http://www.spokes.org.uk/wordpress/2014/01/scotland-bikerail-the-future
CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » Cycling News
Spokes encourages ScotRail bidders
(14 posts)-
Posted 10 years ago #
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Having taken up spokes' suggestion of emailing the bidders I've just had an interesting reply from Arbelia.
Of the other 4 First Group haven't responded and the other 3 all pretty much thanked me for my input and said it had been fed into the process.
Arbelia meanwhile seem to have taken the time to consider my email and made reference to what I actually said.
They obviously can't give out details of their bid but I thought the following comments in their emails were interesting:
"For a number of reasons there are elements of our parent company experience in the Netherlands which doesn’t help as to carry a cycle on a train in the Netherlands, for instance, incurs a charge and then of course the rolling stock fleet is entirely different from what we have available in the UK...In fact one of the reasons why cycles outnumber people in the Netherlands is because everyone has two cycles. One from door to departure station and the other from arrival station to place of work.""to give some reassurance to you on our attitude to full integration with cycling or as we call our ‘door to door’ philosophy we have opened up several Bike&Go facilities in our other UK franchises. I have pasted below the link to our Go Dutch - Bike&Go Schemes which gives an indication of our intentions to expand cycling facilities elsewhere in the UK:
http://www.passengertransport.co.uk/2013/06/going-dutch-cycling-in-the-uk-the-abellio-way/
Bike&Go is the UK’s first fully integrated cycle hire scheme for train stations.
As you would imagine as Abellio is the international division of Dutch State Railways cycling is a significant part of our cultural and attitudinal DNA and we see this as being just as important to Scotland than any of our other UK franchises.
""Therefore, cycling is very high up on our agenda."
Posted 10 years ago # -
They;ve got a point about bikes on trains in the Netherlands - there's no way that that volume of bike use could be accomodated with everyone taking their bike on the trains.
What would be good would be for, for example, a family of four to be able to book all their bikes onto the same train so as to go on holiday together.
Posted 10 years ago # -
It would be good to have Scotrail in state hands, even if the state in question is the Netherlands. Sigh.
Posted 10 years ago # -
It all sounds good, but there will be very little change whoever wins the franchise. There is a shortage of diesel trains in the UK and very little appetite to build any more, as plans for electrification mean that new diesels might not produce an adequate return for the institutional investors that fund their construction. Which means we are stuck with the rolling stock we have - it could be upgraded, but having rolling stock that can run on multiple routes suits the operators so they are unlikely to customise units for particular routes as it reduces operational flexibility - e.g. fitting better seats and buffets on trains to Inverness/Aberdeen would benefit passengers but mean they would not be suitable for use on the Edinburgh-Glasgow run.
New ScotRail electric rolling stock is to be specified by the next franchise holder rather than Transport Scotland - bad for passengers, as no-one is involved who represents the public interest. I imagine any new electric trains will be Siemens Desiro's (already operating on the North Berwick route) with an interior designed to maximise passenger carrying capacity. Just a guess, I have no insider knowledge, but why introduce another train fleet which just increases costs and what incentive is there for a private company to specify trains that prioritise passengers over profit.
Posted 10 years ago # -
I'm dreading them changing our rolling stock as our trains currently carry six bikes - I'd bet any money a new train would carry the usual measly two
I think the bike & Go idea is a good one and a better approach for most Scottish towns for bike share than the boris bike type schemes (as Dumfries is learning to its cost).
It costs c. €6 per day to take your full size bike on a Dutch train (it gets a sort of day pass). I don't think you can book and it's only outside peak hours. It's a bit of a squeeze - you can get 3 or 4 if you're creative with handlebars and nobody wants to get their bike out in a hurry
Posted 10 years ago # -
"
This is a huge opportunity for a step change in bike/rail provision in Scotland. Spokes has been working hard on this ever since the re-franchising was announced, and now you can help too. The outcome will have a major impact on bike/rail conditions throughout Scotland for the next 10 years, and so it could hardly be more important."
http://www.spokes.org.uk/wordpress/2014/06/scotlands-bike-rail-future
Posted 10 years ago # -
I have it from One Who Knows that several of the bidders are planning to use / buy 2nd hand rolling stock from (shhh) England. One suspects that Mr Salmomd and friends might not be happy about that.
Posted 10 years ago # -
"One suspects that Mr Salmomd and friends might not be happy about that."
You mean 'on principle', or because they 'expect shiny new ones'?
There are several people on CCE with expertise about railway franchising/rolling stock leasing, so maybe we'll get some more inside info!
Posted 10 years ago # -
I had quite a long chat with the Abelio fat cat at the bike brekkie. I was pushing the old rolling stock on the slow train to Glasgow via shotts. You can hang six bikes up no problem, I would be amazed if they ever had six bikes of course. So my point was asking him not to give it the Dutch two bike model but to go for the six. Bike shotts model.
Posted 10 years ago # -
Gembo the Dutch model is no bike at peak times, and a charge for a bike at other times.
Official bike numbers are not 2 bikes but set by the safety case (the parameters for safe use of the train) which under the ROGS (Rail & Other Guided Systems) are written by the TOC for the trains they operate.
For the electric trains that Scotrail operate ROGS approve the use of the door vestibules on the opposite side from the platforms for 2 bikes apiece. That makes a typical electric train (3 carriages - 6 pairs of doors 12 bikes) Best I've seen 37 bikes on train to Balloch. New Class 380 has 5 tip-up seats as a specific bike space and large area of tip up seating around the accessible toilet - reports indicate that 30+ bikes comfortably fitted on trains via Carstairs. Most 3 coach trains carry around 200 passengers.
For Diesels 3 main classes 156, 158, 170
156 - local trains 75mph top speed but good acceleration 6 bikes per 130-140 passengers (some have extra luggage racks) aligns well with 4% figure that is commonly noted for cycle carriage on buses & trains where this has been surveyed.
158 - original express trains 90mph top speed - riginally had 'the cupboard' Entire fleet (at the time) was modified in 1998 to have a Calyx bike rack and 2 tip-up seats in place of cupboard. Expensive job compared to SWT/Northern conversion (2 x butterfly clips to locate wheels and length of pipe lagging on grab pole. 2 bikes for 140 seats - Highland units modified with second bike space (5 bikes) and a batch of units transferred from South retain the cupboard (4 I think).
170 - 59 units - the main fleet 100mph but a bit slower acceleration. All main Scotrail units have 2 bikes officially at each end and 190 seats Each space can fit in more (up to 6). 4 trains - ex Hull have buffet and only 1 space by accessible toilet as do 7 built for SPT services - both these have different seat colours. After POP1 I observed trains coming back into Glasgow Queen Street and up to 32 bikes per 6-car train were coming in
4+4 in bike spaces and 12+12 in the doorways.First GW and First Capital Connect also have the doorways approved in their ROGS.
I cannot repeat enough times that in the absence of the TOC collecting data, it is really useful for those travelling on a train with bikes on it to record the numbers - of bikes, of all passengers, and of the train type (to give us an approximate total number of seats). I am fairly sure that the weekend Ardrossan 'boat train' (14.15 from Glasgow) regularly has 12-16 bikes on it for the ferry and this represents 10% of the passenger total on a train which is normally half full (by seat count). I'm also aware that trains to Dumbarton East also see heavy use by those with BMX bikes heading for Unit 23.
Posted 10 years ago # -
@livd @chdot conversation fro twitter
Posted 10 years ago # -
Some 125s have the bike hangers.
Putting 125s on the Aberdeen/Inverness seems like a good idea.
Presumable the E-G plan would be extra trains to Central?
Posted 10 years ago # -
Hard to see how using 125's would stack up financially. The track access charges for a 125 are far higher than the current turbostars.
This would be dependent on the 125s being cascaded to ScotRail after the introduction of the Hitachi SuperExpresses on the Great Western and East Coast lines - which will only begin in 2017/18. There may also be competition for these trains from other operators.
Also, bike carrying capacity on 125's isn't great. No big improvement on the current levels.
Posted 10 years ago #
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