CENTRAL TRAINS

'Central Trains' is a train operating company in the United Kingdom, running local and long-distance services in central England. The company’s operations are centred on Birmingham in the West Midlands.
The longer-distance services are branded as Central Citylink.

Contents

Overview

Network

Local Services

★ Birmingham - Wolverhampton ★ Birmingham - Walsall / Stafford ★ Walsall - Wolverhampton ★ Cross City Lines Redditch/Longbridge - Four Oaks/Lichfield Trent Valley ★ Great Malvern/Kidderminster - Dorridge/Shirley/Stratford-upon-Avon Via Snow Hill

Rolling Stock

Current fleet

The future

References

External links

Overview

The franchise covers 2,100 km of railway, and has more than 43 million passenger journeys per year, travelling a total of 1,495 million km.
On 19 October 2004, Transport Secretary Alistair Darling announced that at the end of the current franchise in 2006, Central Trains’ routes will be divided between the Silverlink, Chiltern, Virgin Cross Country, Midland Mainline and Northern Rail franchises.^[1] The end of the franchise has now been delayed until November 2007 (See The Future).
From a low pre-privatisation base, the company now has £74 million worth of new trains, replacing the slam-door rolling stock it inherited with the modern Class 350 ‘Desiros’, which it shares with sister-company Silverlink. It has also refurbished many of its stations, introducing ticket gates and ''live'' information boards, and clamped down on vandalism on its trains.
Central Trains is owned by the National Express Group, and employs over 2,400 staff.^[2]
In 2006 the company took the step of producing posters with lists of names and addresses of those who had been fined for ticket evasion.^[3]

Network

Central Trains serves 232 stations in the Midlands, North East, North West and East Anglia. Most services are operated in Central Trains colours except for services in the West Midlands county which operate under contract to Centro, the West Midlands Passenger Transport Executive and operate in the Centro livery. In 2003 Central Trains services were split into Central Citylink, Centro and Local services as of 2006 these are the main services they operate.
=== "Citylink" Services===


★ Birmingham New Street - Liverpool Lime Street

★ Birmingham New Street - Preston (one evening peak service Northbound, no Southbound service)

★ Birmingham New Street - Stansted Airport

★ Cardiff Central - Nottingham

★ Liverpool - Norwich via Manchester & Nottingham

★ Northampton - Crewe/Preston via WCML

Local Services

★ Birmingham New Street - Shrewsbury

★ Birmingham New Street - Coventry - Northampton

★ Birmingham New Street - Nuneaton - Leicester

★ Nuneaton - Coventry

★ Doncaster / Lincoln Central - Peterborough via Spalding

★ Newark North Gate - Lincoln - Grimsby/Cleethorpes

★ Leicester - Lincoln Central

★ Nottingham - Skegness

★ Derby - Matlock

★ Derby - Crewe via Stoke-on-Trent

★ Derby - Nottingham

★ Birmingham - Nottingham

★ Nottingham - Leicester

★ Nottingham - Mansfield Woodhouse / Worksop

★ Stafford - Hanley via Stoke-on-Trent (Bus service)
===Network West Midlands Services=

★ Birmingham - Wolverhampton

★ Birmingham - Walsall / Stafford

★ Walsall - Wolverhampton

★ Cross City Lines Redditch/Longbridge - Four Oaks/Lichfield Trent Valley

★ Great Malvern/Kidderminster - Dorridge/Shirley/Stratford-upon-Avon
Via Snow Hill

Performance==
Considering the difficulties that Central Trains have to contend with, including sharing tracks with so many other operators, Central Trains has not performed too badly recently. The latest figures released by the ORR (Office of Rail Regulation), rate Central Trains' performance at 86.2% for the PPM (Public Performance Measure) over the last quarter of the financial year 2006/7^[4]. This is an improvement over the same period last year, during which they then acheived 85.1%.

Rolling Stock

When National Express Group took over Central Trains in 1997, the company started to dispose of its last 1960s and 70s ‘slam door’ trains. By 2000, all older trains were out of service,^[5] and the franchise operated a fleet of one and two carriage Diesel multiple unit railcars, mostly inherited from Regional Railways, the division of British Rail that preceded Central.
These 'Sprinters' were introduced during the 1980s, in line with a policy of replacing locomotive-hauled trains with shorter but more frequent single class rail car services. Soon after the franchise was awarded in March 1997, 33 new Class 170 100mph air-conditioned Turbostar trains were ordered.
Central Trains have recently taken delivery of 30 new 100mph Class 350 Desiro units, which are shared with Silverlink County for use on the West Coast Main Line between Euston and Northampton/Liverpool via Tamworth. The additions are part of a £100 million investment by the SRA to improve comfort, convenience, speed and accessibility.
In conjunction with the new timetable (21st May 2007), it was announced that Central Trains had acquired 9 Class 158 Sprinters from TransPennine Express giving the network an extra 36 carriages. These can already be seen in service and will act as extensions to busy services and short notice standbys. They will be re-branded as Central Trains fleet but will also remain in their TransPennine Express liveries.
The majority of Central Trains services are operated by diesel trains, as lines they operate are not electrified.

Current fleet

Class	Image	Type	Top speed		Number	Routes operated	Built
			mph	km/h
Class 150 ''Sprinter''		diesel multiple unit	75	120	34	Network West Midlands (non-electro)	1984-1987
Class 153 ''Super Sprinter''		diesel multiple unit	75	120	16	Lincolnshire Rural Services , Coventry-Nuneaton And Stourbridge Branch Line	1987 - 1988
Class 156 ''Super Sprinter''		diesel multiple unit	75	120	10	Local Mid-Distance Service	1987 - 1989
Class 158 ''Express Sprinter''		diesel multiple unit	90	145	21	Mostly ''CityLink'' Routes Plus Nottingham-Hereford , Nottingham-Shrewsbury,Leicester-Lincoln Central	1989 - 1992
Class 170 ''Turbostar''		diesel multiple unit	100	160	53	Mostly Central Citylink. (29 move to CrossCountry, 24 move to London Midland.)	1999 - 2002
Class 321		electric multiple units	100	160	4	Birmingham - Northampton ONLY	1988 - 1991
Class 323		electric multiple units	90	145	26	Cross City Lines	1992 - 1993
Class 350 ''Desiro''		electric multiple units	100	160	301	Liverpool - Birmingham , Northampton - Birmingham / Crewe	2004 - 2005

#Built for Central Trains and Silverlink regional express services and Central Citylink services on the southern section of the West Coast Main Line.

The future

It was announced in October 2005 that the Central franchise would end in April 2007 (later extended to November 2007^[6]), as part of a programme to reduce the number of franchises in the Midlands. Central Trains will be split into three parts, each of which will be amalgamated with another franchise:

★ West Midlands - this will include Silverlink County, and will take over Central's services West of Leicester and Nottingham.

★ East Midlands - this will include Midland Mainline, and will take over Central's services on the Midland Main Line and East of Nottingham.

★ Cross-Country - this will encompass Virgin Cross-Country, and will be slightly expanded from its current size by taking over the Nottingham to Cardiff, the Birmingham to Stansted "Citylink" services, and the Hereford/Nottingham service.
The future of the problematic Liverpool to Norwich service now appears relatively secure: previous suggestions to split the service into two separate services between Liverpool and Nottingham, and Nottingham and Norwich, have been abandoned,^[7] and the service will become part of the East Midlands franchise.
Recently Central Trains in the Centro area, which covers the West Midlands, Class 150s have been repainted in a livery similar to the Central Trains services. However, it is not known if the Class 323s will also be painted in the same livery.
It was announced on Thursday 21 June 2007 that many of Central Trains services (including Snow Hill lines), will be run under a new franchise operated by London Midland^[8] whose parent company is Govia.
It was announced on Thursday 22 June 2007 that many of Central Trains services (including local services in the East Midlands), will be run under a new franchise operated by East Midlands Trains^[9][10] whose parent company is Stagecoach Group.
It was announced on 10th of July 2007 that many of Central Trains services (including Cardiff - Nottingham, Birmingham - Stanstead Airport and Hereford - Nottingham), will be run under a new franchise operated by CrossCountry^[11] whose parent company is Arriva.
This will come into action as of Sunday 11 November. Central Trains will not run any more train services for the Midlands and beyond and it will cease trading as a company from this date.^[12]

References

1. Rail franchising arrangements, October 2004
2. Key Facts and Figures
3. Train firm tackles fare dodging
4. [1]
5. Our Fleet
6. Central Trains franchise extended
7. ‘Nottingham split’ scrapped, but hourly Norwich – Liverpool service under threat
8. London Midland News Page
9. Stagecoach Group welcomes East Midlands rail franchise win
10. Stagecoach unveils new train company
11. Arriva welcomes new CrossCountry rail franchise award
12. New franchise winner announced

External links

★ Central Trains website

★ National Express Group website

★ Department For Transport Railways page



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