London Midland

Services

London Midland's services are divided between four groups of routes: London Euston Routes, Birmingham Regional, West Midlands Local and Branch Lines.

London Midland operates several "parliamentary train" stations, where only a handful of trains a day call. These include:

London Midland also operates stations where it operates no services. These stations are only served by CrossCountry, which does not manage any stations. These include:

As of February 2016, its routes off-peak Monday to Friday, with frequencies in trains per hour (tph), include:

Former services

In December 2008 London Midland discontinued the direct service between Walsall and Wolverhampton. Traffic on the route was low, but growing, and there was a campaign to keep the service. The service was a priced option with the new West Midlands franchise, but the Department for Transport decided not to provide funding from December 2008, and as a result the service ceased. There is only one early morning train on Saturdays from Wolverhampton to Walsall (Parliamentary service). London Midland advised that passengers should use National Express West Midlands buses instead.

In December 2008 a two-hourly Worcester Shrub Hill to Gloucester service was introduced to improve transport links between the two towns as well as to provide an increased service at Ashchurch for Tewkesbury. This service was withdrawn in December 2009 because of low passenger use. However, since the December 2009 timetable changes, London Midland still does run a (Parliamentary) service once a week from Birmingham New Street to Gloucester, in the southbound direction only.

Proposed services

In October 2010 London Midland applied to the Office of Rail Regulation to run a new hourly Birmingham to Preston service from 2016 by diverting every other Birmingham to Liverpool train. The Euston to Crewe service would then be extended to Liverpool to maintain a half-hourly service between Crewe and Liverpool by 2016 as well. This was rejected by the Office of Rail Regulation. London Midland also sought to run additional evening and Sunday trains between Euston and Crewe, to satisfy what the company says is unmet demand. From April 2012 London Midland began operating an hourly Euston to Crewe service on Sundays.

In order to win a contract extension, London Midland has agreed to put on extra services, resulting in an extra 6,600 seats per week.

Performance

The company stated that it experienced many breakdowns due to the outdated rolling stock it inherited and which it has now replaced, and has also provided extra seats in the 2014 timetable.

In Autumn and Winter 2012 many services suffered cancellations owing to a shortage of train operating staff.

Performance since the staff shortages have been varied with a low of 76% for the period 10 November - 7 December 2013 to a 92.2% for the period 1–26 April 2014 The average punctuality since the start of the franchise is 87%

A new partnership agreement between London Midland and transport authority Centro is set to trigger a £10m investment in station improvements across the West Midlands. 'Transforming Rail Travel' is a deal between the two organisations to continue a two-year arrangement with the aim of delivering further enhancements to services and facilities.

Rolling stock

London Midland inherited a fleet of Class 150, Class 153, Class 170, Class 321, Class 323 and Class 350/1s from Central Trains and Silverlink.

One of the major franchise commitments was the replacement of the existing fleet of Class 150s and Class 321s. Upon being awarded the franchise, London Midland ordered a total of 66 new trains of three different types, comprising two Class 139 Parry People Movers, 12 two-carriage and 15 three-carriage Class 172 Turbostars and 37 four-carriage Class 350/2 Desiros.

All bar three Class 150s were cascaded to First Great Western (12 x 2 carriage, 2 x 3 carriage) and Northern Rail (18 x 2 carriages) and the Class 321s to First Capital Connect (13) and National Express East Anglia (17). The Class 153, Class 170 and Class 323s have all been refurbished.

The first of the Class 350/2 Desiros arrived in the UK in early October 2008 for testing at the Siemens Northampton depot. By July 2009 they were all in service.

London Midland was to lose all of its Class 321s, but a change of plan saw it retain seven for use both on the Watford Junction to St Albans Abbey branch line and on peak-hour express services between Northampton/Milton Keynes Central/Tring-London Euston. The final seven units moved to Abellio ScotRail in 2015/16, and were replaced by seven Class 319s cascaded from Thameslink.

The two Class 139 railcars were due to enter service on the Stourbridge line with the start of the new timetable on 15 December 2008. However, problems in testing caused a delay in their introduction, with a replacement bus covering the route following the reallocation of the Class 153 originally used. The two railcars finally entered full passenger service in June 2009.

London Midland was to lose all of its Class 150s, but a change in plan saw it retain three Class 150 vehicles as additional capacity, following a statement from the Department for Transport on 10 August 2011. However, London Midland transferred two Class 153s to First Great Western as a result. The other Class 150s were transferred to First Great Western and Northern Rail.

In 2011 London Midland announced that it would be procuring a further 18 four-coach Class 350 Desiros, eight for itself and ten for sub-lease to First TransPennine Express. In February 2012 it was announced that 20 Class 350 Desiros had been ordered by London Midland. Ten Class 350/3s entered service with London Midland, and ten Class 350/4s with First TransPennine Express.

Future fleet

The franchise agreement included the option of replacing the three remaining Class 150/1s in the fleet with six Class 153s in June 2017. The Northern franchise agreement indicates this option has been taken up, as the London Midland Class 150 units will transfer to Northern in 2017. The Northern franchise agreement also rules out the option of any additional Class 323 trains being leased from Porterbrook to London Midland before 1 January 2019.

In July 2016, London Midland and the West Midlands Combined Authority announced that it would run a year-long trial of the prototype Vivarail Class 230 DMU on the Coventry to Nuneaton Line. In January 2017, this was cancelled by the West Midlands Combined Authority as a fire on the trial unit would have caused the trial to be impossible to complete before the end of the franchise.

Past fleet

Former units operated by London Midland include:

Future

In April 2016, the Department for Transport announced an Abellio/East Japan Railway Company/Mitsui consortium, Govia and MTR Corporation had been shortlisted to bid for the next franchise. The Invitation to Tender (ITT) was issued in August 2016, with the franchise due to be awarded in June 2017. The successful operator will begin services in October 2017.

In July 2016 it was announced that MTR Corporation had withdrawn from the bidding process.

Future franchise requirements

The Invitation to Tender requires that the new franchisee provide: