Electrification, IEP and their effects - presentation from FGW

[whole diary]

[grahame]

From a presentation by Matthew Golton of FGW^▸ (First Great Western) to TravelWatch SouthWest on 5th March 2011 at Taunton.  "Errors and Omissions Excepted" please - a busy day, and an eventful journey home too.

Electrification

London to Newbury
London to Oxford via Didcot
London to Bristol Temple Meads via Chippenham / Bath
London to Bristol Temple Meads via Bristol Parkway
London to Cardiff via Bristol Parkway and Newport

This is seen as a first phase, with a rolling onward program if a case can be made.

Swansea is not included; it does not make the case at the lower service level that's the most that's currently justified, and there is no extra speed gain from electifying this twisty section on its current track routing

South Wales valleys are possibly in - next stage of electification - in the next control phase (i.e. 2014 - 2019).

InterCity Express Program (IEP^▸ (Intercity Express Program / Project.))

2016 for initial delivery.   
Hitachi to provide 533 vehicles for daily use of which 308 will be on GW^▸ (Great Western); note that more will be built to provide for those being serviced by Hitachi, etc
To be formed into 8 car electric sets and 5 car bimode sets
Ratio (of vehicles?) electic : bimode to be 40 : 60
Bimode sets capable of coupling to make up 10 car sets for busy services
All vehicles will be passenger carrying
Vehicles will be 26 metres long
Bimode sets will have engines under 3 of the 5 carriages
Design is to allow for easy lengthening / shortening of the sets

Service futures (GW)

4 trains per hour, London to Bristol Parkway (1 hr 11 mins)
- 2 carry on to Cardiff (1 hr 42 mins), of which 1 carries on to Swansea (2 hrs 39 mins)
- other 2 carry on to Temple Meads

2 trains per hour, London to Bristol Temple Meads via Chippenham / Bath

Core peak services from London to Hereford/Worcester, Swansea, Exeter, Cheltenham and Oxford, plus "perhaps some beyond". Carmarthen was mentioned, as was Taunton (which I guess is via Bridgwater).

This is said to be an extra 8500 peak seats - an increase of 30%

West of England is "future phase". No mention made of Weston-super-mare.

The HST^▸ (High Speed Train) fleet, refurbished by FGW for a life to 2013, will be extended to 2016 for the whole fleet with a longer extended life for a smaller fleet for West of England services, pending cascade of other trains from elsewhere in the UK^▸ (United Kingdom) or further new builds.

Questions asked

"First has the option to carry on to 2016 or to complete the franchise in 2013. Can you tell us if a decision has been made yet?" - "No decision made"

"You talk about the government, Hitachi and the operators having inputs into the deisgn of the new trains.   Will passengers have an input on the interior design". Real anger was expressed by the questioner on high, hard seats, lack of tables, and very close airline style seating. - "Yes - passenger inputs will be taken from Passenger Focus and operator inputs from ATOC^» (Association of Train Operating Companies See - here).  We have not seen details yet but bear in mind that safety is paramount and you'll note that modern interior design is very much safer - see Lambrigg accident, for example, with limited casualtys from a high speed accident"

"Redoubling via Kemble - part of the scheme?" - "No, but the usefulness of doing so is recognised." [I think there was comment about further announcement in next 10 days]

"Exeter / Plymouth, and cascading of HSTs" - "Exeter will be 2 trains per hour bimode, Plymouth hourly HST beyond".   The questioner asked about using HSTs for the stoppers on the Cornwall main line and also Cardiff - Portsmouth, but I didn't catch any answer given to those points

"What about Torbay" - "Torbay is important to us as witnessed by the extra service introduced recently" I didn't catch any further answer telling us about service patterns for Torbay under IEP / re-allocated HSTs.

West fleet question held back for another thread - not IEP / electric train related

Edit - correcting my misspelling of Matthew's name - sorry Matthew 

[anthony215]

4 trains per hour, London to Bristol Parkway (1 hr 11 mins)
- 2 carry on to Cardiff (1 hr 42 mins), of which 1 carries on to Swansea (2 hrs 39 mins)
- other 2 carry on to Temple Meads



Unless the Heathrow express  services become part of Crossrail then it will be very difficult to have additional trains to Bristol as there are no spare paths between London Paddington & Airport Junction.

If you want extra trains to Bristol  the other option you have would be to run a 10 carriage Bi-mode to Bristol Parkway where the train splits with 1 going to South wales and the other to Bristol TM^‡(resolve)  , but  that would mean that  therw would be a need for extra capacity up Filton Bank.


That said maybe Network rail could built a flyover at the western side of Airport Junction and run  some direct rail services to/from Heathrow Airport

[ChrisB]

From a presentation by Matthew Gorton of FGW^▸ (First Great Western) to TravelWatch SouthWest on 5th March 2011 at Taunton.  "Errors and Omissions Excepted" please - a busy day, and an eventful journey home too.

That's Matthew Golton, btw.

InterCity Express Program (IEP^▸ (Intercity Express Program / Project.))

2016 for initial delivery.   
Hitachi to provide 533 vehicles for daily use of which 308 will be on GW^▸ (Great Western); note that more will be built to provide for those being serviced by Hitachi, etc
To be formed into 8 car electric sets and 5 car bimode sets

Although Matthew stated they would be formed into trains of 5-8 coaches, I reckon you're right....

Design is to allow for easy lengthening / shortening of the sets

Now, did that mean that this was for easy joining up of bi-mode sets or easy to add/remove coaches from sets?.....I wasn't sure.

Service futures (GW)

4 trains per hour, London to Bristol Parkway (1 hr 11 mins)
- 2 carry on to Cardiff (1 hr 42 mins), of which 1 carries on to Swansea (2 hrs 39 mins)
- other 2 carry on to Temple Meads

2 trains per hour, London to Bristol Temple Meads via Chippenham / Bath

Right at the end, Matthew corrected hgimself after consulting his laptop - to 5 total to Bristol, not 6, without explaining which route lost a train. I suspect it's one of the two listed as going Parkway to TM^‡(resolve).

Core peak services from London to Hereford/Worcester, Swansea, Exeter, Cheltenham and Oxford, plus "perhaps some beyond". Carmarthen was mentioned, as was Taunton (which I guess is via Bridgwater).

On the way to Exeter bi-mode.

Questions asked

"First has the option to carry on to 2016 or to complete the franchise in 2013. Can you tell us if a decision has been made yet?" - "No decision made"

Or if it has, they're not saying.

They have to qualify for the extension, which doesn't happen until the autumn. The actual method, built around various measures, is set out in the franchise documents. If they qualify, then it is solely FGWs decision whether to extend. The DfT^» (Department for Transport - about) can't say yea or nay. FGW then have until around Xmas to make their decision.

But they're on Revenue support until the end, whichever end date is chosen / available. There's also franchise payments of ^1 billion to be paid if they extend. So I reckon there's no given that they'll extend at all.

"You talk about the government, Hitachi and the operators having inputs into the deisgn of the new trains.   Will passengers have an input on the interior design". Real anger was expressed by the questioner on high, hard seats, lack of tables, and very close airline style seating. - "Yes - passenger inputs will be taken from Passenger Focus

And pray, when did PF^▸ (Penalty Fare) ever take soundings from passengers about seating style? Expect questions in the next survey specifically on this, I reckon. It's something that I'll take to the next Customer Panel - that FGW talk specifically to *their* customers directly.

"Redoubling via Kemble - part of the scheme?" - "No, but the usefulness of doing so is recognised." [I think there was comment about further announcement in next 10 days]

Didn't hear that myself....but may have missed it - it does seem unlikely that another announcement would be made so soon though?

"Exeter / Plymouth, and cascading of HSTs^▸ (High Speed Train)" - "Exeter will be 2 trains per hour bimode, Plymouth hourly HST beyond".   The questioner asked about using HSTs for the stoppers on the Cornwall main line and also Cardiff - Portsmouth, but I didn't catch any answer given to those points

He didn't get one - it will depend on negotiations (which can only have recently started) on HST life extensions. I can't see it personally, as there's not the loadings beyond PLY^» (Plymouth - next trains) nor on the longer distance journeys Cardiff-Portsmouth. (A lot of air to drag around for just the busier Western end)

"What about Torbay" - "Torbay is important to us as witnessed by the extra service introduced recently" I didn't catch any further answer telling us about service patterns for Torbay under IEP / re-allocated HSTs.

IEP is only going to Exeter.
The other is subject to HST extension decisions, but I can't see customers wanting to change trains with luggage.....

[paul7575]

Unless the Heathrow express  services become part of Crossrail then it will be very difficult to have additional trains to Bristol as there are no spare paths between London Paddington & Airport Junction.

However the current GW^▸ (Great Western) RUS^▸ (Route Utilisation Strategy) explains clearly that there will be significantly more mainline paths available with IEP^▸ (Intercity Express Program / Project.) and electrification.

The main point of your argument doesn't seem to account for all the infrastructure changes already planned and associated with IEP.

Paul

[paul7575]

"You talk about the government, Hitachi and the operators having inputs into the deisgn of the new trains.   Will passengers have an input on the interior design". Real anger was expressed by the questioner on high, hard seats, lack of tables, and very close airline style seating. 

FGW^▸ (First Great Western)'s representative should have been armed with the details from the IEP^▸ (Intercity Express Program / Project.) ITT^▸ (Invitation to Tender) - unless they've been completely ignored of course.  The 'specifications table' we discussed the other day gives the number of tables, seat legroom etc, etc required in the different configurations so should make it possible to answer this sort of question. 

None of the three variant specs are the same as FGW's high density HSTs^▸ (High Speed Train)...

Paul

[eightf48544]

None of the three variant specs are the same as FGW^▸ (First Great Western)'s high density HSTs^▸ (High Speed Train)...

Are they better or worse?

[JayMac]

Difficult to tell if something is better or worse when it is only on paper!

I actually like FGW^▸ (First Great Western) HST^▸ (High Speed Train) standard class airline seats. Comfortable, ample leg room and a power socket.

[paul7575]

None of the three variant specs are the same as FGW^▸ (First Great Western)'s high density HSTs^▸ (High Speed Train)...

Are they better or worse?

Don't know really - all I was pointing out on page two of the 'campaign against bimode' thread is that a spec exists, and goes into great detail on the subject.  Without the exact figures for an FGW HST I can't say - but there are more tables - 50/50 in the intercity for example.

This was the link:
http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/+/http://www.dft.gov.uk/pgr/rail/pi/iep/iepinvitationtotender/ieptraintechnicalspecifi.pdf
 
Section 6 of this, especially the comparison table at section 6.4.

Paul

[Zoe]

That said maybe Network rail could built a flyover at the western side of Airport Junction and run  some direct rail services to/from Heathrow Airport

I heard that the land required for this has a no building rule so it can't be done.

[Chris from Nailsea]

I actually like FGW^▸ (First Great Western) HST^▸ (High Speed Train) standard class airline seats. Comfortable, ample leg room and a power socket.

Hmm. I'll probably be vilified (or accused of being 'staff' again) for saying so, but I also actually like the FGW HST standard class airline seats.

While I don't use the power socket (I tend to use the electric razor before leaving home!), I rather appreciate the comparative privacy of the seating: I don't have to sit opposite someone picking their nose, or feel the need to apologise profusely every time they move their legs under a table and we end up playing footsie.

CfN 

[Ollie]

and an eventful journey home too.

How come?

[grahame]

and an eventful journey home too.

How come?

Err ... it wasn't practical for me to make the whole journey by train.  I was in a road vehicle which broke down.