Class 810 for East Midlands Railway Construction/Introduction Updates

InTheEastMids · 1 Feb 2024

WesternLancer said:
not a single 222 seat cushion in stad class made acceptably comfortable

Disagree. Where the new grey seat covers have appeared, the seat cushion has also been replaced and we are back to 2008 comfort.
It's not the full update the trains still really need, but is addressing the most noticeable issue and does make them feel a bit less third world.

Trainbike46 said:
I can't easily figure out how many seats were on the HST fleet

The number of seats per train does tell you something about ability to reduce overcrowding on specific services, but they had 5 standard class coaches so would expect something like 380-400 seats vs

Bald Rick said:
2 x 810s (508 standard seats

But that also doesn't tell you about utilisation, which impacts the total capability of the TOC to move people from one place to another. EMT had a mish-mash of different length 222s and HSTs that I recall made utilisation inefficient. Plus a lot HST services I remember catching from St Pancras often emptied out significantly by Kettering. A lot of offpeak services were very empty.
[although I'm mostly on Nottingham trains, and accept that things may be different on Sheffields]

Main concerns about 810s are based on
- disappointing reliability/availability of similar GWR/LNER trains (based on reports on this Forum)
- specific trains (potentially offpeak/weekends) which will be 5 cars when they really need to be 10 - e.g. saturday mid-morning trains to London seem very busy
- whether they'll be a step backwards from the 222s in terms of ride quality (I wasn't wowed by GWR's or Scotrail's Hitachi trains)

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WesternLancer · 1 Feb 2024

InTheEastMids said:
Disagree. Where the new grey seat covers have appeared, the seat cushion has also been replaced and we are back to 2008 comfort.
It's not the full update the trains still really need, but is addressing the most noticeable issue and does make them feel a bit less third world.

I stand corrected! I've not seen one of those as yet - are they fitted to all Std Class seats in a carriage concerned, or just the worst seats, as a matter of interest?

I see the EMR press release indicates all seats. This work - along with a deep clean, esp carpets - would go a long way to address the passenger environment problems on the 222s. It can't come soon enough.

InTheEastMids · 1 Feb 2024

WesternLancer said:
I stand corrected! I've not seen one of those as yet - are they fitted to all Std Class seats in a carriage concerned, or just the worst seats, as a matter of interest?

I see the EMR press release indicates all seats. This work - along with a deep clean, esp carpets - would go a long way to address the passenger environment problems on the 222s. It can't come soon enough

My experience was that the entire carriage had been done, but it was the only carriage in the set that had been done.

Jamesrob637 · 1 Feb 2024

WesternLancer said:
EMR, IMHO, are up there with Connex South Central for the most shockingly bad train interior experience I have had the displeasure to travel on.

They are a disgrace.

The EMR 158s are extremely comfortable, if a little claustrophobic due to the height of the seats.

WesternLancer · 1 Feb 2024

InTheEastMids said:
My experience was that the entire carriage had been done, but it was the only carriage in the set that had been done.

Thanks - that's good to know

Jamesrob637 said:
The EMR 158s are extremely comfortable, if a little claustrophobic due to the height of the seats.

Yes, I agree ref the 158s and the EMT refurb some years back was well done in that regard - tho again now getting tired and dirty due to time that has elapsed and presumably an inadequate cleaning regime / need for deep cleaning - again carpets and upholstery in particular.

Mugby · 1 Feb 2024

What would have been more preferable; more sets with 5-cars to allow more doubling up - or less sets with 7 or 8 cars which would eliminate doubling up?

Trainman40083 · 1 Feb 2024

WesternLancer said:
I would say that EMT regularly filled lots of 1st class seats and this was with full HST rakes, by pricing it right - EMR came along and stopped pricing 1st class sat suitable discounted prices and ran them with lots of empty setas - and still do. EMR are thus poor at getting the yield price right for the market - and happy to see std class crush loaded.

EMR are hopeless at so many levels.

Not a single train interior refurbed yet, not a single 222 seat cushion in stad class made acceptably comfortable - train I was in on saturday (222) had upholstery rips and tears repaired by gaffa tape....

EMR, IMHO, are up there with Connex South Central for the most shockingly bad train interior experience I have had the displeasure to travel on.

They are a disgrace.

I thought some 222s had had new seats, possibly a seven car. That said for the prices they charge, ripped seats are shocking. So many complaints.. It might be a passengers first impression

duffield · 1 Feb 2024

Mugby said:
What would have been more preferable; more sets with 5-cars to allow more doubling up - or less sets with 7 or 8 cars which would eliminate doubling up?

More five car sets, otherwise you're wasting very limited platform space at St. Pancras. That's why the order is for the specially shorter 810's, so 2x5 coaches fit on each platform.

I bet that having just a handful more five-coach units would make the situation comfortable in nearly all cases, with a fair allowance for non-availability.

dosxuk · 1 Feb 2024

Trainbike46 said:
There is 27 222s (23 5-cars and 4 7-cars), with a total seat capacity of:
7-cars: 236 standard and 106 first class seats:342 seats per train, 1368 seats total in fleet
5-cars: 192 standard and 50 first class seats:242 seats per train, 5566 steats total in feet

Across the whole 222 fleet, there are therefore 6,934 seats

There will be 33 810s, all 5 car
they will have 254 standard and 47 first class seats, giving 301 seats per train, or 9,933 across the fleet

In short, there will be an uplift from 6,934 seats across the fleet to 9,933 seats, so about 3,000 extra seats, both by having more trains and more seats per train. If that doesn't qualify as a capacity uplift I don't know what does!

Trainbike46 said:
But remember, part of that fleet was replaced with the 360s, which previously also used the IC diesel fleet

The 360's effectively replaced the 4 four car 222, which were primarily brought in for, and used on, the Corby services - they had 132 standard/33 first seats: 165 per train, 660 seats total in fleet.

If we knock those off your total for the 222's to discount them being replaced by the 360's, we get 6274 seats on the remaining (original) 222 fleet. Then there were the 9 sets of HSTs with 468 seats each, for a total of 3744 seats in the HST fleet - and a grand total of 10,018 seats across the 222/HST fleets.

Suddenly that 9933 seats doesn't seem like such a big increase does it?

43055 · 1 Feb 2024

WesternLancer said:
I stand corrected! I've not seen one of those as yet - are they fitted to all Std Class seats in a carriage concerned, or just the worst seats, as a matter of interest?

I see the EMR press release indicates all seats. This work - along with a deep clean, esp carpets - would go a long way to address the passenger environment problems on the 222s. It can't come soon enough.

They are gradually being done I think during normal maintenance time. One the other week looked like it was half red and half grey seating in the same coach.

Yew · 1 Feb 2024

Trainbike46 said:
I can't easily figure out how many seats were on the HST fleet

EMR replaced part of the IC fleet with the 360s, so comparing seat numbers with before those were in service is kind of pointless anyway

How many of threse 360s have made it up to the East Midlands?

Bald Rick · 1 Feb 2024

InTheEastMids said:
specific trains (potentially offpeak/weekends) which will be 5 cars when they really need to be 10 - e.g. saturday mid-morning trains to London seem very busy

How do you know? Have you seen the new diagrams? Or just guessing?

Energy · 1 Feb 2024

duffield said:
I bet that having just a handful more five-coach units would make the situation comfortable in nearly all cases, with a fair allowance for non-availability.

There were talks of the 180s being kept, with a single 810 being equivalent to a 7 car 222 rhre should be plenty of seats without them.

Yew said:
How many of threse 360s have made it up to the East Midlands?

21. 6 diagrams so enough for 3x4 car with 3 in maintanence.

InTheEastMids · 1 Feb 2024

Bald Rick said:
How do you know? Have you seen the new diagrams? Or just guessing?

Sorry, I don't think I was clear enough. It wasn't about how 810s might be deployed, but how 222s are (in my experience) deployed.

My experiences of really bad overloading (i.e. standing in vestibules, down the aisles, the luggage area behind the cab where you're not supposed to stand) since the pandemic have actually been on weekends, and I'm concerned that some of these may continue to be too short, even once the 810s take over.

Yew · 2 Feb 2024

Energy said:
21. 6 diagrams so enough for 3x4 car with 3 in maintanence.

I meant geographically, I've not seen one in Nottingham, Derby or Sheffield?

Richard123 · 2 Feb 2024

Bald Rick said:
Except that the majority of that authorised borrowing - Network Rail’s to be specific, is now Government debt. 2% of it. And there are several road schemes where the taxpayer has not provided the money up front: various big bridges and the M6 toll obviously, but also parts of the A1(M), A50, A19 and other projects.

No, it is quoted within overall government liabilities due to the ultimate guarantor.

The debt is Network Rail's, and they pay commercial interest rates. £4bn this year.

Examples of this in road-maintenance, renewals and upgrade are very rare; most funding is cash. If roads were funded in the same way over the past three decades, we would be paying interest on hundreds of billions in debt.

Bald Rick · 2 Feb 2024

Richard123 said:
No, it is quoted within overall government liabilities due to the ultimate guarantor.

Not quite. Debt issued before reclassification in 2014 is Network Rail’s, guaranteed by Government. Debt issued after reclassification is issued by Government directly.

Richard123 said:
If roads were funded in the same way over the past three decades, we would be paying interest on hundreds of billions in debt.

Not so. The amount spent by Goevrnment on railways vs roads in the past 3 decades is not much different.

ChrisC · 2 Feb 2024

duffield said:
More five car sets, otherwise you're wasting very limited platform space at St. Pancras. That's why the order is for the specially shorter 810's, so 2x5 coaches fit on each platform.

Five car sets certainly do help with the best use of limited platform space at St Pancras. Midweek, off peak in the middle of the day, 5 car trains with the 810’s increased capacity should be more than adequate on most trains especially the Nottinghams.

At peak times and especially at weekends to avoid overcrowding these sets will require doubling up. The main problem I can see is that even if there are enough sets to double up, will EMR actually always do so? If 8 car sets had been ordered, ignoring the capacity issues at St. Pancras, EMR would have no alternative but to run 8 car trains. With 5 car trains there is always the opportunity for widespread short forming which is often currently the case at weekends.

Energy · 2 Feb 2024

Yew said:
I meant geographically, I've not seen one in Nottingham, Derby or Sheffield?

They aren't electrified. 360s are only used on London - Corby.

QSK19 · 2 Feb 2024

Yew said:
I meant geographically, I've not seen one in Nottingham, Derby or Sheffield?

Unless some locos come along and haul 360s akin to a 57-390 arrangement to Holyhead, they won’t be visiting north of Kettering (MML side I mean, not Corby side) for a while yet.

Even if a 57-390 idea did take off (it never would though!), there wouldn’t be enough 360s to spare anyway given that there are shortformed services even when working with all 21 of them!

Peter Sarf · 2 Feb 2024

ChrisC said:
Five car sets certainly do help with the best use of limited platform space at St Pancras. Midweek, off peak in the middle of the day, 5 car trains with the 810’s increased capacity should be more than adequate on most trains especially the Nottinghams.

At peak times and especially at weekends to avoid overcrowding these sets will require doubling up. The main problem I can see is that even if there are enough sets to double up, will EMR actually always do so? If 8 car sets had been ordered, ignoring the capacity issues at St. Pancras, EMR would have no alternative but to run 8 car trains. With 5 car trains there is always the opportunity for widespread short forming which is often currently the case at weekends.

This is the same argument we all saw discussed on the GWR IET thread way back.

In a nutshell :- Having two sets make up a service does allow the ability to run the service even if one set is unavailable. If it were one longer set then cancelled. Can be viewed a different way as its easier to run short forms. Glass half full or half empty ?.

But I would go for the flexibility to double up where needed being good. Better would be an all full length (10 car) fleet with plenty spare but I don't have enough savings to buy plenty more coaches !.

Energy said:
They aren't electrified. 360s are only used on London - Corby.

My guess is the point being made was that the 360s are not part of the equation for seat capacity to Nottingham and Sheffield via Derby. In which case remove the previous number of 222s from the equation (the four 4car 222s ?).

All in all it looks pretty tight. Depends on availability (promises). I suppose being able to run a pair of 5car 810s would be more use than a single 7car 222. Even if you have a spare 222 you cannot run it with a 7car 222 as St Pancras platforms are too short ?.

baz962 · 2 Feb 2024

Yew said:
I meant geographically, I've not seen one in Nottingham, Derby or Sheffield?

I hope not.

43066 · 2 Feb 2024

Yew said:
How many of threse 360s have made it up to the East Midlands?

Corby does count as part of the East Midlands, as I understand it.

Meerkat · 2 Feb 2024

Peter Sarf said:
My guess is the point being made was that the 360s are not part of the equation for seat capacity to Nottingham and Sheffield via Derby.

The 360s have taken the stops off the longer distance trains haven’t they? That gives people going north a better chance of a seat at St Pancras.

Yew · 2 Feb 2024

QSK19 said:
Unless some locos come along and haul 360s akin to a 57-390 arrangement to Holyhead, they won’t be visiting north of Kettering (MML side I mean, not Corby side) for a while yet.

Even if a 57-390 idea did take off (it never would though!), there wouldn’t be enough 360s to spare anyway given that there are shortformed services even when working with all 21 of them!

The point I'm trying to make is that it's pretty poor for EMR to try and justify less capacity to the main cities of the east midlands, for which it is named, by saying that they've strengthened services that mainly serve London and the home counties.

Meerkat said:
The 360s have taken the stops off the longer distance trains haven’t they? That gives people going north a better chance of a seat at St Pancras.

Stops that people in the East Midlands might want a direct connection to, like Luton Airport?

43066 · 2 Feb 2024

Yew said:
The point I'm trying to make is that it's pretty poor for EMR to try and justify less capacity to the main cities of the east midlands, for which it is named, by saying that they've strengthened services that mainly serve London and the home counties.

To be fair the rolling stock allocations are down to the DfT, rather than EMR. The capacity on the route will increase as the new fleet is introduced.

Yew said:
Stops that people in the East Midlands might want a direct connection to, like Luton Airport?

More people will want a faster connection to London, though.

Yew · 2 Feb 2024

43066 said:
To be fair the rolling stock allocations are down to the DfT, rather than EMR. The capacity on the route will increase as the new fleet is introduced.

Yes, and now reports are talking about the end of '25 before full operaiton. These trains were originally ordered for Dec '22. The situation has changed, therefore the stop-gap rolling stock allocation needs to also change to reflect that.

43066 said:
More people will want a faster connection to London, though.

The "Slow" services to london from Nottingham and Sheffield always seemed fairly well patronised? I'm not suggesting that all trains stop at every stop, but the previous slow/fast pattern seemed to work very well.

43066 · 2 Feb 2024

Yew said:
Yes, and now reports are talking about the end of '25 before full operaiton. These trains were originally ordered for Dec '22. The situation has changed, therefore the stop-gap rolling stock allocation needs to also change to reflect that

Well yes, that’s a fair point. It’s a little difficult to see what can really be done on the IC side in terms of a stop gap. Going from 8 to 12 coaches on the 360s will be a possibility as numbers rise (subject to unit availability).

Yew said:
The "Slow" services to london from Nottingham and Sheffield always seemed fairly well patronised? I'm not suggesting that all trains stop at every stop, but the previous slow/fast pattern seemed to work very well.

I think the intention was to speed the slows up to even out the service, and capture some of the passengers from Nottingham who would previously have driven to Grantham and used the ECML. Clearly this has been at the expense of some direct journeys; Wellingborough travellers heading north have fared about the worst.

duffield · 2 Feb 2024

ChrisC said:
Five car sets certainly do help with the best use of limited platform space at St Pancras. Midweek, off peak in the middle of the day, 5 car trains with the 810’s increased capacity should be more than adequate on most trains especially the Nottinghams.

At peak times and especially at weekends to avoid overcrowding these sets will require doubling up. The main problem I can see is that even if there are enough sets to double up, will EMR actually always do so? If 8 car sets had been ordered, ignoring the capacity issues at St. Pancras, EMR would have no alternative but to run 8 car trains. With 5 car trains there is always the opportunity for widespread short forming which is often currently the case at weekends.

Unfortunately, you can't ignore the capacity issues at St. Pancras. There's zero chance of them being resolved at any time in the foreseeable future, so they are the tail that wags the dog. It's a ridiculous situation but due to the cramped space allocated to EMR when St. Pancras was rebuilt, it's what we have to live with.
Given that the DfT is micro-managing the railways, ideally they would be requiring EMR to double up all services which regularly get overcrowded by some measure (if a unit is available). But that would potentially cost a bit more than running overcrowded single units, so they won't do this even if it drives people off the railway.

Richard123 · 2 Feb 2024

Bald Rick said:
Not quite. Debt issued before reclassification in 2014 is Network Rail’s, guaranteed by Government. Debt issued after reclassification is issued by Government directly.

Not so. The amount spent by Goevrnment on railways vs roads in the past 3 decades is not much different.

Central government major schemes? local and central? Or all road OM&R?

The bottom line when comparing annual government spend is that £4bn a year is now simply servicing debt on spending previously described as government investment, but actually merely permission to borrow.

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