What did the Westerns do? |
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The Westerns were “mixed traffic” locomotives, that is they worked on both passenger and freight trains. A Western could for instance, haul the Cornish Riviera express passenger train on one day and then a 600 tonne stone train the following day. This is unusual today, when modern locomotives are specifically designed for either one role or the other.
In their early days, Westerns worked trains from London Paddington through to Birmingham Snow Hill, Wolverhampton Low Level, Shrewsbury, Chester and Birkenhead. These duties ceased in the late 1960s with the closure of Birmingham Snow Hill, although in later years they regularly worked to Birmingham New Street via Oxford and Reading. Westerns regularly worked on passenger services from London Paddington to and from Bristol, Cardiff, Swansea, Plymouth and Penzance. It was relatively rare for them to go further afield. Freight duties included working stone trains out of Merehead Quarry in Somerset, China Clay trains to and from Cornwall and Milk trains from the West Country to London.
The reign of the Westerns came to an end with the completion of the electrification of the north part of the West Coast main line between Crewe and Glasgow. This released the fleet of fifty class 50 diesel electric locomotives, which had worked those services. The plan was to reallocate the Class 50 fleet to the Western Region in 1974 enabling the Western fleet to be made redundant; to be withdrawn from service and scrapped. The first Westerns were withdrawn in 1973 and it was planned to complete the process by 1975. The Warship fleet had been withdrawn by the end of 1972 and the Hymek fleet had been withdrawn by early 1975.
The class 50 fleet proved to be notoriously unreliable in service. They were often known as 50/50’s because they previously worked in pairs on occasions or because it was perceived that you had a 50% chance of getting to your destination without a failure! Whilst they were technologically advanced locomotives, the Western Region were unfamiliar with their foibles and at one point half the fleet were out of traffic waiting for repairs. This left the Western Region with a locomotive shortage and so the Westerns soldiered on.
In October 1976, the Inter City 125 High Speed Train (HST) entered service and subsequently formed the backbone of Western Region and later First Great Western express passenger services. It is interesting to note that the HST locomotives are now being re-engined with MTU power units. MTU are the successors to Maybach and the new Adelante class 180 of diesel multiple units have hydraulic transmissions.
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