‘Keep it simple stupid’

DO our new trains really need to be so complex? Every issue of The RM seems to include some new reason for a delay, incompatible couplers that prevent swift removal of failed trains, cracks in service, but the most common appears to be software.

Isn’t it ridiculous that an eight-mile, low speed, self-contained line (Isle of Wight) is now closed for many months due to software issues. Elsewhere you can’t add extra coaches, as new coach won’t speak to old coach. The IET issue on the GWR couldn’t be resolved by moving spare under-used units from other TOCs as, apart from driver training perhaps, I read that software differs across regions, so even supposedly identical units were not compatible.

This ludicrous situation is amply demonstrated by the lovely picture of steam age Braunton happily hauling Mk.1 and Mk.3 coaches on the West Coast Main Line, electric services on that line regularly had Mk.1, 2, and 3 in their consists in early Virgin days.

Multiple units clearly have their uses, but oh how I hanker for the simple engine plus coaches days (even one at each end to simplify terminal work), when anything could pretty much pull anything, and adding some extra capacity required no more than shunting an extra coach on, subject to just braking and heating type in some cases.

“Keep it simple stupid” worked well in our heyday, but now it seems we do things purely because we can, not because we actually need to.

Graham By email

Colin Hughes, Royal British Legion Southport ‘8F’ TRIBUTE: I thought that you might be interested in this depiction of an ‘8F’, one of the locos that won the war. This fine tribute to railway workers is situated in The National Arboretum at Alrewas, Staffordshire. Three of my uncles who were railwaymen fought in the Second World War and my father, who was a lineman with S&T (Signal and Telegraph), was in a reserved occupation and served on the home front.