Taxpayers to pay £2m for comfier train seats
TRANSPORT for Wales will pay almost £2m extra to avoid “uncomfortable and unsuitable” seats in future new trains, but has dropped its pledge to gather passenger feedback before choosing the seats.
Its choice for the 77 long-distance trains appears to be the same as the seating in Great Western Railway’s new trains – criticised by many passengers – but could be configured differently.
Franchise operator KeolisAmey and train manufacturer CAF proposed to use the same seating as in the new Thameslink trains in the London area.
Some Thameslink passengers claim the seats are like “concrete” or “ironing boards” and unsuitable for longer journeys such as London to Brighton, w hich takes more than an hour. KeolisAmey and CAF proposed the same seats for routes such as Milford
Haven to Manchester via Cardiff – six hours from end to end. TfW board minutes reveal that TfW “raised concerns” in July about the proposed seats with KeolisAmey, which operates under the TfW Rail Services brand.
TfW, the Welsh Government-owned company which procured the 15-year rail franchise, said the technical specification “mandates that the trains must be comfortable and practical for journeys of up to three hours”. It argued that the Thameslink seats are “uncomfortable and unsuitable for long distance journeys”.
However, it decided it would not have a “strong legal argument” to force KeolisAmey and CAF to pay for more comfortable seats. “Such legal action would be unlikely to succeed but would incur considerable additional cost and cause significant programme delay.”
Instead, taxpayerfunded TfW agreed to pay an extra £1.9m for its own choice of seat in the new trains, which will operate all Cambrian services between mid-Wales and Birmingham, all services from Cardiff to Manchester and Liverpool and most in north Wales.
KeolisAmey’s Colin Lea, customer experience director at TfW Rail Services, indicated that KeolisAmey would not use fire safety standards as an excuse to provide firm seats. He said: “This is a big issue of mine. We’re going to do our best to not hide behind the fire standards which we’ve seen with some franchises. A lot of those journeys are very long.”
Asked why TfW had chosen the seating without feedback from passengers, a TfW spokesman said: “The customer is at the heart of our decision making at TfW, and the gold standard seats that we have selected for our new Class 197 trains are the best option available through our train supplier.”