EMR anniversary
East Midlands Railway has had the ultimate year of two halves. Managing Director WILL ROGERS chats to TOM INGALL about an eventful start to the new franchise
East Midlands Railway Managing Director WILL ROGERS looks back at an eventful first year for the new franchise.
In an almost 20-year railway career, precious little could have prepared Will Rogers for the past 12 months.
Starting as an engineer with Interfleet Technology (now SNC-Lavalin), he has been involved with fleet management and newbuild fleet procurement before moving into operations, latterly as Managing Director of Arriva Rail London.
Moving to the same job for East Midlands Railway might have seemed like more of the same. However, the year has had other plans for us all.
Faced with such unprecedented challenges, Rogers is very quick to offer praise to his entire staff: “We don’t underestimate their efforts, especially our frontline teams in helping to keep our services running throughout the pandemic. It’s been incredible to see how everyone has responded and continues to do an outstanding job during an uncertain and difficult time. I can’t say thank you enough.”
In particular, the word ‘agile’ crops up throughout our interview, as he explains East Midlands Railway’s approach to the times we live in.
Owner Abellio was a late entrant into the race for the franchise. In April 2019, it was announced that it had unseated the incumbent (East Midlands Trains, operated by Stagecoach), and on August 18 2019 its eightyear reign began and its distinctive purple branding started to appear on trains.
The operation is split into three strands: the inter-city services running between London St Pancras, Leicester, Derby, Nottingham and Sheffield; the regional services (for example, Liverpool to Norwich and Derby to Matlock); and finally a new offering, the electric trains running the outer-suburban services which will now continue up to Corby.
Rogers is sure that the promised level of transformation was key to securing the franchise: “We want to really deliver for the customers and communities of the East Midlands. There is fleet replacement and significant commitments around stations.
Fleet replacement is quite a big story, which is starting imminently with the introduction of Class 180s that we’ll run for a period of time as we transition High Speed Trains out of service.”
The HSTs were due to have departed the Midland Main Line by now, as they were no longer compliant with disability access regulations.
Some have already made their last revenue-earning journey, but with dispensations put into place because of the uncertainty of the electrification programme, others continue in traffic - supplemented by the so-called ‘red’ HST sets cascaded from the East Coast Main Line.
Ultimately, there will be an entirely new fleet of bi-mode express trains ( built by Hitachi) to replace the HSTs, the Class 180s and the relatively young Class 222 Meridians on the inter-city strand of the business.
“We’re expecting the bi-mode trains at the back end of 2022 into early 2023, as the current plan. There will be significant changes to the rolling stock on each part of our network,” Rogers continues.
“In May next year we’ll introduce Class 360s into service, which will run the EMR electric service - a half-hourly timetabled departure between St Pancras and Corby. The ‘360s’ are currently operated by Greater Anglia and come as four-car sets but can run as up to 12-car units. This service will utilise the electrified infrastructure and brings with it the sixth path into London, which will allow us to increase capacity.
“On our regional fleet we have the Class 170 transition, which is starting. We’ve received our first ones and driver training is under way.”
The Class 170s will replace the venerable Class 156 and ‘158’ diesel multiple units, offering not only a more modern experience for passengers but also a higher top speed.
It must be quite startling, however, to begin a new franchise and see every assumption fundamentally challenged or changed just six months later. But as the pandemic accelerated, EMR acted presciently and made changes before the Government put the country into lockdown.
“The big decision for me was on March 2, when we made the call to stand up our command structure and we established the objectives straight away to keep our staff and customers safe,” explains Rogers.
“That structure remains in place today, and I’m pleased we made that call then because it stood us in good stead to deal with the range of challenges that the pandemic has presented.
“By the time the Government implemented the full lockdown we’d already done quite a lot of planning. Such have been the changes in terms of what we’ve been delivering and the impact on our workforce, setting up a good command structure has meant we can be very organised as a business. It’s been essential and I’m pleased we made that call then.
“I have been blown away by how people have pulled together to keep essential services running. You could see passenger numbers softening, and then they fell away very quickly after lockdown.”
I travelled to London for work in late April, and the contrast with the normal experience was so stark it remains with me today.
On the platform at Sheffield at 0805, the trains rolled backwards and forwards but for 20 minutes I was the only passenger in sight.
On the 0900 train there was one other passenger from Chesterfield to Leicester, and after that we were empty coaching stock to London. You would have heard a ticket drop on the empty concourse at St Pancras. At their lowest point, passenger levels were some 99% below normal.
We’re looking across customer segments - business, commuter and leisure - they will return at different stages and different volumes.
Will Rogers, Managing Director, East Midlands Railway
There’s an oft-repeated piece of frontline railway humour that goes something along the lines of: ‘This job would be alright… if it wasn’t for the passengers.’ 2020 has delivered the punchline - be careful what you wish for.
Rogers continues: “We’re about 87% down right now, so there has been some improvement. But there is clearly a long way to go.
“I think it’s really difficult to say how long it is going to take for customers to return. There are a number of different factors, but a key one is ‘the new normals’ that people and businesses are establishing.”
Can you do more to bring people back to the railways?
“Customer expectations have changed. Things such as cleanliness, safety, reliability and trust are all the top priorities, and we’re responding to that. We have been pleased by some of the findings of our most recent travel surveys - 90% of customers told us they felt ‘safe’ travelling with EMR and 87% of customers would recommend travelling with us since the pandemic started.
“We also need to understand what new travel patterns will be like - for example, will there be a peak or not? We’re looking across customer segments - business, commuter and leisure - they will return at different stages and different volumes.”
Besides passenger usage dropping so rapidly, there was another seismic change for the rail industry which went practically unmarked in the wider media. Franchising was suspended - EMR, like everyone else, is now on an Emergency Measures Agreement, with the Government paying the way and taking the revenue.
“The current contract lasts until September and we don’t know yet what is coming next. There’s an expectation something will follow, but precisely what that looks like we’re not sure.
“Looking at our passenger volumes today, there’s still a significant challenge to the structures that went before. I think a return to franchising that we knew back at the start of March is unlikely in the short to medium term.”
Does that mean that Rogers and EMR will have to change their approach? Will there still be new trains if passengers aren’t riding?
“Absolutely. As we look forward there are still exciting improvements for our customers. We’re planning ahead and focusing on delivering the commitments we made, which includes the fleet replacement.
“Electrification has been a significant investment in the future of the Midland Main Line and will bring significant enhancement in journey times and capacity. Clearly there’s talk of wider electrification schemes, which would be good to see, particularly as we look to rail to fulfil the sustainable transport brief which we know is more in focus as we bounce back from Coronavirus.
“It’s interesting to look at what might be possible on our regional services, too - either enhancing services or bringing services to areas that might not have had them previously.”
It has been an extraordinary first year. But rather than retreat into a bunker, EMR has maintained its mission against the backdrop of a global health crisis. It has continued to serve, both on the tracks and off. Its staff have raised money for charity and supported local food banks.
It would be wrong to pretend this has been the year it expected, and EMR’s agility will doubtless be tested further depending on the future business model the Government imposes.
However, while our minds are elsewhere, it’s still running the trains and bringing about the changes it committed to when the world looked very different.