Regional Railways

Regional Railways was one of three passenger sectors of British Rail and was from 1982 to 1996, two years after the privatization of British Rail. The sector was originally called Provincial.

Regional Railways was the most subsidized of the three sectors of British Rail. His expenses were after the founding four times as high as the revenue.

Foundation

After the sectorization in 1982, British Rail was split into three sectors: Intercity, for high-speed trains; London & South East (renamed Network South East in 1986) for regional trains in the London area; and Provincial (renamed Regional Railways in 1989 ) for all other passenger trains. In the Metropolitan Counties local connections of the Passenger Transport Executives were administered.

Compounds

Regional Railways operate local and express trains. Express trains were operated mainly on non- branch lines or thin routes such as Birmingham or Liverpool to Norwich or from Liverpool to Scarborough, and were usually operated with older locomotives and intercity car. Especially the BR Class 158 at Express connections - - Later these compounds with Sprinter units were served.

Local connections were operated on main and branch lines and were often operated with DMUs first generation, which were mainly built as early as the 1950s. Trains with longer distances were often operated with older cars and locomotives such as the series 31, 40 and 45 similar vintage.

Development of new vehicles

In the early 1980s, asbestos was found in many DMUs and passenger cars. Since the distance would have been very expensive and the old vehicles were now become unprofitable, it was decided to develop a new generation of diesel multiple units.

Pacers

The first generation ( Pacers ) used the bus technology from the bus line Leyland National. Shortly after the introduction suffered a large number of them in a series of technical problems, especially in the area of ​​transmission. In Cornwall, it was found that their long wheelbase caused unbearable squeaking and the high wheels had a lot of wear in tight curves, so they were replaced again a short time later by the old railcars. After several modifications, the Pacers proved in the trade as robust and reliable.

Sprinters

British Rail had to find a middle way between the Pacers and the Class 210. In 1984/1985 two experimental Dieseltriebzugkonstruktionen were put into operation: the Class 150 and Class 151 by BREL from Metro - Cammell. Both had a diesel- hydraulic drive and were less busähnlich than the Pacers. According to studies, the 150 series has been selected for series production and commenced operations in 1987. The reliability has been increased with the new trains, so depot visits of two to three times could be reduced to two a week during the week.

At the end of the 1980s and early 1990s, secondary fast trains were introduced, which completed the intercity lines. The Class 155 - and 156 - class sprinter have been developed to replace locomotive hauled trains on these lines; the interiors have been designed so that long trips were enjoyable. In particular, Scottish and Pennine routes with Class 158 Express Sprinters have been upgraded, while a network was introduced by ' Alphaline' connections elsewhere in the country.

Until the late 1980s, passenger numbers grew and the cost was only two and a half times as high as the revenue.

Coloring

From 1986 to Provincial used a version of the prototype livery of the class 150: "Airplane " blue over white, with a light blue stripe at waist level. Both all new units, as well as selected old as the Class 304 EMUs, got the new color scheme. Some cars and trainsets received the livery with " ScotRail " - or "Trans - Pennine " brands.

The Class 158, introduced in 1989, appeared in "Express" color: dark gray window frame light gray, with light and dark blue stripe on waist. This color scheme was also in some Class 156 train sets, around the time of the privatization, applied.

The last vehicle that got the Regional Railways livery, was a Class 153 railcar, who got the East Midlands Trains livery in July 2008.

Division in the privatization

As part of the privatization between 1994 and 1997 Regional Railways was divided into several parts which are independent companies were later: