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Scotrail staff sitting near cabs

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noddingdonkey

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Guards not being able to drive in emergencies has always surprised me.

On the underground guards were emergency drivers, emphasis on emergency, able to move a train , out of service , if needed, also able to take the controls in cases where defect handling required two drivers. (one at each end). The proper driver always stayed with the brake, be it at the front or the back of the train.

I realise that this relates to an era which has next to no relevance to now, but in the days of slip coaches, uncoupled at speed from a train and slowed to a stop at the station by the guard operating the coach brakes, was the guard deemed to be driving?
 
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najaB

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I realise that this relates to an era which has next to no relevance to now, but in the days of slip coaches, uncoupled at speed from a train and slowed to a stop at the station by the guard operating the coach brakes, was the guard deemed to be driving?
That's a good question - I say "Yes" since he had control of a rail vehicle.
 

Dr Hoo

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That's a good question - I say "Yes" since he had control of a rail vehicle.
Yes. Ironic that in the days of unfitted goods wagons the poor ground staff out in the pouring rain at night pinning down handbrakes at the top of hundreds of inclines and the guards frantically getting an extra turn on the brake wheel in their vans probably did as much to achieve a safe railway as the drivers of those trains.

But we are getting rather off thread from the point about operating staff 'on the cushions'. Sorry.
 

bluesfromagun

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I know of at least one TOC where the Ops Director had driving turns to maintain his competence.

It all depends on each company. I'm fairly sure that FGW had driver managers actually working turns as drivers quite often for a while.
ScotRail its a no-no, the DTMs have driving competency, Ops Standards nearly all have driving competency, and there are possibly others in the management structure who have kept their driver competency, but they can't drive without a driver present. Oddly though, this doesn't apply to Guards Managers (CTMs), who can (and do) work trains as a guard during Conductor shortages.
The thing at ScotRail is also that DTMs absolutely do not want to be driving trains either - most of them are DTMs because they had enough of driving or the shifts, and although the salary is slightly more than a driver, in real terms they get paid no more (probably slightly less) than a driver does. They work 5 days a week where a driver works 4, and they don't get overtime at all, just time in lieu. Oh, and they have an on call requirement too...so you can imagine, there's no incentive for them to want to be doing shifts as a driver. Not at ScotRail anyway.

Likewise at the 2 TOCS I’ve worked at, DM’s regularly relieve drivers on their way to/from work or just randomly in order to keep their competencies up

They do this at ScotRail too (well, prior to COVID). The difference here, I'm guessing, is that if you're a driver manager and you jump into a cab and tell the driver you're taking their train off them, you'll expect them to stay in the cab with you whilst you drive. Its been said before, but I think they have to do 6hrs a month and I doubt they ever go over that. Allegedly they cover every route in those six hours, but they never know routes as thoroughly as drivers do. They're quite interesting to watch actually, everything is much more deliberate and focussed, like they're very conscious of the fact they're being watched and that they don't drive very often.
 
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I assume they have to put their belongings somewhere and I believe they have some degree of traction training. I was under the impression (maybe false) that they work in much the same way as guards without the operational duties albeit in normal circumstances expected to be in the train (as as ScotRail guards in general to be fair).
When I was a TE, many lunar cycles ago, the only reasons you were allowed to be in the rear cab was to deposit/collect your belongings (jacket and the like), to carry out any counting/sorting of cash (only to ease your duties during the day as the end of shift had allocated time at the depot), if the train was very heavily crowded (four of us once travelled in the back cab of a 320 to Balloch one day when a concert was on at Loch Lomond because the train was like sardines), or to hide (me and a teacher hid there once from some teens that had assaulted her and were going to be arrested at Central LL, the driver sat the train just off the platform until he seen the cops arrive on the platform).

318s have a great bit where you can be out of the passenger compartment, but not actually in the back cab. A great “grey area” to go to when the train was a bit mobbed.

However, as I hated that job, and really don’t like people in general, I was probably in the back cab far more often than I ought to have been. Hence why I now don’t work there and opted for the track based life instead.
 
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