Disability dispensation
THE Department for Transport is under mounting pressure to allow older trains to continue running beyond the December 31 accessibility deadline, after which new regulations come into effect.
A number of operators have not yet been granted permission to do so, raising the prospect that hundreds of services could be cancelled from January. The problem affects diverse fleets including High Speed Trains, Pacers, Sprinters and locomotivehauled Mk 2 and Mk 3 stock. RAIL understands that around 200 vehicles are affected.
Northern, Transport for Wales and East Midlands Railway are all still awaiting dispensation from the Persons with Reduced Mobility - Technical Specifications for Interoperability (PRM-TSI), to continue to use non-compliant stock. Sources have suggested that Greater Anglia could also be affected.
On October 15, a Department for Transport spokesman said there was no date for when dispensation would be handed out. A DfT document showed that, at the end of December 2018, there were 11,912 vehicles in use on heavy rail, of which 88% were compliant.
Northern, TfW and GA have all been hindered by delays to new train fleets, while EMR has been affected by the decision to cancel electrification north of Kettering.
Northern confirmed on October 11 that it would have to use Class 142 Pacers in the North West on four dedicated routes, owing to delays with CAF Class 195 diesel units under construction at Newport.
Nine two-car ‘142s’ are planned to be used each day, with two maintenance spares. They will operate on the Clitheroe/Blackburn-Rochdale (via Bolton and Manchester Victoria), Manchester Piccadilly-Rose Hill/ Marple/New Mills/Chinley and Manchester Piccadilly-Sheffield routes. At all times they will run with a fully accessible Class 150 or ‘156’ so that passengers of reduced mobility are able to travel.
Northern Managing Director David Brown said: “We have sought approval for a small number of Pacers to operate on a handful of routes in South/West Yorkshire and the North West for a few weeks into 2020.”
He said the majority of Pacers would be withdrawn by the end of this year.
CAF UK Director Richard Garner said: “CAF regrets the delay in delivering the next batch of trains to Northern, but we are working hard to catch up. We continue to work closely with Northern to bring these new trains into passenger service as soon as possible.”
EMR spokesman Andrew Commons said the operator was still unaware of any agreement to transfer redundant LNER High Speed Trains, to replace the existing fleet which doesn’t meet accessibility rules. He also added there was no date for the transfer of nine Class 156s from Greater Anglia to EMR, to meet the December timetable.
Further south, Transport for Wales’ Sprinter fleet is going through interior refurbishments to meet Disability Discrimination
Act requirements. Spokesman Eryl Jones said 73 trains (36 Class 150s, 24 ‘158s’ and 13 ‘153s’) were affected, with the operator expecting its ‘158s’ and ‘a good proportion of ‘150s’ and ‘153s’ to be treated. In the meantime, the operator has applied to DfT for dispensation relating to a number of fleets.
TfW has been affected by delays to the Porterbrook Class 769 FLEX project. Until FLEX trains are available, it plans to use pairs of Class ‘142/143s’ on the Rhymney route (see pages 30-31).
A senior source at a rolling stock owning company attributed the delays to factors including huge demand from suppliers, cost overruns on various projects, the West Coast franchise fall-out in 2012, and the discovery of the condition of older vehicles when being refurbished.