THE NORTH WALES COAST RAILWAY NOTICE
BOARD
Rheilffordd Arfordir Gogledd Cymru Bwrdd
hysbyseb
47 805
runs round at Holyhead station, 5 July. Many more Freightliner pictures
below! (Rowan Crawshaw)
This site is dedicated to all our regular contributors and
supporters, and especially the rail staff of North Wales.
Edition of 05 July 2004
Freightliner 47 invasion
No sooner had we completed updating the Trains page
with nice details of the fleet of eight Virgin locos allocated to North
Wales duties, and Deiniol Williams of the Railhead news site
had headed south on holiday, than the Virgin locos were replaced
without any warning by Class 47s hired from the Freightliner company.
This influx began on Saturday 3 July; on Sunday when engineering work
closed the Chester - Crewe and Chester - Altrincham lines three
Freightliner locos shuttled Virgin trains between Chester and Holyhead.
47 197, a loco not fitted with electric train supply so unable
to work the air-conditioing of thr coaches, Virgin-liveried 47 805
and bizarre Police-liveried 47 829 worked the trains. The first
train from Holyhead (1T87) and return (1D87) provided 47 197 at
the Crewe end and 47 829 at the Holyhead end of the rake of
Virgin mk3 coaches.
The second departure from Holyhead had 47 805 alone, which and
ran round at Chester on arrival.
Also at Chester station on 4 July was 158 791, a Central
Trains unit on hire to FNW, which in turn was on hire to ATW (Keeping
up with this?) It was supposed to have worked a Manchester - Holyhead,
however it had a TPWS fault so a FNW 142 was sent empty to Manchester
to work the train, which then ended up working all the way through to
Holyhead.
Mark Lloyd Davies recorded the Sunday scene at Holyhead (above
and below)...
... and Rowan Crawshaw was on hand at Bangor (above and below)
The same locos continued to work the trains between Crewe and Holyhead
on Monday 5 July, and Rowan Crawshaw took the change for a a
ride behind 47 829 from Bangor to Prestatyn on 1A49 then 47
805 on 1D87 to Holyhead and 1A77 back to Bangor, to take the
pictures below.
Here, 47 829 departs Prestatyn with the 1A49 09:20 Holyhead -
Crewe.
47 197 calls at Prestatyn on the rear of 1A49.
And here's an arresting view by Tim J. Rogers of 47
829 proceeding in an easterly direction through Mostyn on 5 July.
Here's a little tailpiece taken by Mark Lloyd Davies on Anglesey
showing the whole formation of one of these trains. - 5 July
Serco/NedRail
announced as preferred bidder for Northern
Rail
Franchise (yawn)