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March 13th 2008.
156422
East Suffolk Line Sprinter on the branch line
(Get on Board with the East Suffolk
Line)
Sprinter Fleet active in Norfolk
and Suffolk.
156402,407,409,412,416,417,418,419,422
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Sprinter 156419 in
new National Express colours
Photographed at Chappel by
Darren Johnson on May 30th
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Sprinter 156419 in
new National Express colours
Bures Station June 26th
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Sprinter 156402
"Love Shopping
- Love Chapelfields"
Sudbury Station on June 13th 2008
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156402
Pulling out of Bures station heading for Sudbury, Dec 4th 2008
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July 2008
BURES & CHAPPEL NOW REQUEST STOPS
National Express announced that the
1922 and 2008 service from Sudbury to Marks Tey will no longer automatically
stop at Bures or Chappel.
Both stations have been changed to
"Request Stops",
Passengers now have to signal the train from the platform or inform
the conductor if they wish to alight. The trains will also travel
at an appropriate speed to see the passengers waiting at the platform.
National Express have imposed this restriction because of the limited
number of passengers using these stations in the evenings. Non stopping
will allow more time for the busier return connection with the Liverpool
St trains at Marks Tey
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We seem to be very fortunate on the
branch line, as a different Sprinter appears each day.
The Sprinter is diagrammed as follows:-
National Express East Anglia only
have 1 DMU fuelling point - Norwich, plus being some 50 miles away
from the branch adds another 100 miles to the total to allow for
inward and return trip.
The official diagrams show a unit swap every night, apart from Saturday
night - the Sat/Sun single car unit is fresh off Crown Point on
the Friday night and runs empty to Colchester therefore can do 2
days no problems, it could even work a 3rd day if needed, but it
would be too small for weekdays hence the swap there.
The Mon - Fri 156s in the week are diagrammed differently.
A unit comes off the depot on day 1 full and does a day on Sheringham,
then it works in the evening to Norwich to Lowestoft, and then the
last Lowestoft to Ipswich service,
then empty to Colchester for day two when it does a full day on
Sudbury and finishes up working back to Norwich Crown Point for
fuel where it should repeat the process.
Doing it that way gets the most use out of their fleet with fewer
empty stock movements than if they were allocate 1 unit to Sudbury
all week. Plus now they only have 14 Sprinters and need 12 in use
every day - with the other 2 on maintenance - there's little room
for any slack.
Information courtesy of Darren
Johnson
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 156422
seen at Marks Tey on Nov 26th
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 Photo
courtesy of Keith Partlow
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