On 24 Mar, 21:49, "Paul Scott" wrote:
wrote:
On Mar 24, 9:11 pm, (Neil Williams)
wrote:
On Tue, 24 Mar 2009 20:59:22 GMT,
(Neil

Williams) wrote:
Talking to London Midland about something they were going to do
anyway, you mean? It was their idea, and they told me about it at a
Meet the Manager about 6 months ago, though at that point it was

Actually possibly it wasn't that long ago. But still...

Steve Banaghan did mention it at an Abfly meeting last October, but
said it would probably come in December 2010.

I wonder if back then they were not expecting to retain any 321s once the
350/2s had all arrived. Originally all 37 321s were lined up for other TOCs
in the DfT rolling stock plan. So the extra services would require the later
additions planned for the LM fleet.

It is still possible that however many 321s they initially retain, they will
subsequently be replaced by more 350s anyway.

Paul S

Yes, there's an OJEU notice out for between 8 and 11 four-car trains
(to replace the retained 321s?) and 18 3-car trains.
The guess (and it really is a guess) is that the DfT has decided to
send the 323s to Northern, rather than order new trains there, and put
new trains into the West Midlands.
Assuming these trains have to work with the existing fleet the spec
all but says "Desiro" on it, and this would be quite sensible - give
two TOCs a single-train-type fleet rather than splits.

Tony