3)

If it breaks, get a new loco on the front, if its summer, add a coach. Simple.

The first of the HST's entered service in 1976 therefore in 10 years time they will be over 40 years old while they are sturdy build and have proven themselves time and time again it would be more economic to build new than carry out a major strip out and reequip, although FGW have done a good job referbing them recently it was an expensive task.

What form the new IEP's will take will be dictated my the out come of the route electrification study due to report this year.

Exactly, why can't they build a 21st century version of the HST for non electrified routes and an electric version with MK5 coaching stock?

Instead, millions has been spent by DaFT and the companies bidding on IEP and we still don't know what they are planning. Thats of course if they have come up with something that the crazy specification required so much so that one of the bidders pulled out. Makes you wonder doesn't it  ::)

Whatever they come up with nothing will ever beat the HST. They are best rolling stock going and even if you aren't too keen of the seating layout, First are to be applauded for the amount of work and money that was put into them to keep them going for another 10 or so years.

And yes, as thetrout says NO UNDERFLOOR ENGINES PLEASE! It's ruined long distance XC travel.

The next build of long distance train SHOULD be of loco and coaches, with electric Power Car at 1 end ONLY and with Twin Diesel power cars, that can be coupled at the other end when required. Such as this, an East Coast Train from London KX is Electric Hauled to Edinburgh and whilst the Electric traction comes off at the front, Diesel power cars are connected at the Rear to push the train to Aberdeen.

For the return journey the reverse applies.

Use Twin Diesel Power Cars to keep Axle weight down but give the reliablity of twin diesels, if 1 engine shuts down the train can keep going.

Some Coaches will need Driving Cabs.

I don't understand the logic behind long distance Units like Voyagers, because Power units need about 10 times the maintenance of simple coaches.
 
So if you need 20 carriage Sets to run your service you need 24 Loco's to haul these trains about, but using units you need at least 26 FULL train sets and whilst 24 loco's might mean 48 engines to look after, an 8 car unit fleet means OVER 200 engines to look after.

Well, the underfloor engines started the job of ruining travel on the XC network. Arriva it would appear may be more than capable of finishing it...  ;)

Aren't all of your suggestions what the IEP is?

The IEP's aim is to build a new InterCity train to replace the current IC125/IC225 (and presumably to add capacity to XC).

They are now deciding on which out of EMUs, DEMUs, hybrid or loco. I think E loco - then you can have a DVT with bike and luggage space.

Maybe they should create a carriage similar to the MK2 BSO with the large storage space for bikes and luggage, similar to the BSO operating in the LHCS on Cardiff Central - Taunton. Also having a restaurant onboard would be ace ;D

IEP may have started out as a simple new express train, but once DafT got going, it mushroomed into a multi-variant monstrosity. If one is to believe Modern Railways, they aren't deciding anything about it, as the Treasury took one look when the announcement of the preferred bidder was due in December and put the brakes on the whole thing. It may well be that when Adonis makes his imminent announcement on electrification that IEP will quietly be buried, having been overtaken by events - and a nice off-the-shelf, proven and reliable electric loco from Bombardier or Siemens.

Ideally Mark 5 coaches (preferably 9 or even 10 of them) + either Electric locomotive and DVT or electric power cars. The pendolinos seem far more rattley and unpleasant than the electric hauled mark III coaches. Diesel power cars will do for where it is unsuitable for the wiring to go up.

And while we're at it, 350 / 360 type things for inner / outer suburban thames stuff, and a nice load of 4 car 172's for wessex regional work.

As posted before Roger Ford has a complete debunking of the IEP in February's Modern Railways.

Whilst in the same issue Ian Walmsley has a brilliant case for the Mark 5 and  an electric loco (cut down continental 4 voltage 125 job) with diesel haulage for off the wires.

Which is exactly what the Southern did in 1967 for Weymouth, electric push to Bournemouth and a 33 to pull to Weymouth and vice versa on return. Admittedly they used a high powered 4 coach EMU with as a loco pushng 2* 4 TC. Which meant the Bournmouth to Weymouth portion could be 4 or 8 depending demand.

But then again, Nigel Harris' view has changed in his article in the latest Rail magazine following the positive electrification noises coming from the DfT.

Roger Ford is also sayinmg that even an all electric 125 IEP  fixed formation unit with distributed power is not the way to go and as for the hybrid carting round a dead weight diesel engine for most of the journey is not a good idea.

It seems that up to 125 (non tilt) possibly 140 as in Germany which requires LZB signalling, loco and coaches are the most efficient and flexible formation. Giving opportunities fro adding or subtracting coaches and through journey opportunities with a loco change.

Anglia used to have different length foramtions which they rostered for peak and off peak and they get to Great Yarmouth with a diesel loco.

As electrification spreads then the need for loco changes becomes less and the whole operation more efficient.

We need the ICEP because the HSTs wont last forever, and also have inadeqaute capacity on many services.
As others suggest what we need is a long train of proper loco hauled coachs,with facing seats, tables, luggage space, and a restaurant/buffet, with diesel or electric locomotives/power cars being used as required.

What we will probably get is some variety of complicated diesel/electric hybrid multiple unit, shorter than existing trains and with high density bus seats and no catering or luggage space.

>:(

1. As I remember in 1976, when HST descended to the Western Region of BR, it was to have a service life of 15 years (to 1991). Fortunately it was an engineer-designed train, and public service, nationalised industry engineers at that, so it had a galaxy of in-built virtues. It had advanced, long (23m) monocoque coach bodies made of Corten steel, (stronger and corrosion resistant). It had engineered BT10 bogies without cheap cart springs. It was production engineered so that it was cheap to manufacture but had flexibility in length and style so as to allow trailer and loco hauled cars (mk 3a), sleepers, rough and ready class 455/7/8/9's, slightly better class 317/9/21's and even SR class 442's, not to mention the 150's. The power cars were a generation step forward with high speed, lighter and (for then) reliable  engines, brushless alternators and motor bogies that rode rather than bounced and were kind to the track. The electric equivalent, the Class 87, disappointed in that although it had 4 times the power of a Class 253/4 (our power car) it was low geared and therefore slow, smashed the track and slipped on the grades, giving electrification a bad name for 30 years.

2. While the Mark 3's could probably well exceed the 50 year lives of Mark 1 emu's, we will need both replacements and additions in time. The above listed virtues of technology, flexiblity, performance and cost are good starting points but in addition I suggest the following:

(a) Capacity. HST's 5 2nd class and 2.5 1st class cars provide a microscopic consist for a modern train. For any popular route, such short train lengths would require tube-train frequencies, soaking up paths and clogging up the line. Eurostar manages a maximum of 18 trailers compared to HST's 8, although TGV has the flexiblity to have shorter units in multiple. Hence we need long trains.

(b) TENS. The Europeans understand high speed lines and have devised a template towards which national railway administrations must work for designated lines, such as common signalling, 400m platforms, power supplies etc. In the UK the designated routes are ECML, WCML and GWML (Bristol/S Wales) as well as CTRL. Hence we need a compatible design.

(c) Power. Only 25kV from an AT feeder station (80MVA) could match the size and speed needed. Putting in tiny diesels, whether 300 kW or 2.7MW, adds complexity where don't want it - on the move - and might still leave us slipping on Dainton etc. Better surely to put in decent catenary and enough masts to avoid breakdowns in the first place and bring Exeter and Plymouth under the wires. West of Plymouth, we probably can't go fast enough (because of curvature) to need more than a hitch-up diesel locomotive.   Lets KISS and have a practical power solution.

IEP - Innovative Engineering Prevented.

OTC

Spot on :)

But to be fair to Class 87s - and their 1960s forebears - they were all something of a compromise, built to mixed-traffic spec, rather than an out-and-out express passenger design. And the 86s with their original suspensions were the true track-killers.

As for longer trains, you would need to rebuild the entire throat at Paddington, King's Cross, etc, to allow their use. Instead, how about a series E4 double-decker Shinkansen train, eight cars (6x25m and 2x25.7m driving cars), distributed power so no problem up Dainton Bank, seating capacity 817 people! Seems like FGW have got a way to go to achieve true high capacity.

Buried away in Modern Railways for February is an interesting nugget that seems to suggest 2016 could be the end of the road for FGW's HSTs, as Alstom, which makes the Automatic Train Protection system, has given notice it will not provide maintenance support beyond 2016. So short of equipping trains with a couple of years' life left in them with expensive new ETCS kit, that's it for the 125s if use of ATP or something with a similar function is to remain compulsory.

Alstom also supplies the different ATP system used on the Chiltern Line, where it has said it will only make two more trains' worth of kit, beyond that already on order for the 172s and will end maintenance support by 2019.

I suspect because as soon as they encountered Box, Chipping Sodbury or the Severn Tunnels FGW would become the proud operators of National Rail's first open-topped train service!

I wasn't being entirely serious. Just that writing 'longer trains are the answer' is no answer, as you need infrastructure able to handle them. Paddington as it stands is awkward for anything much longer than an HST, and at King's Cross I just don't see how you could do anything to extend train lengths, as the space between the platform ends and the tunnels is full of pointwork, which you can't do without.

Double deckera as not the solution either as dwells are increased.

How about the reintroduction of broad guage? :P

Yep I read that bit. Hope DafT call Alstom's bluff and give the contract a British manufacturer.

A capacity of 817 small healthy Japansese people equates to about 300 average sized over-weight pasty chomping British people!  ;)

The ATP issue is an interesting one, Voyagers are permitted to run at their full 125mph speed on the GWML between Didcot and Reading without any form of ATP (and I believe west of Swindon too), but are restricted to 100mph east of Reading (though not that many go that way any more!). Anyone know why?

Good Question although it is worth bearing in mind that Voyagers aren't booked to use the Main Lines between Didcot and Reading, most Voyagers use the reliefs AFAIK.

I believe they are not allowed on the main lines due to not having ATP.  This could have been one reason it was decided to withdraw Virgin Cross Country services to Paddington in 2003.

Although they do indeed often get pathed on the Relief lines, they are allowed on the Main Lines as per my original post; Didcot-Reading 125mph and east of Reading at 100mph max.

Is that why the service to Paddington was withdrawn?

I don't think that was the specific reason. After all, Operation Princess, probably meant just as many if not more ran on the GWML between Reading and Acton on Brighton services via Kensington Olympia. Operation Princess' initial number of trains running through to Brighton and Portsmouth naturally replaced the Paddington trains as more sensible destinations to supplement the hourly Bournemouth service. Sadly, Portsmouth was very short lived as a destination and now Brighton has gone too.

Though it would appear as though the publicity surrounding the "ghost bus" means that DaFT are now saying they will reinstate some sort of service. But whether it is one local service a week or a meaningful service to Brighton remains to be seen. 

That's the equivalent length (200m) to a 10 coach train of old Southern Region EPB slamdoor stock (the stuff I was "brought up on".  See http://www.kentrail.co.uk/Class%20415.htm .  Quick calculation of their capacity.

4 x 4 EPB power cars - 2 compartments at 11 + 6 at 10 = 82 / car = 328 seats
2 x gangwayed trailers, with 2 at 11 and 8 at 10 = 102 / car = 204 seats
2 x "singles" trailers, with 10 at 12 = 120 / car = 240 seats
1 x 2 EPB power car with same seating as a 4 EPB power car = 82 seats
1 x 2 EPB power car with 2 compartments at 11, 2 at 10 and 5 at 12 = 102 seats

So that's 936 seats!

(That's units 5001 to 5053 for the 4 EPB calculation, except 5005 (or was it 5008) that was 12 less because it was built with wide singles for some reason I don't know, and 5701 to 5750 or so for the 2 EPBs.   The 5100 to 5260 series had the same 4 EPB capacity but a different layout, and the last 15 2 EPB units had one less compartment and a bigger luggage van - for their previous Tyneside use in carrying boxes of fish, I just learned today)

How did VXC get to Portsmouth from Reading?

Via Guildford and Havant usually.

I bet journey times were poor.

Didn't VXC run the Paddington services with 158s? (B'ham, Stroud, Swindon, London)

No - Voyagers

The reason Alstom are giving notice is that the ATP kit will be obsolete and ready for the dustbin, indeed, compared to cab signalling/ATP systems used elsewhere, you could argue it is already. You're talking about early 1990s technology. Are you still using an early 1990s computer? No-one would be interested in taking over from Alstom.

And Modern Railways also noted that there will be implications for Chiltern anyway from resignalling of the London Underground sub-surface lines, including the Metropolitan, which Chiltern uses south of Amersham, so their trains will need new kit for that.

Alstom has extensive operations in the UK and is one of Network Rail's key signalling suppliers, so has strong British credentials.

Voyagers only ran for a brief period to Paddington before the 2002 timetable changes, when XC stopped running east of Reading. For most of the years before that it was 47s and Mk2s.

As far as I can remember, the 158s ran Birmingham-Swindon only, before Virgin dropped its plan to keep on some 2+5 HSTs which would have run Birmingham-Paddington via Stroud. As a result, the local services from Swindon to Cheltenham reverted to Wessex Trains.

And the destination of Paddington was more on operational grounds than anything else as the stock (LHCS or Voyagers) was serviced overnight at Old Oak Common. I think there was only one train - a lunchtime arrival at Paddington - that then formed a service back out that same day. Though of course XC continued running east of Reading as far as Acton from 2002 up until last December with the Brighton trains that were routed via Kensington Olympia.

Or .......... now this is radical ................... make the concorse smaller back to where it was in the 1980's  :)

You mean like what they are going to do to Waterloo?

"A capacity of 817 small healthy Japanese people equates to about 300 average sized over-weight pasty chomping British people!"

.... perhaps we should look for great things from the Sushi bar on the lawn.

I have a Japanese friend who has commuted from Reading to Paddington for 15 or so years. He says our trains are wonderfully comfortable, uncrowded, more punctual and reliable than  commuter trains in Japan (but not Shinkasen).

"As for longer trains, you would need to rebuild the entire throat at Paddington, King's Cross, etc, to allow their use. "

As has been pointed out, it would help if we used all of the train sheds for trains, not coffee shops etc. Concourses should go in the air space above trains and platforms, even in heritage stations. Platform 1 at Paddington, although mutilated, is basically long enough for anything already.

That might allow 2 extra cars

The usable length of a HST is only 184m but it occupies 220m. A 10-car Wessex electric (Class 442) has nearly 230 m, because the workings have been squirrelled away underfloor, like tube trains. The innovation required is to produce a unit train with all or much of its gear underfloor.

Extra 2 (passenger) cars possible?

There's always Waterloo International....

OTC

No, I am on about moving the stop blocks back to half way between where they are now and the Lawn or even more radical move the stop blocks back to the Lawn ........... not sure where all the passengers would have to wait now the Lawn is full of retail and stairways

Some coffee shops are quite useful.  ;D

That's because an HST doesn't have its engines underfloor, and thus a much quieter ambience which most people prefer than having a diesel throbbing underneath you for x hours. The answer is of course to electrify, when you can use more or less the full length of the train, as pendolinos have shown. 

I agree. Having underfloor engines on long distance IC travel is not fun. All you can hear is the engine roaring whilst travelling at 100MPH on a voyager. I was once sat on an Adelante at Exeter St Davids and it was vibrating quite violently and I was bouncing around in my seat, again not fun!

However, the HST, 225 or LHCS is quite comfortable to sit on and, you dont hear the engine as much. Nor do you have your cup of tea slopping everywhere  ::)

Not exactly innovative, as has been said Pendolinos manage it. Japanese Shinkansen have always been built like this, also the German ICE3 and its derivatives for export and Alstom has come up with the AGV, ordered by an Italian open access operator, even if SNCF is sticking with power car TGVs for the time being.

With electrification, you have a golden opportunity to build trains to UIC gauge anyway, as bridges will need replacing to give clearance for catenary. The post-modernisation WCML is now W12 gauge all the way to Glasgow, including some pretty tight tunnels. If this gauge was adopted as standard, it would also allow taller, wider passenger trains to operate, as it is built for 9ft 6in tall, 2.6m wide container boxes.

And at King's Cross, the entire length of the train shed always has been used for the trains.

But Brunel's broad gauge whilst much wider track (7ft 1/4inch) the carriages were much the same width as Standard gauge stock, hence with far less bodywork overhanging the rails, far greater speed around curves was allowed, and a far smoother ride on straight track

It was 5005 ... just found a photo, following up reading another thread about the "singles" coaches

http://www.railphotoarchive.org/rpc_zoom.php?img=0140020311000

Don't know about that.  I remember the end of a broad gauge coach that is preserved in the Didcot Railway Centre's carriage shed.  It is only one fixed bench seat in length (it was re-used as a cricket pavilion IIRC) but its width would seat at least eight persons comfortably, i.e. considerably wider than standard stock.  I would hazard a guess that the overhang was the same (both broad and standard gauge stock accessed the same platforms on dual gauge track) so I would guess that Brunel's carriages were about 3'3 3/4" wider than Mr Stephenson's - or there abouts!

That's nearly a metric yard! But then Brunel's father was French.  ;D

I wrote that five years ago!
And what are we getting ? complicated hybrid diesel/electric multiple units, mainly shorter than existing trains, with most seats being bus style, and no catering beyond a trolley for steerage, luggage space remains to be seen, but is hardly likely to be improved is it ?

Yes ... I was trawling through and re-opened a very old thread to answer a open question ... admittedly one that's unlikely to make a huge difference in the future, though it was the first experiment with more standing space for more passengers at the expense of reduced seating.

It is very interesting to look back at these old threads sometimes and see how things have come to pass.

No, the reason why those coaches had wider compartments was because they were former 4-SUB Trailer Composites with 6 wider 1st class compartments and 3 narrower 2nd class. At some time in the 1950s they were declassified and transferred into 4-EPB units. One such coach did however have its 1st class reinstated when it was part of an experimental TC (Trailer Control) unit used on the Oxted line in the 1960s.

For a while in the early 1980s I commuted daily from Earley to St Margarets which involved changing onto 4-EPB Windsor services at Staines. On a few occasions I remember enjoying the relative additional comfort of these wider compartments although they did have standard 2nd class 6-a-side seating.

OK, back to IEPs!

Aren't we going over old ground here? Although I seem vaguely to recall that opinion was in favour of the IEP, I know that I and a number of others expressed a view in favour of locomotive haulage enabling switches between diesel and electric power.

Seems to have come full circle in favour of locomotives - personally why a train has to lug "dead" power units around is beyond me.

You could say that...  ::)

I think the main reason (on the so-called 'electric' IEP sets) is to keep the heating/air-con working if the OHLE falls down, so passengers don't overheat/freese. Completely overlooking the possibility that the air-con itself has failed (which is something class 158s in particular have been quite widely critisized for). Too late to do anything about that now, but letters to our MPs are in order to try and persuade the DfT that the new fleet needs to allow for growth and not cut back quite so much on off-peak capacity. There are more diagramed seats (11,286) in the 18 'electric' diagrams planned than the 32 bi-mode diagrams (10,080 diagramed seats) and potentially reduced seats per day on certain routes (with the diagraming used to determine the size of the fleet, south Wales sees a reduction in seats per day). Passenger Focus agree that: Surely nobody believes the visible investment in electrification, new trains and doubled frequency to Bristol will have no effect on growth?

How much growth did the new trains and increased frequencies on CrossCountry (probably far less headline-grabbing than electrification) create?

Not forgetting the ability to self-propel over short distances which will be incredibly useful if the juice has been switched off or damaged for some reason, or the train itself has pantograph issues.  I'm sure the air-con will be reliable, certainly I can't remember many air-con problems with recently built traction, especially the Javelin trains on which the IEP trains are fairly closely related to.

The installed emergency engine(s) will prove a fantastic asset in my opinion.

Since we're going over old ground ... not so. Electric trains are required to have limited movement without overhead power, but only "basic services". That's more than just emergency lighting, and so might need a lot of batteries, but does not include heating or cooling. However, the other key requirement is for the full interior environment when hauled by a locomotive that supplies no electricity. That requirement (and probably limited movement too) mean that in effect the solution has to have diesel generators.

stebbo asked and I answered. I hadn't forgotten about the ability to 'limp home' but unlike IndustryInsider I don't expect it to be particularly useful in practice due to other stock not having the facility and the likelyhood that if the OHLE is down it will be tangled in the pantograph of a train. That presumably prevents that unit moving anyway. That left basic 'hotel' services as the main justification for the diesel engine in my opinion.

Obviously if a train has brought down the wires it's not going anywhere soon. However the current will be switched off, and that will affect trains either side that are otherwise stranded. Clearly it is much better for them to limp to a station and wait out the problems rather than be stranded as well.

Just received Today's Railways Europe which has an article on Inno Irans the big rail show in Berlin.

It seems most manufactures are offering Powerful Electric locos with Last Mile diesel engine. Bombardier with the TRAXX and Siemens with the Vectron plus our own Vossloch EURO Dual Class 88. These  would seem to be the answer to the problem with breakdowns of the O/H and allow loco haulage.

There is also a hint that EDs with more powerful Diesel Engines are being looked at like the upgrades to the 73 where the diesel and Electric power are nearly equal. These could be usueful in places like cornwall where the mainline might be elctrified but the branches won't and you don't rquire a 160 kmh loco under the wires.

So why put diesel engines under EMUs

I wonder how on earth we've managed up until the second decade of the 21st century.

Could not the driving trailer have a small diesel for emergency purposes?

Perhaps there's a difference between "managing" and "optimising"?   

Multipower units used to be very complex, and extremely limited in some of their modes - but as technology moves forward there are other balances that can be struck with better equipment. The talk in this thread, on IEP, is electric stock with infill diesel engines, but you could equally look at electric stock with infill batteries - the unit being tested at the moment (a 379?) being able to run for around 75 miles.   I'm noting too reports of tram systems with catenary only for a part of the route or use alternative power such as http://www.caf.es/en/ecocaf/nuevas-soluciones/tranvia-acr.php and http://www.railwaygazette.com/news/urban/single-view/view/battery-trams-running-in-nanjing.html and http://www.douglashorsetramway.net .

This is really exciting stuff - so many railway services start from a big city (let's call it "London") with a lotta services each hour, and electric is obvious.  But the along the way, the lines branch, some services terminate and the remaining services reduce in frequency.  And there's the nightmare question "where do we end electrification"?  Go all the way until you run out of railway and it's not cost effective; stop at an intermediate point and without the second power type in the same train, you have diesels doing long electric runs, or a change of trains for people going beyond the electrified zone - creating a most awkward area just beyond where people feel cheated - that everyone else's gain on electrification to the boundary may be their loss.

I can see now - and into the future - some places where alternative power could get extended use either prior to being included in a more-future electric program, or indeed in the longer term, over and above where IEP use is envisaged.

I don't think we've managed particularly well.  Just look at the complete and utter chaos when the wires are (frequently) down, or the power supply is switched off on the East Coast or West Coast routes.  I'm reminded of a situation at Crewe I found myself in a a few months ago when an empty engine derailed south of the station, but my train (and another Pendolino) in the station were unable to move northwards due to that section of current being isolated.  

As more and more of the network is electrified, more and more trains are likely to be affected by these things (countered by the general better reliability of electric trains over their diesel counterparts), so to me it makes sense to provide an alternative means of getting round a power outage, such as the one described above, and if that's not possible then at least the train can generate suitable conditions on the train until the line is cleared.  Perhaps longer term those engines can be removed and replaced with batteries when the technology is mature and cost effective enough?

Remember that the IEP process didn't tell the bidders how to provide either limited movement for electric trains nor off-wire services, though it did define some of the options (like defining a locomotive as not supplying train power). Bidders were to decide between loco-hauled electric trains and bi-modes, and work out what supplies the alternative power whether routine or back-up. And, I guess, they can replace them during the contract with an alternative that does the same job better if they want to (though not without DfT's say-so).

Having just found (again) a DfT presentation that says that, it occurs to me that the need for on-board power on loco-hauled EMUs may have disappeared. Hitachi's bid offer bi-modes, not loco-hauling, as the solution for off-wire routes. So the on-board diesels now only have one mandatory use: limited movement. Of course there is nothing to stop the supplier providing more than the mandatory minimum.

This is really exciting stuff - so many railway services start from a big city (let's call it "London") with a lotta services each hour, and electric is obvious.  But the along the way, the lines branch, some services terminate and the remaining services reduce in frequency.

OK - but, for example, I live in Gloucestershire and use the Cotswold Line; I used to live in Hereford. For the Oxford to Worcester/Hereford stretch, batteries aren't much use and a DMU (effectively) lugging electric traction equipment - and vice versa - around doesn't seem that sensible. Same if you live beyond Bristol, say around Plymouth or Penzance (and I'm sure the diesel engines will welcome hauling the electrical equipment up the South Devon banks).

For emergency use doesn't a small diesel unit in a driving unit seem a useful idea; otherwise have an electric locomotive on one end and switch it to a diesel when required as on ECML.

I'm not suggesting it's an "everywhere" answer. But it might provide for ... Paignton when via Newton Abbot is electrified, for trains calling at Frome when electrification goes to Taunton, for extending current Thames Valley suburban trains from where the electrification runs out to where the current suburban service ends (and that may include Hanborough and perhaps extras to Moreton in Marsh). Looking in your neck of the woods again, for trains into Worcester when Bristol - Birmingham is electrified.

I agree - but how long before we see the wires going to Plymouth or Penzance? Or further down the Berks & Hants line? And electrification of the Cross Country route from Bristol to Bromsgrove won't help (if that gets done anytime soon).