"Annabel Smyth" wrote in message
...

I don't think they know, do they? On Sunday I went down from CJ to
Arundel on what the announcer called a Southern train - but all the
in-train announcements said "South Central".....

They've only just rebranded themselves as Southern Railway, so it will take
a few weeks to change all the signage and to modify all of the announcements
(I noticed recently that even at Waterloo East there are still some
automated station announcements referring to Connex South Eastern!).

Incidentally, it was a new train, and *extremely* uncomfortable for the
1.5 hour run (although the mid-Sussex line is really beautiful,
especially south of Pulborough), but the train I caught back today,
although identical outside, was quite different inside and far more
comfortable than the one I got on Sunday! Anybody know what/why?

There are several different variants of the Electrostar design. Some of them
have 2+2 seating, some of them have 2+3 (and are not so comfortable!). I
suspect that you may have gone out on one of the latter and returned on one
of the former. Most of the new trains were ordered by Connex South Central,
in the distant days when they ran the franchise, and are to their
specification. Southern Railway (aka SouthCentral Trains) are aware that the
environment is not ideal and intend to make some modifications once the
whole fleet is in service.

Oh, and are the lavatories *always* locked out of service?

That's the problem with computerised toilets! Whenever something goes wrong,
or it can't flush, they lock themselves out of use, requiring a member of
staff to check whether there actually *is* a problem or not and to reset the
software. It's a common problem with all of the Electrostar and Turbostar
(the diesel version) family. It's not so bad where the TOC have specified
one disabled loo and one traditional loo per set (the traditional loos have
an ordinary handle on the door) but where they have only specified one loo
(which, to satisfy regulations, has to be suitable for disabled persons) it
is causing problems.