Service improved? 3

London Midland have a page on their website titled Improving our services where they describe the steps they are taking to address a number of problems areas.


This is the third in a series of postings based on the aspects of the service that London Midland are working on (for the previous post, see Service improvements? 2).

More Trains

London Midland claim that they are addressing this item through an application to the Department of Transport for new carriages.  They say that if authorisation is granted then from 2011 new trains will be built and existing stock refurbished.

So the rail operating companies have to apply to the government for permission to purchase/lease new trains...  A previous posting (15 year franchises) covered the prescriptive nature of the contracts that companies like London Midland have to enter into when they take on the operation of rail services.   This is I'm sure a very complex subject which probably involves discussions on subsidy levels (London Midland receiving £185m of tax-payer funding to run our trains this year - see How much?!!) and consideration of the limited length of the franchise, but I still think it is absolutely daft that a commercial operator has its hands tied in this way.

For the other improvement areas covered so far it has been relatively simple to decide whether I think London Midland deserve a green tick or a red cross, but on the face of it here that's difficult when it appears that London Midland are in the hands of the Government.  But is that the whole story?  Does More Trains have to involve New Trains?  Are London Midland making the most of the trains that they have?

The 07:00 from Bletchley arrives on platform 11 around 07:37 and within minutes is moved out empty to make way for another train.  Is an empty stock movement during the morning rush-hour a good use of assets?  This might be only one train but are their more?

London Midland are rather proud of the fact that they have introduced trains on their new 'Watford Shuttle' which serve only outer London stations.  They have also continued with Silverlink's 'Tring specials' which also only serve a limited length of the Euston-Northampton route.  Is that a good use of assets?  These trains can obviously be turned around quicker but they are still taking up train units, crew and track slots.

How may trains do we see sat on platforms at Euston or their northern starting point for lengthy periods?  Is this a good use of stock?  Couldn't the turnaround time be made shorter so that additional services could be run using the same rolling stock?

There are a lot of question marks above and I have to say that this is probably a subject where I'm going to have to say that I have no idea what the answers are.  On that basis, I think London Midland probably have to get a yellow question mark on the basis that I don't know, but if you reckon that you have the answer then do please say so.

As usual, comments very very welcome.  Do you think that London Midland are doing enough to provide more trains then say so.  Equally, if you reckon that they need to do more to meet the needs of their customers in this area then please have you say below.

On the London Midland site their fourth improvement area is More Punctual.  I promise not to sit on the fence for that one  :-)