TPE ‘397’ debut
TransPennine Express Class 397s enter traffic, but operator warns of cancelled services due to lack of crews.
TransPennine Express is cancelling trains in the new December timetable, due to the late delivery of its new fleets.
The operator announced on December 6 that owing to a maintenance backlog and infrastructure issues which it claims have caused delays in crew training, services on its new Liverpool Lime Street-Edinburgh route will be amended.
This route is welcoming new CAF Class 397 five-car electric multiple units. They are replacing fourcar Class 350/4s, which started moving to West Midlands Railway from the end of November.
A TPE spokesman told RAIL that the infrastructure issues related to various problems on both the East and West Coast Main Lines, both of which have been blocked in recent weeks due to flooding and overhead wire problems. This has affected driver training of electricpowered trains.
“Unfortunately, it’s not just services in passenger use that get affected when the infrastructure goes down, although Network
Rail acted swiftly in all cases to get customers on the move again,” he said.
With the maintenance backlog, this is mainly down to the Class 802/2s being unable to return to their Doncaster base for required maintenance, because of a lack of available crews.
TPE’s spokesman said: “There’s not just one cause for this, but a mixture - including requirement for crew training and having Class 802s in service.”
He added that there is no specific date for the full timetable introduction, as this depends on training and train availability: “It will be reviewed constantly during the period when the amended timetable is in operation. This means that if there are sufficient numbers of trained crew and units, some of the trains which have been temporarily removed from the
timetable may be reinstated.”
TPE Managing Director Leo Goodwin said: “In recent weeks our customers will have noticed that we have had to cancel a number of our services, and we are truly sorry for the inconvenience that this has caused.
“To mitigate this, we will be running a temporary amended timetable on our Liverpool to Edinburgh services, to ensure that we can have the trains and crew we need to run our services, alongside providing training on our new Nova fleets of trains.
“However, while this is a temporary 5% decrease in our services, overall we will be providing an increase of over 30% in capacity for our customers. Alongside this, we are pleased to offer greater connectivity for our customers with the launch of new direct services between Liverpool and Glasgow Central.”
Between December 1-8, just over half (52%) of TPE services ran on time, with 23.8% late and 24.2% very late or cancelled (very late is recorded as 30 minutes-plus).
A source also confirmed that diagrams are having to be rewritten to ensure certain individual trains return to their home depot each night, due to their condition. This has led to TPE having to cancel trains.
“This timetable change should have been good news for TPE passengers, with more services and new trains,” said Transport Focus Director David Sidebottom.
“Passengers have already experienced far too many delays and cancellations. This reduction in services will be another knock to passengers’ trust.
“TPE now needs to make sure it lets all affected passengers know about these late changes and communicate its plan to minimise further disruption.”
As part of the timetable that was due to launch on December 15 (after this issue of RAIL went to press), three trains per day will run between Liverpool and Glasgow, Liverpool-Newcastle trains will be extended to Edinburgh with the majority calling at Morpeth, and Manchester AirportMiddlesbrough trains are extended to Redcar Central.
There will also be new earlymorning trains between Sheffield and Cleethorpes, additional earlier and later services on Anglo-Scottish routes, and new ‘clockface’ departure times for trains at Leeds for Manchester Victoria and vice-versa.
All 44 new trains ordered for
TPE have been delivered to the
UK, comprising 12 Class 397s, 13 rakes of CAF Mk 5A coaches and 19 Hitachi Class 802 bi-mode units ( RAIL 893). It is planned that 20 will be in traffic from the December timetable change (mainly ‘802s’).