The Anonymous Widower

A Lonely Stansted Express In East London

When I last visited Emerson Park station, I travelled in a rather clean Class 317 train, that had been refurbished for use on the Stansted Express. I was surprised to see that today it is still there.

As this is a train with a universal-access toilet, luggage racks, a First Class section and has been fully refurbished in only 2000, surely this train, which is one of fifteen, could be better employed somewhere else. These two airport routes are possibilities.

1. Routes to Manchester Airport from Liverpool and in the near future, Preston and Bolton.

2. Cardiff to Swansea via Cardiff Airport, after South Wales is fully electrified.

But then as Northern Rail are happy with their Class 319 Trains, perhaps we’re getting to the point that we’re going to have to put better class trains into storage.

On the other hand cities like Glasgow and Leeds are looking to create purpose-built rail links to their airports. So building these links will hopefully be more affordable as the trains might not need to be built.

It has also to be noted that according to the Future section in Wikipedia for the Class 317 trains, a demonstration is being built to see if it is worth fitting new traction equipment and an updated interior, to give the trains a life extension of twenty years.

Remember though that these trains are based on Mark 3 Coaches and thus are inbred to both chameleons and Lazarus, so it looks like if they refurbish the Class 317 trains, they’ll outlive some of the much younger trains.

June 1, 2015 - Posted by AnonW | Transport/Travel | Class 317 Train, Romford And Upminster Line