Ken's 2019 All Lines Rail Rover
Day 6 - Thursday 1st August 2019

For those who have been keeping up, it still Day 5. I’m at Glasgow Central and about to travel on the sleeper up to Euston. I travelled with my family in a sleeper cabin on a MotorRail service between Glasgow and London in 1988, and I have used sleepers several times since I started pounding the tracks in earnest in 2006. I love it on the Highland sleeper as you look out in the early morning summer light onto Loch Lomond and the Trossachs before crossing the expanses of the moors all the way to Fort William. But tonight I was on the Lowland Sleeper, which links Edinburgh and Glasgow to London. The scenery is far less dramatic but it’s still a great way to put some miles under your belt as you sleep.

The sleeper business was split off from the main ScotRail franchise in 2015 and awarded to Serco. Yes, that jack of all trades with a proud record of underachievement. What could possibly go wrong? But it could have been worse. Capita, anyone?

Serco relaunched the service in 2017 and ordered a fleet of brand new trains. Just like every other train operator. While they were being constructed Serco hired in refurbished electric and diesel locomotives to improve reliability, including the unique class 81 electric loco (mainly used to convey empty carriages) and the class 73/9s, early 1960s locomotives originally intended to live on the Southern Region of British Rail using electricity from the third rail, but now using diesel to drag sleeping passengers across the moorlands.

The new sleeper train orders were unusual in that very, very few operators run unpowered carriages these days. So far as I know, none have been delivered in Britain for almost 20 years, although there are a fair few still in use. Most passenger trains are multiple units, a fixed formation of between one and 12 carriages that are self-powered and can be combined to make longer trains. But a sleeper has different requirements. It has cabins, showers, toilets and is altogether a specialist vehicle. There’s a need for flexibility: the highland sleeper runs between London and Fort William, Aberdeen and Inverness. It needs to split into three sections en route and to pick up additional carriages for the Fort William ‘day’ cars (seated and dining accommodation), as well as do the reverse in the other direction. The demand for the three sections varies, so the train makeup has to, too. The lowland sleeper also joins/splits on the way. So a flexible setup with unpowered carriages pulled by locomotives makes sense.

The new carriages should have all been in service by now but have been plagued by teething problems. So much so that at the time of writing (September 2019) Serco has yet to introduce them on the highland sleeper, being keen to iron out the difficulties on the lowland service before they risk it. But my train is new, with shiny Mark 5 carriages and a sleek class 92 electric locomotive at the front.

I was greeted, as is usual for the sleeper, by a crew member dedicated to my part of the train, and handed my keycard. I went straight to my cabin.

Much has been made of the vastly improved interiors of the new trains compared with the old Mark 3 sleepers they’re replacing. And they do feel much more modern. The old trains had cabins that can be locked from the inside, but not the outside. The new have electronic keycards. The old trains have toilets at the ends of the carriages and showers available at stations; the new have en-suite cabins. Both have an upper berth that is tucked away when not needed.

There is now much better lighting and heating/aircon, and a better ride, although I always liked the rocking of the old carriages.

But what of the much publicised en-suite? Well, for teeth-brushing and shaving there’s still a wash-basin under a folding shelf below the window, but now you have a whole new (very small) room. It has a toilet (reducing the need for the wash basin at 3 am) with a folding shelf that covers it. The shower is, more or less, above the toilet, so it’s best used as a sitting shower. But I had hot water (unlike many this summer – that was a major problem area) and everything worked as designed.

One thing I love about the sleeper is the lounge car. The old ones had seats that were not fixed to the floor, and sofas, providing a nice, informal atmosphere. The new ones have various dining booths, stools and, of course, accommodation for passengers with wheelchairs. But comfortable and inviting.

The food? I enjoyed it. I had a Scottish gin and tonic; haggis, neeps and tatties; some wine, a selection of Scottish cheeses and a malt whisky. Like the accommodation, the prices seem to have shot up since my last trip. Is it worth it? Yes, but probably not if you have to do it often, or with a family.

One thing that hasn’t changed: I was waited on by a pleasant steward.

I left the lounge car and retired to my cabin. It was only about 2340 and the train was still in Glasgow Central, but we soon set off. I was fast asleep by the time we stopped at Carstairs to join with the Edinburgh portion before setting off down the west coast main line to the south.

I awoke some hours later and headed for the lounge car for my full Scottish. It wasn’t a patch on the old BR fry-ups, but it set me up for the day: orange juice, bacon, scrambled egg and a few other things. Importantly, tea. I watched the waking world go by: Rugby, Milton Keynes, Watford. As we passed Queens Park I want back to my cabin to check that all of my belongings, plus any portable freebies, were safely stuffed in my backpack.

So, how was the sleeper experience? Pretty good. But really, the new trains make little difference, it seems to me. It’s still the sleeper, for good (travel as you sleep, and on a train) and ill (small cabin). I like it, but some don’t.

The approach to Euston is steep, as trains pass over the Regents Canal before descending to the terminus. But gradients aren’t something a modern traveller needs to think about. Or are they? At about the time my train drew up safely to the buffer stops in Euston, the Edinburgh section of the down sleeper was approaching Waverley, also down a hill. The driver applied the brakes and promptly suffered a Caledonian brownout as the train failed to slow as quickly as it should have done. It overshot the station by 700 yards. Luckily it was a through platform and there were no trains or other obstacles in the overrrun, but imagine if it had happened at Euston. The train only stopped when it did because the guard had the presence of mind to apply the train brakes. The initial enquiry suggests that a valve on the train brake pipe was left closed when the train was split at Carstairs, leaving the driver with brakes on the engine only, with no braking available to him/her from the rest of the train. Every train journey is supposed to include static and running brake tests to make sure that the brakes are working properly, so something went seriously wrong that night.

But I knew nothing of this potential disaster as I stepped into early-morning London. So where to?