An interesting day out. After less than 2 minutes’ instruction I was in charge of an 8 car Desiro train doing 100mph! OK, maybe I overshot the station by 4 car lengths, but I didn’t go through any red signals! My fellow drivers had it worse though, in a very short space of time they had cracked windscreens, road vehicle incursions, driving rain, thick fog and heavy snow. No, this wasn’t a typical autumn day but a very enjoyable day spent at the Basingstoke Campus a joint venture between South West Trains and Network Rail to train operating staff (drivers, guards etc.) as well as maintainers. We were initially given an overview of the centre by Mark Ellis then Brian Kimber (both of South West Trains) gave us a very detailed and illuminating presentation on not only what they (South West Trains) look for in their drivers, but the lengths they have to go to in the training before they are let loose in the cab by themselves for the first time.
So you want to be a driver, well get in the queue – the waiting list is 3000 ! And for every 1 that succeeds in holding that power controller, there are 300 that didn’t make in! Then there are the 56 weeks of training to get through before you are let out in charge of a train by yourself!
So what do SWT look for in a train driver? Qualifications are quite low on the list, what they are looking for is an aptitude, responsibility, motivation, happy with your own company, these are all important factors in the decision process, the selection process they use must be good, because whilst only 1 in 300 make the grade to start training, only a very small percentage don’t make
the grade.
So what is in the training, everything from Front End Turns that’s watching not driving and up at 04.00 – nobody said that driving a train had sociable hours! Through 6 weeks of learning the rules, 3 weeks of practical handling (slow speed moves in the depot), Advanced Route Learning (you need to know where you are going), the different types of traction, 14 weeks of actual driving (under supervision) the a 1 week final assessment. At that point after 38 weeks you could be passed out as a driver, but the learning doesn’t stop there! Before you get your own train, there are another 16 weeks of route learning followed by 2 weeks of assessment. Finally, after 56 weeks since starting, you are allowed out, by yourself with anything between 800 and 1000 passengers relying on your skill to get them to their destination safely!
Autumn, as you may well know, with the wrong sort of leaves can bring a multitude of problems
and delays to the service. The longest slide recorded in the UK (and that’s with the driver as a passenger!) was over 2.5 miles! Network rail are working hard through various methods to reduce this as a problem and with 1,917,588 station stops in autumn 2015, there were only 33 overuns, that’s 1 in 43,000 adhesion related overruns and it is getting better!
After the presentation we were taken down to the Desiro simulators and given a chance to have a go at driving a train. We each had about 25 minutes of driving with 4 station stops, having to respond to AWS alarms, the use of the Drivers Reminder Appliance and also the guard’s bell codes for right away. In the simulator control room events could be simulated to see how the drivers respond. These could be anything from extreme weather conditions, a broken windscreen, vehicle incursions and signals unexpectedly changing aspects. Whilst we were having fun these simulators are used in the training of drivers and in the final assessment to ensure that react appropriately to a suite of wide and varying circumstances. These simulators are actually (in software terms) quite old and we were given a quick peek of the state of the art simulators for the new Siemens class 700 trains soon to come on stream with South Western Trains and with over 800 drivers needing training, they will be put to god use as soon as they are commissioned!
So next time you’re in a train, that person at the pointy end has been through a very rigorous training process and regular refreshers to make sure they are at the top of the game to get you to your destination on time and safely.
The day spent at the Basingstoke Campus showed a very close relationship between Network Rail and South West Trains that is paying dividends. Although we focussed on the train driver, there was also an outside area to practice the use of Road Rail Access Points (RRAPS), a large welding shop (for Thermit welding), a signalling panel for training signallers and a soon to be commissioned indoor area of track with switches and crossings with all the usual trackside objects (signals, point machines, TPSW and AWS aerials etc.) so maintainers can be trained in a controlled environment, dry and safe from passing traffic! Although a few sprinklers and machines blowing freezing cold air could be used to add to the realism!
Altogether a fascinating day and the IET’s grateful thanks to South West Trains and Network Rail for allowing us to visit Basingstoke Campus.
In addition to the above blog and attached images, I also recorded this short video in one of the
training simulators.
Peter Sheppard
Railway TPN Executive Team member