Centro liveried sprinters pre privatisation

[Foden]

I seem to remember seeing Centro liveried 150 sprinters through Leicester station as a common occurrence as a young lad, but can’t remember if any of those recollections were pre privatisation.

 

Once Central Trains came to be I know they were used on the line quite often as three car hybrid units, but did Regional Railways use them as such, or did they then stick more rigidly to the West Mids?

 

And on that prior point, did RR run the 150/1 and /2 as 3 car hashups or was that only post privatisation?

[Bill Radford]

As far as the "hashups" are concerned P5 lists 150 141, 142, 144, 145, 146, 148 and 149 as three car Tyseley units in 1990 - all 2 car were Derby. Also 150 202, 204, 206, 210, 214, 216 and 208 from Newton Heath.

[russ p]

Both two and three car ones used to do Nottingham worksop quite  often,  seem to recall one making it to Norwich 

[russ p]

Duplicate post

Edited August 16, 2019 by russ p

[wombatofludham]

I worked for Centro for ten years and the history of the "Centro" liveried fleet was quite interesting.  

 

The PTE supported rail services in the West Midlands via what was called "Section 20" payments to the British Railways Board.  As part of the agreement a certain number of 2 and 3 car units were specified for use, but, in order to aid flexibility, the whole Tyseley allocation of Class 150s were painted in the Centro-Regional Railways colours which is why you would find Class 150s in Centro livery from Yarmouth to Barmouth - in effect they were Regional Railways units just carrying a "pool" livery in order to guarantee that when allocated to a west Midlands diagram they were in the correct colours.

 

There were three versions of "Centro" livery - between 1990 and 1999 the "Regional Railways" based livery with the green band around the windows, the pale blue stripe at waist height, and silver grey lower body panels.  Between 1999 and 2005 the livery was modified to have white stripes either side of the doors to mark out the door area, and the Centro logos were moved from alongside the doors (this is carried by the most recent Bachmann 150/'2 model) and then post 2005 the 150s were refurbished and repainted into a Central Trains based livery (the livery carried by the Bachmann Class 150/1 model).

 

In terms of unit allocations, in theory the three car units (the two prototypes, 150 001-2, and the three car lash-ups with a 150/2 centre car) should have been allocated to key commuter services in the West Midlands, such as the Jewellery Line, but Regional Railways Central and Central Trains were notorious for having a "random unit generator" when it came to allocated units.  When I lived in the Midlands I would occasionally have a 156 turn up on the Rugeley route (I once had a hookey cab ride in one all the way from Birmingham to Rugeley TV but you haven't heard that from me, right?) and one fine day I even experienced the luxury of a Class 158 to Rugeley, and there is photographic evidence of 156s and 158s working through Snow Hill when with Central trains.  Three car 150s would sometimes be used on summer Saturday services to Skeggy and Barmouth pre privatisation, to help out with summer traffic levels when West Midlands loadings were lighter.

 

Post privatisation the 150s tended to roam less especially after the 156s were allocated to the East Midlands and became less common around the West Midlands.  Central tried to keep the 150s on West Midlands services but even in the final days of the franchise the odd 158 or 170 could turn up on locals, and of course eventually the 170+153 combinations became commonplace on local West Midlands services, which are still plying the Snow Hill lines to this day.

 

So in summary, up until about 2004-5 Class 150s were fairly common in the East Midlands and three car sets would sometimes appear, but as a rule of thumb after 2005 East Midlands locals were more likely to be 153 or 156 units with some 170s and 158s helping out.  I'm sure however others will be able to quote occasions post 2005 when they rode a 150 east of Burton!

 

The above is my recollections of course, and I'm open to correction as a lot has happened since I left the Midlands nearly 20 years ago.

[Foden]

Wow, fantastic insight guys, really appreciate the responses.

 

Seems they were well travelled units well before privatisation then.

 

I always liked the early Centro livery too, very pleasing on the eye. A 3 car 150/0 would be an interesting train to model also I think.