Atomic Systems

salopiangrowler wrote:i dont know why SWT dont purchase a 153 and 150/2 for the job run them as a 3 car set it'll save the need to run a 158 or 159 up and down at slow speeds. incidently will the dieselisation of the Lymington branch mean they'll be switching off the juice and even removing the 3rd rail contacts.

It's going to cost SWT a lot of money just to remove it.

connorurry wrote:

LeeEAS wrote:Waste of diesel using a 158 on an electrified line...

Not entirely Lee.

Maybe using 3rd rail is getting expensive and they want to cut costs to save money.
Diesel is cheap these days.

Just curious though, but would they be allowed to constantly use a diesel through the New Forest? It is a national park after all. I know that voyagers (and previously HST's) go through the NF but they are only on an hourly basis. I also realise diesels probably used to pass on the Weymouth-Waterloo stretch in the 70's-80's often but now the forest has national park status could the constant use of diesel be frowned upon for the enviroment of that area or is it a case of SWT can run what they want, when they want?

kieranhardy wrote:

connorurry wrote:

LeeEAS wrote:Waste of diesel using a 158 on an electrified line...

Not entirely Lee.

Maybe using 3rd rail is getting expensive and they want to cut costs to save money.
Diesel is cheap these days.

Just curious though, but would they be allowed to constantly use a diesel through the New Forest? It is a national park after all. I realise diesels probably used to pass on the Weymouth-Waterloo stretch but now the forest has national park status could the constant use of diesel be frowned upon for the enviroment of that area or is it a case of SWT can run what they want, when they want?

A good point Kieren. SWT should keep the 3CIGs. They are life-expired after 2013.

The boundaries of the new forest dont touch the Lymington branch as its the wrong side of Brokenhurst for starters.

what about EWS and Freightliner then.

salopiangrowler wrote:The boundaries of the new forest dont touch the Lymington branch as its the wrong side of Brokenhurst for starters.

It runs through the New Forest.... with the forest on both sides of the track at points.

salopiangrowler wrote:what about EWS and Freightliner then.

What about them? They don't go through the New forest 4 times in an hour like the trains on the Lymington branch do.

The only freight trains that run on a regular basis west of Totton are the LPG trains to Furzebrook

Can't see why the 3rd rail would be removed. It would take a lot of effort to do so, and to what end?

It wouldn't be SWT paying for the removal if it did go, though. That would be NR's decision and money. And why on earth would NR want to spend money downgrading the network?

508s or something would be a better solution than a diesel though, or maybe even a few 313s when they become surplus at LO/FCC. I guess the issue would remain that they would have to retain a small fleet dedicated to the lymington branch, which hardly has the traffic to warrant it. Long term the solution ought to be to extend the lymington town platform - even though there isn't the traffic, money has been spent on that kind of thing before for stock utilisation reasons.

As for diesels through the new forest - two per hour on the Bournemouth XCs?

arabiandisco wrote:Can't see why the 3rd rail would be removed. It would take a lot of effort to do so, and to what end?

It wouldn't be SWT paying for the removal if it did go, though. That would be NR's decision and money. And why on earth would NR want to spend money downgrading the network?

508s or something would be a better solution than a diesel though, or maybe even a few 313s when they become surplus at LO/FCC. I guess the issue would remain that they would have to retain a small fleet dedicated to the lymington branch, which hardly has the traffic to warrant it. Long term the solution ought to be to extend the lymington town platform - even though there isn't the traffic, money has been spent on that kind of thing before for stock utilisation reasons.

As for diesels through the new forest - two per hour on the Bournemouth XCs?

They kept the 3CIG's though and paid for their refurbishment even if they were non-standard. I read somewhere that Bournemouth Depot's been downgraded since the 442s are no longer maintained there so the 3CIGs can't be sent there for maintenance. The only other place they could go for routine maintenance would be Wimbledon Park which pushes the cost right up; they could only go there at certain times because the southampton-waterloo line's very busy.

I think there's only one X/C service to Bournemouth per hour anyway. A few do start/terminate at Southampton. Until 2002/3 (cant remember) they carried on to Poole but the service was cut back to Bournemouth since Virgin didn't have enough Voyagers (and the SRA wouldn't let them keep any HSTs). At the same time services to Portsmouth and Liverpool were axed because of this reason.

Wimbledon maintain the 3CIGS they go to a throu with a 73 at the helm

salopiangrowler wrote:they go to a throu with a 73 at the helm

Not always, they can be self propelled on the mainline, especially for tire-turning.

Plus I thought Bournemouth maintained them?

Not since bournmouth closed all maintainance is done at Wimbledon.

they maybe self propelled but as far as im aware out of all the ECS movements 95% of them were made with a 73 in the consist as the 3CIGs are only give permission to run from Brokenhurst-Lymington Pier not mainline! although in the absence of a 73 and the need to move them the CIGs do venture onto the mainline under their own power.

energize wrote:

arabiandisco wrote:Can't see why the 3rd rail would be removed. It would take a lot of effort to do so, and to what end?

It wouldn't be SWT paying for the removal if it did go, though. That would be NR's decision and money. And why on earth would NR want to spend money downgrading the network?

508s or something would be a better solution than a diesel though, or maybe even a few 313s when they become surplus at LO/FCC. I guess the issue would remain that they would have to retain a small fleet dedicated to the lymington branch, which hardly has the traffic to warrant it. Long term the solution ought to be to extend the lymington town platform - even though there isn't the traffic, money has been spent on that kind of thing before for stock utilisation reasons.

As for diesels through the new forest - two per hour on the Bournemouth XCs?

They kept the 3CIG's though and paid for their refurbishment even if they were non-standard. I read somewhere that Bournemouth Depot's been downgraded since the 442s are no longer maintained there so the 3CIGs can't be sent there for maintenance. The only other place they could go for routine maintenance would be Wimbledon Park which pushes the cost right up; they could only go there at certain times because the southampton-waterloo line's very busy.

I think there's only one X/C service to Bournemouth per hour anyway. A few do start/terminate at Southampton. Until 2002/3 (cant remember) they carried on to Poole but the service was cut back to Bournemouth since Virgin didn't have enough Voyagers (and the SRA wouldn't let them keep any HSTs). At the same time services to Portsmouth and Liverpool were axed because of this reason.

I think there's a difference between keeping something you already had which is non-standard and getting something new which is non-standard. Using a diesel on that line is a great example of the fragmentation of the railways. If the whole of the SE network was operated by one company, this would have been solved by using a 3-car 377, 508, 456 or 465, all of which would be NSE (or whatever it would have been rebranded as by now). Since SWT have determined that they don't need any other electric trains of less than 4 cars, we end up with a 158 shuttling from Brockenhurst to Lymington.

And yeah, only one XC per hour to Bournemouth, Plus one XC per hour from bournemouth = 2 XC per hour through the new forest I think it's only the first one of the day that starts from Southampton, and probably the last one finishes there.

arabiandisco wrote:
I think there's a difference between keeping something you already had which is non-standard and getting something new which is non-standard. Using a diesel on that line is a great example of the fragmentation of the railways. If the whole of the SE network was operated by one company, this would have been solved by using a 3-car 377, 508, 456 or 465, all of which would be NSE (or whatever it would have been rebranded as by now). Since SWT have determined that they don't need any other electric trains of less than 4 cars, we end up with a 158 shuttling from Brockenhurst to Lymington.

A friend of my dad used to work fairly high up in the Department for Transport. He informed me that one of the first things the Tories will do will be to create bigger franchises i.e. one for the whole of the former Southern Region. I don't know whether it's in their manifesto but it would definitely make sense since it would allow for more efficient utilisation of rolling stock. Hopefully that would be a precursor to creating a vertically integrated railway.

Dont go all political on me.

You can tell your friends dad from me that if he remembers Margret Thatcher's hate for trains nothing much improved since then. and it was the Conservatives that Privatised the railway in the first place.

and what as this got to do with a couple of 3CIG's

i dont care how high up anyone is, or if he is your friends father i dont think its his business to tell anyone anything about whats happening as it may not even go ahead. then again the DfT change there mind more than ever these days.

salopiangrowler wrote:Dont go all political on me.

You can tell your friends dad from me that if he remembers Margret Thatcher's hate for trains nothing much improved since then. and it was the Conservatives that Privatised the railway in the first place.

and what as this got to do with a couple of 3CIG's

i dont care how high up anyone is, or if he is your friends father i dont think its his business to tell anyone anything about whats happening as it may not even go ahead. then again the DfT change there mind more than ever these days.

this was obviously a response to arabiandiscos post about the fact that if the railways were more integrated then the "couple of 3cigs" would not have to be replaced by 158/159 stock, and that stock could be 377/3 etc.

continuing the topic yesterday the blue/grey 3cig was running on the shuttle, after i took a little trip to lymington.

Back to energizes post, it would be interesting to see how they would be split up, NSE, GWR, RR, any other franchises i've forgotten?