Wight decision
COVER STORY Converted 40-year-old LU stock earmarked for Isle of Wight in £26m investment in trains and track.
THE Isle of Wight’s 8½-mile railway is to benefit from a £26 million investment in replacement trains and upgraded track.
Vivarail Class 484s converted from London Underground trains will replace the second-hand, 1938-design Tube trains used on the Island Line since 1989, and which are by far the oldest in daily use on the national railway system.
At 40 years old, the five two-car former D-Stock trains are half the age of the carriages they will replace. They will be rebuilt at Long Marston, and painted blue. The first one will arrive for testing next summer, but will only enter passenger service following track work the following winter.
“They are basically new trains,” said Vivarail Chief Executive Adrian Shooter. “The only bits that we re-use are the aluminium bodyshell, which is as good as the day it came out of the factory in Birmingham, and the frames of the bogies. Everything else is new.”
As a franchise commitment, South Western Railway (SWR) was required to develop a plan to give the line a sustainable future. The Government has now accepted that plan.
Funding will come largely from the Department for Transport, with £1 million from the island’s council and the Local Enterprise Partnership. The leased trains will be financed by Lombard NatWest, a subsidiary of Royal Bank of Scotland.
The need for the trains is immediate. Two days after the announcement, the Island Line was forced to halve its twice-hourly service. Only one of its working trains is available for service, with another taken out for maintenance.
The company said the revised schedule would remain in place until further notice, with a spokesman telling RAIL: “We will return to normal as soon as possible, but the age of these trains and the difficulty in securing replacement parts means this may take longer than normal.”
The track work will include a new passing loop at Brading station. This will enable a half-hourly service instead of the present timetable which means the trains do not coincide with Wightlink ferry departures from Ryde Pier Head to Portsmouth.
Uniquely among rail franchises, Island Line track and trains are maintained and run by a single organisation. The operator agreed a new 20-year lease from Network Rail in August.
“The £26m is not just for new trains,” said SWR Managing Director Andy Mellors.
“We’re going to crack on with delivering these improvements. We expect that the last of the new trains will be with us in spring 2021. That’s when we will alter the timetable, running a train every half-hour.
“Brading station is about halfway along the line. By putting a passing loop in at this station, we are then able to run an even-interval 30-minute service. At the moment the infrastructure means we cannot do that. A clock-face timetable will
really help connecting with ferries.”
Brading station still has two platforms connected by a footbridge, although one is not used. The station was formerly the junction for a short branch line to Bembridge.
Mellors added: “The investment is huge. Plus the funding that Network Rail is already putting into work on the pier at Ryde. This is transformational for the railway.”
The new trains will continue to use third rail electric power. They will have more capacity, with WiFi and passenger information systems.
Vivarail is developing a range of power sources for its trains.
“The requirement from the customer here was to produce a train powered from the existing third rail,” said Shooter.
“There were alternatives, but why do anything else when you already have an electrified railway?”
Concerns have been raised about the ability of the Vivarail trains to fit through the small tunnel at Ryde, but Shooter countered: “That’s a question I’ve been asked a thousand times. A number of things will have to be done to the infrastructure before trains run, including making sure the trains fit with platforms in a few places, but the trains will all be here by the end of next year.”
The new trains will have connecting doors. Unlike the 1938 vehicles, a guard will be able to move along the train to collect fares.
“This for us is Mission Accomplished,” said David Pugh, of the Keep Island Line in Franchise campaign, KILF.
“We’ve been campaigning for more than four years for this line to have a sustainable future. We now have that.
“It’s a practical solution. There was talk of brand new rolling stock, but we’ve got refurbished stock. We are quite happy with that. We don’t want a soulless modern train - we like a bit of retro on the island. And it will be a smoother ride. Visitors sometimes feel they are on a rollercoaster as it shakes from side to side.”
The Isle of Wight Steam Railway has long-held ambitions to run services beyond Smallbrook Junction into Ryde St Johns Road station, with the potential to greatly increase its passenger numbers. However, that idea has been omitted.
The Island Line is often described as the most heavily subsidised railway in the country, measured per passenger. Accurate figures are impossible to obtain, but it is generally accepted that each £1 taken in fares requires more than £1 in public support.
Recently appointed Rail Minister Chris Heaton-Harris visited Brading on September 16 to make the announcement.
“570,000 people travelled on the line last year,” he said. “It’s a great space for economic development. It’s a good pitch for the future of the island. Good for visitors, good for commuters. It’s easy to stack up economically.”
The island’s MP Bob Seely added: “This represents the first significant upgrade to the route for over 50 years, since electrification in 1967. For too many years, successive governments have kicked the can down the road, putting Island Line in the ‘too difficult’ box. We can finally be confident that our much-loved local train service will have a sustainable future.”