Reduction In Weekend Engineering Works

Network Rail and Greater Anglia have announced that there will be significant fewer disruptions in 2013 caused by engineering work. Also, for the first time in many years disruption this Christmas will be kept to a minimum.

Under the new plans scheduled for 2013 on the GE Mainline, only two Saturdays are affected by engineering work that will require a replacement bus service.  There will be no disruption requiring replacement buses from the end of March to October.

Since 2007, there have been on average 30 weekends a year requiring bus replacement services.  In 2013, there will only be 7 planned weekends of such disruptive engineering work.

Greater Anglia Franchise Agreement

The Great Anglia Franchise agreement is now available to download on the Department for Transport website.

Inter City Carriage Refurbishment

The rail media is reporting that East Midlands Trains are now intending to bid for the refurbishment work of the Mk3 carriages used on the London - Norwich services.  Greater Anglia has confirmed that work is likely to start next year with the carriages receiving [another] coat of paint in GA white with red doors.

Interior improvements have been discussed and the work may include automatic plug-doors which have been successfully implemented on the same carriages used on the Chiltern Line.  Such work would extend the life of these coaches considerably raising questions about future plans for new trains on this line.

Ageing Greater Anglia Trains

The average age of trains run by Greater Anglia is now 24.72 years which is significantly higher than the national average of 17.93 years.  This puts Greater Anglia (GA) in 4th spot overall for the oldest fleet on the network.  Although GA is carrying out a deep clean of its trains as part of its franchise agreement, nobody can deny that the fleet needs some significant work carried out on it to counter the age and poor condition of the trains.

'Meet The Manager' At Liverpool Street

There will be a Meet The Manager session at Liverpool Street station this Wednesday, the 19th, from 16:30 to 18:30.  This is an opportunity for Greater Anglia customers to ask questions of the station's management team.

If you are unable to make the session but have a question you can use the Twitter hashtag #ttmga

Petition Against Fare Increases

A petition has been set up on the government's e-petition website to protest against rail fare increases.  Unfortunately the wording is not perhaps as good as it might have been but if enough people sign up for it then perhaps the government will take note.

The petition can be found here

Anger At East Anglian Rail Subsidies

An article in today's East Anglian Daily Times (EADT) highlights the extraoridinary way that passengers in this region are heavily subsidising other parts of the rail network while we endure all but the oldest trains in the country and a level of underinvestment that adversely affects the service we receive on a daily basis.

Members of the ERUF committee, of which the MRUA is a member,  will be meeting Simon Burns, MP for Chelmsford and recently appointed Transport Minister, on the 10th September and this ridiculous situation will be top of the agenda.

The full story in the EADT can be found here.