Vivarail's 'D Train' - 'D' stock reborn

Arriva Trains Wales have some awful Pacer units which regularly show up on the Swansea - Pembroke Dock service making that a pretty dismal 2 hour+ journey, Id love to see some refurbed D stock taking its place, having spent many hours huddled in the back cab of a D back in the day when they were quite new...

I cant see ATW bankrolling new rolling stock for this area so the D train project might be a good compromise to provide an efficient and comfortable stock on aline that really doesn't do enough business to justify the investment in new build.

It seems to be happening: there's a short article about the work, and the first vehicle to arrive, in this week's RAIL magazine

The rmt want the same kind of investment ad in the south?
So moves towards driver less then? ;-)

Better they get re-used elsewhere than sent on a one way trip to the scrap merchants.

Thank you!

Someone has obliged!
BBC Look-North

Would be great if one / several of these were used on the Greenford Shuttle, even if only for a few days (special event) over a long weekend which includes Sunday services. It would need to be the longest train that the platform at Greenford can accommodate, as it / they would likely be very popular with some people travelling distances to see it / them.

Now, where did I put my camcorder...

Simon

Not necessarily.

All of the pacers must be scrapped (as we know) - which is a total of 212 carriages across both the 142 and 144 classes. 212-120 = 92 cars that still need to come from somewhere. Some trains are expected to be cascaded to the franchise, but they are all electric and so a lot of it depends on the various electrification programs happening on time (which they probably won't!). That is before you get to details such as having to reform the class 153s back into 155s (halving the number of trains) to get around various DDA compliance issues, so the franchise will be down on stock, that is for certain! The logical choice would be the D train, just as a filler until electrification is complete at which point they can make their way to the scrapyard and the operator can use their new 319s (which are now all expected to make their way up north), or potentially even some new build.

Even if the government rephrase the document and explicitly forbid the D trains (which frankly would be a mad thing to do, a seat on a train is a seat on a train, even if the body and chassis of said train are 35 odd years old), you could still end up with them going off to some other part of the country (Devon and Cornwall, Wales etc) so it's not over

The idea of scrapping large numbers of Pacers is ridiculous. One minute we're being told it's virtually impossible to specify new diesel trains, then we're looking at completely removing a large fleet. Meanwhile the small number of planned electrification projects seem to slip further and further. Pacers aren't *that* bad, in fact I prefer them to a few other classes of train, in particular class 150s which make up another large part of the Northern Rail fleet.

For most people the main priority is overcrowding, removing a large number of trains to meet an artificial deadline will not help this. I'm sure many would rather have a lightly loaded old train than an overcrowded new train. Pacers would make ideal extra units to attach to other formations at busy times -- and nowadays most times are busy, even on branch lines.

If a combination of electrification and (perhaps) new diesels starts to allow Pacers to be withdrawn then fine, but only if they are genuinely surplus to requirements. In other words, at a time when there are no overcrowded trains which could feasibly be lengthened. Not due a political agenda.

Unfortunately, with a key and unpredictable general election just weeks away, don't expect sense to prevail. Without being cynical, it's conspicuous this issue has received political attention at this particular time.

What an awful document typical of a Govenment department clauses to cover everything and pages of mindless statements for a good part of the document. I gave up reading it as I have a life however any company would ned a band of lawyers to fully understand it. No wonder it takes us so long to do anything in the UK!

How do you read para 5.2.2.4 - "These must be newly-built (not re-using components from existing rolling stock)" - to allow the use of D-trains?

If the RMT are complaining of old rolling stock being used, the logic will be to shut down the whole of the District Line?
Do these morons think that no maintenance is carried out since date of purchase, or is mouth opened before brain(!) is engaged? Historically whether its rail or road transport, vehicles have been cascaded since like for ever.
I had the pleasure last year of having a flight on a De Havilland Rapide.
I knew the aeroplane was built before WW2, but did it cross my mind about maintenance and airworthiness?

That clause is quite irrelevant to the D-train proposals which, notwithstanding their unusual provenance, would be fairly conventional diesel-(electric) multiple units. Clause 5.4.2.2 specifically envisages non-dmu trains as a possibility
("unless the Bidder intends for them to be hauled by a locomotive, must be capable of operating under their own power for significant distances on non-electrified routes. This means that DMUs or IPEMUs with battery range broadly comparable to or better than the unit currently being trialled in the AngliaFranchise could contribute to meeting this requirement")
Thus a BCQ can be raised if you propose to run loco-hailed trains, or BEMUs, or indeed steam trains!

The Front of the D78s are getting a large revamp as part of the modification work. Part of said revamp is putting in a large crash structure (which I understand to essentially be a large steel plate) in a cross across the cab to reinforce it. It'll mean that should there be a crash, it won't behave any worse than a new generation piece of stock (such as the class 387s or 700s) - it will in all likelihood need to be built to meet modern crashworthiness requirements! As for TPWS, I thought it was mandatory for all trains to be fitted with it, which would include the D train?