APPENDIX 42
Letter from Chris Green, Chief Executive,
Virgin Trains to the Clerk of the Committee
I gave North Wales AS/MPs the following update
at a meeting in the House of Commons last month:
1. The 4 four-car Super Voyager trains for
North Wales were all delivered early by Bombardier in 14 October
2002. They unfortunately cannot be transferred onto the West Coast
until National Rail have completed their track upgrade in 2004
and they are being on our CrossCountry services.
2. Network Rail and the Strategic Rail Authority
took a decision in August 2002 to accelerate the West Coast Upgrade
by closing sections of the route on weekdays as well as weekends
in 2003. This will reduce capacity from four to two tracks in
some locations and means that the five car Super Voyagers will
have too little seating capacity to operate during the engineering
period.
3. Chris Austin and Stuart Baker of the
Strategic Rail Authority gave an assurance to a special meeting
of North Wales AS/MPs on 19 November that North Wales would have
a two-hourly service of five car S uper Voyager trains (one peak
train ten cars) not later than the September 2004 timetable.
2 December 2002.
Further Letter from Chris Green, Chief
Executive, Virgin Trains to the Clerk of the Committee
1. Virgin Trains has taken delivery of 44
Super Voyagers which have the ability to both tilt around curves
and operate at 125mph. Both features are essential if North Wales
trains are to get slots on a West Coast mainline that is operating
tilting electric trains (the Pendolino) at 125mph. No other UK
train can provide these unique features.
2. 40 Super Voyager trains were built as
five-car trains for the CrossCountry network and are now operational.
3. The remaining 4 Super Voyagers were specifically
ordered for the North Wales services to London. These trains were
ordered as four-coach trains and are currently in temporary operation
on the CrossCountry network.
4. It is now clear that four-car trains
will not have enough capacity and Virgin Trains and the SRA have
agreed that five-car Super Voyagers will be used on all North
Wales services from September 2004. This was confirmed at our
recent meeting with AS/MPs.
5. It is also now clear that 4 Super Voyagers
will be inadequate to provide a reliable two hourly service and
we reached agreement with the SRA on raising the allocation to
Super Voyagers. This too was confirmed at our recent meeting with
AS/MP.
6. The plan was to retain up to 13 High
Speed Train sets on the CrossCountry network to a) release the
additional Super V oyagers to North Wales and b) provide relief
for the spectacular 40% growth that CrossCountry has experienced
since the new service was introduced.
7. The SRA has now hit a cash funding problem
and it is no longer clear that they will fund retention of the
HSTs which are the key to releasing the full train service for
North Wales. I shall keep you informed as the issues are clarified.
12 December 2002
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