UK: The refurbishment of Chiltern Railways’ diesel multiple-unit fleet is the first step in a three-stage plan to modernise and ultimately decarbonise the operator’s services, according to Managing Director Richard Allan.
Speaking at London Marylebone station during the unveiling of the first refurbished Class 168 DMU on October 9, Allan said the second stage would be to replace the MkIII coaches which are approaching 50 years old. The Class 68 locomotives which haul them are now powered by recycled vegetable oil, but while the coaches ‘are a great design’ they are ‘getting towards the end of their useful economic life’.
Allan told stakeholders at Marylebone that the MkIII sets will have to be taken out of service next year, and ‘getting replacement and additional carriages is absolutely critical to allow Chiltern to do more to serve your communities over the rest of this decade’.
He explained that ‘we have been working really hard with partners to try and secure the funding to both replace them and to get additional carriages at the same time because it is really important to grow this railway’. He noted that ’Chiltern has been historically very successful, we are seeing a lot of demand, especially the middle days of the week and we can see with the commercial and housing developments that are being instigated on this part of the network that there’s going to be rising demand for the rest of this decade.’
Chiltern Railways was asked by the previous government to look at fleets being released by other operators, but the only vehicles now available are the ex-TransPennine Express CAF MkVa sets powered by Class 68 locomotives. Bombardier Transportation Class 222 trainsets are understood to be off the table, given the timescale for their release by East Midlands Railway and strong indications that they are being considered for use in Scotland to allow the retirement of ScotRail’s ageing HST fleet.
Chiltern insiders report a significant level of frustration over the delays to agreeing a way forward.
A desire to decarbonise services forms the third part of Chiltern Railways’ plans for the future, and work is now under way to develop a plan with Network Rail, the Department for Transport and the nascent Great British Railways.
Allan said the HybridFlex project to fit a Class 168 with a diesel-battery hybrid powerpack was not successful ‘for various reasons’, and so attention is turning to ‘new trains and partial electrification’.
He said ‘this plan will remove the diesel trains from this network, it is in its early stages of development and we are looking for some funding’.
Calling for support from stakeholders, he said ‘we are the last London station that still operates diesel trains. We need support from decision-makers and government to make the plan a reality.’
