An American Take On Lumo
One of my Google Alerts picked up this article on an American site called Travel + Leisure, which is entitled A Brand-New Train Launched In The UK Today — Linking Cities Like Edinburgh And London For As Little As $20.
As I have sat next to American and Canadian couples and families on Anglo-Scottish trains, I hope that Lumo’s website is friendly to those living outside the UK.
Will The Lumo Concept Take Off In The United States?
I’m no expert, but on the right route, I don’t see why not!
After all, easyJet, Go and Ryanair took on the concept of the low-cost airline, which was pioneered by Pacific Southwest Airlines in California.
Is Lumo The Ryanair Of Rail?
Someone had to draw the comparison between Lumo and Ryanair and it was The Times, that used a headline of Lumo, The Ryanair Of Rail, Gets The Green Light On East Coast, for their article about the new London and Edinburgh rail service in their article today.
But how alike are the two business models?
Standard Planes And Trains
The Boeing 737 and the Airbus A 320, as used by Ryanair and easyJet are the two workhorses of short haul airlines.
It can also be said, that Hitachi’s AT-300 train is becoming the workhorse of long-distance rail services in the UK.
Customised Interiors
Ryanair and easyJet do customise the interiors of their aircraft to a certain extent and from pictures on the Internet Lumo appear to have done the same.
If you look at the widths of the planes and trains on Wikipedia, you find these values.
- Airbus A 320 – 3.95 metres
- Boeing 737 – 3.8 metres
- Class AT-300 train – 2.7 metres
Dividing by the number of seats across, which is six for the planes and four for the train gives these figures.
- Airbus A 320 – 0.66 metres
- Boeing 737 – 0.63 metres
- Class AT-300 train – 0.67 metres
I know there is an aisle down the middle, so let’s say that it is 0.60 metres. This gives these spaces for each seat.
- Airbus A 320 – 0.56 metres
- Boeing 737 – 0.53 metres
- Class AT-300 train – 0.53 metres
I think that is adequate space for a designer to do a good job.
This picture shows the interior of a Great Western Railway Class 802 train, which use a similar body shell to the trains used by Lumo.
Note.
- The aisle looks to be similar in width to a seat.
- There is a bag shelf above the windows and lots of coat hooks.
As both Lumo and Great Western Railway are both First Group companies, is it likely that the interior dimensions are similar, so that standard trolleys could be used and training could be eased and shared between companies in the group.
This picture shows a trolley fitting in between the tables on a Great Western Railway service.
I suspect, if they design everything together, Lumo could make best use of a narrow aisle to give the seats a bit more width.
This last picture shows TransPennine Express Class 802 train at Willesden Junction station.
Note how the lower part of the side of the train is curved. Is this to get a bit more room for the seat squab?
Passengers Per Metre
This is only a rough calculation and shows typical passengers, fuselage or car length and passengers per metre.
- Airbus A 320 – 164 passengers – 37.57 metres – 4.4 px/metre
- Boeing 737 – 160 passengers – 37.0 metres – 4.3 px/metre
- Class AT-300 train – 96 passengers – 26 metres – 3.7 px/metre
Passenger density in the train is about fourteen percent less.
Toilets
In The Definitive Seating Layout Of Lumo’s Class 803 Trains, I said this.
This article on Economy Class and Beyond is entitled Enter Lumo – The New East Coast Railway Competitor.
It contains a drawing from Lumo, which shows the layouts of the seats on the train.
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- Coach A – 44 Standard seats – 8 Priority seats – 2 Wheelchair spaces – 2 Tip up seats – Accessible toilet – 56 Total seats
- Coach B – 84 Standard seats – 12 Priority seats – Bike store – Toilet – 96 Total seats
- Coach C – 84 Standard seats – 12 Priority seats – 96 Total seats
- Coach D – 84 Standard seats – 12 Priority seats – Bike store – Toilet – 96 Total seats
- Coach E – 52 Standard seats – 8 Priority seats – 2 Tip up seats – Accessible toilet – 62 Total seats
Note.
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- This is a total of 406 seats.
- Judging by the position of the tip-up seats they are for staff and perhaps emergency use, if say a coffee gets spilled on a seat.
- Each car has a pair of tables, where four can sit. As Lumo’s business model allows early booking, if you and your partner want to take the kids to see granny on her birthday, you should be able to get a table, by booking early.
- There are two bike stores in Coaches B and D.
These are some further thoughts.
Toilet Provision
I was on an LNER Class 800 train earlier this week and needed to go to the toilet.
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- I wasn’t sure which way I needed to go, as I couldn’t see a sign pointing me to the toilet, but in the end I struck lucky.
- You don’t have that problem with Lumo’s trains, as there appears to be a toilet at both ends of the three middle coaches, either in your car or the next.
- If you’re in one of the driver cars, there is an accessible toilet at the blunt end.
I don’t think anybody will argue with the toilet provision on Lumo’s trains.
Typically a Boeing 737 or an Airbus A320 will have two toilets for about 160 passengers.
Lumo’s trains have two accessible toilets and two ordinary ones for 406 passengers.
Ease Of Boarding
If you want to catch a train at virtually any station in the UK, in most cases, you just turn up something like fifteen minutes before the departure time, present your ticket and get on the train.
Planes used to be like that in the UK, but they aren’t any more.
Catering
In the article in The Times, Matt Lee, who is Lumo’s customer experience director, said they have been free to develop their own systems. He says this about the catering.
Catering will be a Deliveroo-style service: passengers can order M&S or Pret sandwiches in advance and have them delivered to their seat. “We are a testbed for other FirstGroup train operators.
Will they do gluten-free?
Luggage
Lumo have a luggage courier service called LumoLuggage.
Service Expansion
Suppose an airline or a train operating company wants to run additional services to add capacity to a route.
With an airline, they will need to obtain additional take-off and landing slots to fly the route.
But Lumo are running five-car trains on a route, where all the stations can handle nine-car trains and possibly a pair of five-car trains.
So Lumo just add extra cars to the fleet, so that they match the number of cars running on the route to the demand.
The only costs to increase the capacity are those of the extra cars and a proportionate number of extra staff.
Conclusion
I can see this service model being copied by other train operators in other countries.
I’m looking forward to going North on Wednesday.
Could Avanti West Coast Run A Lumo-Style Service Between London And Liverpool?
Avanti West Cost’s Class 807 Trains
Avanti West Coast will be introducing their new Class 807 trains by 2023.
One of the routes, on which they will run, will be between London Euston and Liverpool Lime Street stations.
These trains are members of Hitachi’s AT300 family, with these characteristics.
- Seven cars.
- 453 seats
- 125 mph operating speed, with 140 mph possible under in-cab signalling, where the track allows.
They have been designed to be able to achieve or better times from the Class 390 trains, which have the advantage of tilt.
The Seats In The New Trains
Seats are important to passengers and there has been criticism, that some of the seats in Hitachi trains are like ironing boards.
But, so far nothing has been said about the seats on the new Class 807 trains.
453 seats in seven cars of a Class 807 train is 64.7 seats per car.
These are comparison figures for other trains.
- On a nine-car Class 801 train, there are 611 seats or 67.8 seats per car.
- On a five-car Class 801 train, there are 302 seats or 60.4 seats per car.
- On a five-car Class 810 train, there are 301 seats or 60.2 seats per car.
- On a five-car Class 803 train, there are 406 seats or 81.2 seats per car.
- On a nine-car Class 390 train, there are 469 seats or 52.1 seats per car.
- On an eleven-car Class 390 train, there are 589 seats or 53.5 seats per car.
Note.
- The Class 390 trains or Pendolinos have less seats per car, than the Hitachi trains. Is this because of all the space taken up by the tilting mechanism?
- As the seats per car for a Class 807 is between the five- and nine-car Class 801 trains, it would appear that the seat density is not much different to the trains on LNER and Great Western Railway.
- Lumo’s Class 803 trains on their low-cost service would appear to have a higher seating density. But Lumo says that they have redesigned the seats for more comfort.
- In The Seat Of Aurora, I looked at a report from Modern Railways on the seats in the Class 810 trains, which the writer found were much more comfortable.
It would appear that the two latest fleets of Hitachi trains have seats that are designed for more comfort.
Consider.
- First Group own seventy percent of Avanti West Coast.
- First Group own hundred percent of two train operating companies; Great Western and TransPennine Express, who run versions of Hitachi AT300 trains, so they probably have a lot of bottom-level feedback.
- In the current Class 390 train upgrade, Avanti West Coast are replacing all the Standard Class seats, the company must care about seat quality.
- First Group own hundred percent of Lumo, who have acquired new trains with comfortable seats.
I would be very surprised if the seats in the new Class 807 trains for Avanti West Coast were not custom-designed for their routes.
The Unusual Length Of The Class 807 Train
These are the length of the Class 390 and Class 807 trains.
- Class 390/0 – nine-car – 217.5 metres
- Class 390/1 – eleven-car – 265.3 metres
- Class 807 – seven-car – 182 metres
Note.
- A ten-car Class 807 train would be 260 metres.This could be convenient, if more eleven-car Pendolinos were needed.
- The Class 807 train is thirty-five metres shorter, than the nine-car Pendolino.
As eleven-car Class 390 trains commonly run London Euston and Liverpool Lime Street, why would they need the Class 807 train to be shorter?
I think there is a clue in this picture.
It shows a Class 390 train in Liverpool South Parkway station.
- At the time, Liverpool Lime Street station was closed for track remodelling.
- Liverpool South Parkway was acting as Liverpool’s main terminus.
- To accommodate the Pendolinos a temporary platform extension was built in the station.
Could it be that shorter trains were ordered to avoid the expense of lengthening the platforms at Liverpool South Parkway and perhaps other stations, that Avanti West Coast might serve?
The Current Service Between London Euston And Liverpool
The current London Euston and Liverpool Lime Street service is as follows.
- There is one train per hour (tph)
- The service calls at Milton Keynes Central, Stafford, Crewe and Runcorn.
- All of the stations can accommodate an eleven-car Pendolino.
- Trains take around an average of two hours and twelve minutes.
- The first Northbound train leaves at 07:07 and the last at 21:07.
- The first Southbound train leaves at 07:00 and the last at 20:48.
Services are generally run by eleven-car Class 390 trains, which gives a capacity of 589 passengers per hour.
I always think, there a need for a later train back to London, but then that could be said of many places.
A Possible Service From December 2022
Wikipedia says this.
- There will be two tph.
- The second service will call at Liverpool South Parkway station.
If two tph were to be run by Class 807 trains, this would give the following.
- A capacity of 906 seats per hour.
- This is a 54 % increase in capacity.
But if only the Liverpool South Parkway service was run by a Class 807 train and the other service was still run by an eleven-car Class 390 train, this would give the following.
- A capacity of 1042 seats per hour.
- This is a 77 % increase in capacity.
And all without expensive and disruptive platform extensions at Liverpool South Parkway station.
According to Wikipedia, the plans will need to be approved by the Office of Road and Rail.
How Fast Will A Class 807 Train Travel Between London Euston And Liverpool?
The Class 807 trains will have these features.
- The trains will have no diesel engines or batteries. This must save weight and that means better acceleration.
- The trains will have no tilt mechanism.. This must save weight and that means better acceleration.
- The trains will have a new nose. Is it more aerodynamic, which would cause less drag and increase operating speed?
Would these features mean the Class 807 trains can match the performance of the Class 390 train, despite not having tilt?
There are also improvements on the West Coast Main Line, that have not been fully reflected in the timetable.
I did a full analysis about how a two-hour journey time might be achieved in Will Avanti West Coast’s New Trains Be Able To Achieve London Euston and Liverpool Lime Street In Two Hours? This analysis led me to these conclusions.
- I am convinced that the new trains are designed for a two hour journey between London Euston and Liverpool Lime Street stations.
- Refurbished Class 390 trains should also be able to do the same time.
- I also calculated that nine trains would be needed for the two tph service, if they can arrange a fifteen minute turnround at both ends of the route. So would, the Class 807 trains be used on the Liverpool service to release newly-refurbished Class 390 trains to boost Blackpool and Birmingham services?
Alternatively, if the two services are run using eleven-car Class 390 trains for the current service and seven-car Class 807 trains for the one via Liverpool South Parkway, Avanti West Coast would need five of each train.
- They could fit in thirty minute turnrounds at both ends of the route.
- The mixed pair of trains would give a 77 % increase in capacity.
- The Class 807 service would be a two-hour trip.
- If the Class 390 service couldn’t match the time it could use current timings.
Whatever is done, it would be a flagship service between London and Liverpool.
The new trains will pay for themselves many times over, if this is the case, as a two-hour journey will surely attract passengers.
Organising The Service
If you really wanted to make the service simple and passenger-friendly, you would have dedicated platforms for the trains at both ends of the route.
- In Liverpool Lime Street station trains seem to have used one platform for many years. Currently, they seem to be using Platform 9.
- Surely, a similar arrangement could be setup at London Euston.
The service could also be setup with contactless ticketing, if that was felt the way things should be done.
Going The Whole Way
Suppose, that the London Euston and Liverpool Lime Street service is very successful for any number of reasons.
- The two hour journey time.
- The all-electric service.
- The doubling of the frequency.
- The availability of more seats.
- The expansion of Merseyrail into England’s first battery-electric Metro, which I wrote about in Chancellor To Fund £710m Merseyrail Expansion.
- The cost of driving, due to a mileage charge on all journeys.
Will this lead to a need to expand the service?
If it does, the obvious way would be to lengthen Liverpool South Parkway station and run longer trains.
An Eleven-car Class 390 train would carry 589 passengers.
Adding three-cars to a seven-car and the train would still be shorter than an eleven-car Class 390 train, but it would carry around 650 passengers.
This would add an extra ten percent capacity to the route.
This would surely provide the capacity until High Speed Two arrives towards the end of the decade.
I do wonder if Avanti West Coast are using the London Euston and Liverpool Lime Street service to experiment with how they might run High Speed Two services.
Conclusion
As a two tph service run by Class 807 trains in two hours would be over 4,500,000 seats in each direction, I feel that this will be a very popular and intensive service.
I feel that Avanti West Coast will need to apply lessons learned on sister company’s Lumo’s service between London Kings Cross and Edinburgh.
Lumo And Dogs
I have just asked Lumo what is their policy on dogs!
I got this reply!
Dogs are welcome on Lumo trains, we would just ask that they are kept on a lead. We also provide water bowls and stool bags, just ask one of our Lumo ambassadors on board who will be able to help.
Sounds good to me! But then, I don’t have a dog, although I know a lady who does!
LNER Tickets For Christmas Getaway
The title of this post, is the same as that of an article in Edition 939 of Rail Magazine.
These are the first two paragraphs.
LNER has made available thousands of Advance tickets for the festive period.
It follows research by the operator suggesting that some 48% of people are planning to travel this Christmas to see family and friends, with 30% of them looking to book at least six weeks in advance.
This is surely a good thing and will LNER eventually copy Lumo in allowing ticket purchases longer in advance?
The article says that LNER Internet enquiries and ridership are on the up, with the latter at over 90 % of pre-pandemic levels.
My Ticket To Ride
I’ve just picked up my ticket to ride to Edinburgh on the 27th of next month from Dalston Junction station.
All very conventional!
Lumo: Why Won’t The New Train Service Stop At Yorkshire Stations?
The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on the Yorkshire Post.
This is the first article, I’ve found about Lumo, that has a negative headline.
The reason is probably very simple, in that most Lumo services are planned to stop at only at Newcastle and Morpeth, with two services having an extra stop Stevenage.
They are intending to run the service in as short a time as possible between London King’s Cross and Edinburgh.
As each stop has a time penalty, not stopping in Yorkshire will give potential to go cut the journey time.
But the positive message that comes from the writer of the Yorkshire Post article is that Yorkshire likes the concept.
This paragraph is their take on the service.
The goal is to encourage a more environmentally friendly mode of transportation and affordable travel. Lumo will provide low-carbon emissions, affordable long-distance travel for more than one million passengers every year.
Perhaps they would like their own Yorkshire flyer.
The obvious way for this to happen would be for the Open Access operator; Grand Central to convert themselves into a train operator like Lumo.
- The ten diesel Class 180 trains would be replaced by new electric trains.
- The trains would need a 140 mph capability under digital signalling to fit in with the plans of Network Rail, LNER and Lumo to create a top-class high-speed high-capacity East Coast Main Line.
- The trains would need a battery capability as Grand Central’s routes are not fully electrified.
- They could copy Lumo’s green marketing philosophy, ticketing and catering offering.
As to the trains, I’m sure that Hitachi could offer a version of their Intercity Tri-Mode Battery Train, the specification of which is shown in this Hitachi infographic.
The trains would need a range of fifty miles on battery-power.
Charging facilities wold be needed at Bradford Interchange and Sunderland stations, as neither has suitable 25 KVAC overhead electrification.
Conclusion
The conversion of Grand Central to work on the Lumo model is possible and as the trains will need to be changed to zero-carbon ones soon to meet decarbonisation objectives, I would suspect that at least that will happen.
The London And Edinburgh Travel Market
This paragraph comes from of this article on Railway Gazette.
Lumo is aiming to carry more than 1 million passengers per year. It is particularly targeting people who currently fly between Edinburgh and London; in June it says there were 74 764 air journeys on the route, compared to 82 002 by rail.
Lumo’s million passengers per year, will equate to around 83,300 passengers per month.
What these figures don’t show is the number of rail journeys made to intermediate stations like Newcastle, York, Doncaster and Peterborough.
These are a few thoughts.
Rail Capacity Between London And Edinburgh
Consider.
- LNER is currently the only rail carrier offering a daytime service between London and Edinburgh.
- LNER run approximately 26 trains per day (tpd) in both directions between London and Edinburgh.
- A nine-car Class 801 train can carry 510 Standard Class passengers and 101 First Class passengers.
That means that LNER had a capacity of just over 950,000 seats in June.
It might seem poor to have only sold 82,002 seats in June between London and Edinburgh, which is just 8.6 % of the available seats.
On the other hand, LNER’s two trains per hour (tph) are a lot more than London and Edinburgh trains, as they connect towns and cities all the way up the East Coast Main Line between London and Aberdeen.
Lumo’s capacity of a million seats per year, works out at 83,300 seats per month, which is another 8.7 % of capacity.
- Lumo will sell seats on price initially and I suspect they’ll end up running about 85-95 % full.
- It has been stated that they need to run 80% full to break even.
- I also think, that they would like to have a few seats for late bookers.
But even so, they will surely affect LNER’s bookings.
What Will LNER Do?
Several of the things, that Lumo are doing can be easily copied by LNER.
- Early booking.
- Improve onboard service.
- Better seating.
They could even reduce prices.
I think it is very likely we could end up with a price and service war between LNER and Lumo.
Would The Airlines Be The Losers?
This could be an outcome of competition between LNER and Lumo.
We are now talking about times of around four hours and twenty-five minutes between London and Edinburgh, but there are improvements underway on the East Coast Main Line.
- The remodelling of the approach to Kings Cross station has not been reflected in the timetables.
- The Werrington Dive Under has not been completed yet.
- Digital signalling is being installed South of Doncaster.
- The power supply is being upgraded North of Newcastle.
When these and other improvements are complete, I can see journey times reduced below four hours.
But would that only be for starters?great b
If a 1970s-technology Intercity 225 train, admittedly running as a shortened train formation, could achieve a time of just under three-and-a-half hours for the 393.2 miles between Kings Cross and Edinburgh stations in September 1991, what could a modern Hitachi train do, if all of the improvements had been completed and perhaps half of the route could be run at 140 mph under the watchful eyes of full digital signalling and an experienced driver.
Consider.
- London and York is nearly two hundred miles of fairly straight railway, that is ideal for high speed.
- Current trains run the 393.2 miles in four hours 25 minutes, which is an average speed of 89 mph.
- A train running at 89 mph would take two hours and fifteen minutes to cover 200 miles.
- A train running at 125 mph would take one hour and thirty-six minutes to cover 200 miles.
- A train running at 140 mph would take one hour and twenty-six minutes to cover 200 miles.
When Network Rail, Great British Railways or the Prime Minister renames the East Coast Main Line as High Speed East Coast, I think we can be sure that trains between London and Edinburgh will be able to achieve three-and-a-half hours between the two capitals.
High Speed Two is only promising three hours and forty-eight minutes.
What About LNER’s New Trains?
LNER Seeks 10 More Bi-Modes, was written to explore the possibilities suggested by a short article in the December 2020 Edition of Modern Railways.
There has been no sign of any order being placed, but Hitachi have moved on.
- They are building the prototype of the Hitachi Intercity Tri-Mode Battery for testing on the Great Western Railway.
- They have completed some of the Class 803 trains for East Coast Trains, which has now been renamed Lumo. These trains have a battery for hotel power in case of catenary failure, but no diesel engines.
- They are building the Class 807 trains for Avanti West Coast, which appear to be designed for high speed and have no batteries or diesel engines.
- The latest versions of the trains will have a reshaped nose. Is it more aerodynamic at high speeds?
It does seem that there is an emphasis on speed, better acceleration and efficiency.
- Could the lessons learned be used to improve the performance of the existing trains?
- Could a small high performance sub-fleet be created to run LNER’s Scottish services?
There are certainly possibilities, that would cut journey times between London and Edinburgh.
Conclusion
I can see the airlines flying between London and Edinburgh suffering a lot of collateral damage, as the two train companies slug it out.
The Definitive Seating Layout Of Lumo’s Class 803 Trains
This article on Economy Class and Beyond is entitled Enter Lumo – The New East Coast Railway Competitor.
It contains a drawing from Lumo, which shows the layouts of the seats on the train.
- Coach A – 44 Standard seats – 8 Priority seats – 2 Wheelchair spaces – 2 Tip up seats – Accessible toilet – 56 Total seats
- Coach B – 84 Standard seats – 12 Priority seats – Bike store – Toilet – 96 Total seats
- Coach C – 84 Standard seats – 12 Priority seats – 96 Total seats
- Coach D – 84 Standard seats – 12 Priority seats – Bike store – Toilet – 96 Total seats
- Coach E – 52 Standard seats – 8 Priority seats – 2 Tip up seats – Accessible toilet – 62 Total seats
Note.
- This is a total of 406 seats.
- Judging by the position of the tip-up seats they are for staff and perhaps emergency use, if say a coffee gets spilled on a seat.
- Each car has a pair of tables, where four can sit. As Lumo’s business model allows early booking, if you and your partner want to take the kids to see granny on her birthday, you should be able to get a table, by booking early.
- There are two bike stores in Coaches B and D.
These are some further thoughts.
Toilet Provision
I was on an LNER Class 800 train earlier this week and needed to go to the toilet.
- I wasn’t sure which way I needed to go, as I couldn’t see a sign pointing me to the toilet, but in the end I struck lucky.
- You don’t have that problem with Lumo’s trains, as there appears to be a toilet at both ends of the three middle coaches, either in your car or the next.
- If you’re in one of the driver cars, there is an accessible toilet at the blunt end.
I don’t think anybody will argue with the toilet provision on Lumo’s trains.
Can The Trains Be Lengthened?
If you look at the diagram of the train, Coaches B and D appear to be identical with a toilet and a bike store at one end.
These ends are connected to the centre car, which doesn’t have its own toilet, but passengers can use the toilets in the next coaches.
One of the advantages of this layout is that although it is a five-car train, it only has four coach types, which must help in both manufacture and maintenance.
But it also helps, if the train service is successful and more capacity needs to be provided.
An extra coach just needs to have a toilet at one end and when it is slotted into the formation. The train software, then automatically acknowledges the additional car.
The rule of having a toilet at both ends of the centre coaches will not be broken.
These trains are certainly designed for a service that could be more successful, than the train operator has initially planned.
The maths of lengthening are very simple.
- Each new coach will add another 96 seats.
- The five trains (25 coaches) cost £100 million.
- That is £4 million per coach.
- All stations on the route are capable of handling at least nine-car trains.
Different lengths of trains would give the following increases.
- Six-car trains would hold 502 seats and increase capacity by 24 %.
- Seven-car trains would hold 598 seats and increase capacity by 47 %.
- Eight-car trains would hold 694 seats and increase capacity by 71 %.
- Nine-car trains would hold 790 seats and increase capacity by 94 %.
The ability to lengthen trains so easily, must mean that Lumo can match their train size to demand, without needing any extra expensive train paths.
Bicycle Storage
There are two bike storage racks in Coaches B and D.
As there has been complaints about bicycle storage on these Hitachi trains, I would assume that Lumo have got the provision right for the target market.
Wheelchair Travellers
These are positioned next to one of the accessible toilets, which is standard practice.
How Will These Trains Compare To Budget Airliners?
This is not a great picture of even a boring subject like the A14 going over the East Coast Main Line.
But it was taken from an airline-style seat through the wide window of an LNER Hitachi train, that is in the same family as the trains purchased by Lumo.
Try taking a decent picture through the porthole on a budget airliner.
If Lumo have used decent seats for the trains, they will have the budget airlines screwed, glued and tattooed on the London and Edinburgh route.
Conclusion
These are certainly trains designed for their market.
Lumo Aims To Be The Green Alternative To Edinburgh – London Flights
The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on Railway Gazette.
Some points from the article.
Lumo Is Targeting Flyers
This is a paragraph.
Lumo is aiming to carry more than 1 million passengers per year. It is particularly targeting people who currently fly between Edinburgh and London; in June it says there were 74 764 air journeys on the route, compared to 82 002 by rail.
I find it interesting that the number of passengers using air and rail are within nine percent. I thought it would have been more of a difference.
The Service Will Ramp Up
This is a paragraph.
Services will ramp up over a period of months to the planned timetable of five trains each way per day. A small increase is envisaged at the December timetable change, followed by full implementation in Q1 2022.
There is a lot of training to do and some more Class 803 trains to be delivered.
Viability Level
Industry sources are quoted that at the prices charged, the trains will need to be eighty percent full to be viable.
As a Control Engineer, who has built hundreds of mathematical models, I am fairly certain, that by adjusting ticket prices and getting the marketing right, they’ll hit that level.
Late Bookers
The eighty percent viability level probably means that they can afford to leave a few seats available for those that need to book the day before.
Yesterday, when I went to Spalding, I bought my ticket in the Booking Office half-an-hour before travel and got a seat with a window.
Seat allocation algorithms on LNER seem to be very good and I don’t think Lumo’s will be in any way inferior.
Early Bookers
The article says advance tickets can be bought earlier than the usual twelve weeks.
So say you always travel to Scotland for your mother’s birthday, you can buy the ticket early and not be hit by low availability, as it turns out later that Rangers are playing Celtic on the day you travel.
Mutual Support In Case Of Disruption
This is a paragraph.
Reciprocal contracts providing support in case of disruption have been signed with other operators, including LNER.
I think in all the troubles yesterday, that I wrote about in Azumas Everywhere!, LNER could have done with some help yesterday.
Lumo Want To Grow Rail
This is a quote from the company.
We want to grow rail and bring people to a more sustainable, environmentally way of travelling.
They also seem fairly relaxed if you want to travel in First on LNER.
Luggage
This is a paragraph.
Passengers will be able keep their luggage close by or, for an additional charge, have it delivered to their final station or destination.
Does that mean you’re going to Edinburgh to see the family at Christmas and the New Year, you can take a lot of luggage and get it delivered both ways?
Efficient Running North Of Newcastle
I particularly liked this paragraph.
The trainsets will be able to run with power draw limited to 80% of normal on the northern part of the East Coast Main Line where there is limited power supply, with modelling by FirstGroup’s engineers and Network Rail suggesting that for five-car sets this will not affect sectional running times and will allow electric trains to continue running.
If you’re on time, the passengers won’t mind, but the electricity saved is all profit.
As a Control Engineer, my philosophy would be to have an economy mode for 80 % power sections.
- Trains would enter these sections with a full battery, that had been charged earlier from the electrification.
- The battery would provide hotel power in these sections.
- Traction power would come from the electrification.
- Trains could leave these sections with an almost flat battery.
The battery is not used for traction, but because it is handling the hotel power, less power is drawn from the electrification for traction.
I always remember Freddie Laker was keen on getting his pilots to save fuel.
Charging The Hotel Power Battery
Obviously this can be charged from the overhead electrification, although I doubt they would charge it in sections where power supplies are limited.
But can the battery be charged using regenerative braking?
In Do Class 800/801/802 Trains Use Batteries For Regenerative Braking?, I tried to answer this question using the information in this document on the Hitachi Rail web site, which is entitled Development of Class 800/801 High-speed Rolling Stock for UK Intercity Express Programme , which was published in 2014 and contains this diagram of the traction system.
Note that BC in the diagram stands for battery charger. So even in 2014, Hitachi were thinking about batteries.
In this diagram it seems to me, that electricity for the Auxiliary Power Supply and charging any batteries, can come from these sources.
- The Electrification
- The Generator Unit, if fitted
- The Drive Converter if it can divert regenerative braking energy to the APS.
It is all very comprehensive.
Handling Engineering Blockades
This is a paragraph.
Lumo has looked at how to manage any engineering blockades involving diversions away from the wires, with options including transfers to Hull Trains or TPE services operated using bimode trainsets, transfer to buses if no alternatives are available, and even the cancellation of a service if passengers indicate they would prefer not to travel if their journey will be disrupted.
Being part of a larger group always helps.
Borrowing Trains
Yesterday, whilst waiting to leave Peterborough, I saw a TransPennine Express Class 802 train go through.
Peterborough isn’t exactly near the Pennines!
On checking today, it appears it was running in one of Lumo’s paths.
So was the train being borrowed for training purposes?
But I can envisage, when a difficult blockade say around Newark is to be enacted, that Lumo would borrow a bi-mode from TransPennine Express, so they could use diesel to run the service via Lincoln.
Conclusion
There’s a lot more to Lumo than has so far been disclosed.
In the meantime read the Railway Gazette article, as there’s more there for starters.
The Anonymous Widower 