ROLLING STOCK SPECIAL
maintenance depots during the day, to ensure the teams know exactly what needs to be done to the train when it comes in for maintenance that night and can have all the parts, tools and people ready at the right place and right time.
“Not only are the trains running more in- tensively, with each one covering 300,000 miles every year whereas a conventional EMU would do about 200,000 miles, the availability has also risen considerably.
“We have moved from being able to put 42 trains in service every day to now be- ing able to provide 47 – and quite regularly 48. Considering that we now only have 52 trains in the fleet and manage to run 48 of them, I feel this is quite an achievement, thanks to a good product and a strong maintenance regime, which have been de- veloped in tandem.
“In terms of further product development, we began discussing the issue of capacity on the West Coast Main line some time ago and realised that it was running out. This led to the biggest development of the product, which will be the running of 11- car trains.
“We have an order ongoing to provide four new Pendolino trains with 11 cars each and then to extend 31 of the existing nine-car trains by an extra two cars, a total of 106 new cars in all.”
“People who regularly use the West Coast Main Line will notice that the frequency of services has improved substantially. In 2004 there was one train an hour between London and Manchester; now there are three and this is also the same from Birmingham to London.”
The first of the new trains began safety tri- als in December 2010, with the company hoping to produce its safety case for the 11-car trains by June 2011, ready to deliver them into service from April 2012.
Capacity is certainly an issue across Britain’s railways so these additional car- riages will be most welcomed – both by the operator and by passengers.
Bentley said: “People who regularly use the West Coast Main Line will notice that the frequency of services has improved substantially. In 2004 there was one train an hour between London and Manchester; now there are three and this is also the same from Birmingham to London.
“This has led the number of passengers using the service to reach 28 million and it is set to keep on increasing. Many services are full and often at peak hours the trains
Above:
Pendolinos at the Wembley pit stop
are full with people standing. It will cer- tainly help to put these additional trains into service to help to deal with this grow- ing capacity issue.
“There is another option which we hope to have included in the next West Coast Main Line re-franchising invitation to tender, which is to bring in an additional 42 cars, to make all of the trains in the fleet 11 cars long.
“The great thing about what has happened over the years with Virgin Trains has been how we have worked in partnership, right from the design of the train onwards.
“The operation of the train has become very good, with the two organisations working very closely together.
“It is a testament to the strength of that relationship that Virgin Trains invited Alstom to place our company branding alongside that of Virgin on a set named Alstom Pendolino by CEO Tony Collins.
“That’s a really strong statement from our customer and not one taken lightly.”
Tim Bentley
FOR MORE INFORMATION W:
www.alstom.com/transport/products- and-services/rolling-stock
rail technology magazine Feb/Mar 11 | 27
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