Alstom’s Depot Dash takes passengers into depots

Alstom’s Depot Dash took a passenger service into three Alstom Traincare Centres. The charity railtour gave participants rare access to operational maintenance depots. The journey was a West Coast Main Line round trip from Merseyside. This is reported by the railway transport news portal Railway Supply.

Alstom’s Depot Dash at three Alstom Traincare Centres

The Branch Line Society charter ran on Saturday 4 April. It called at Alstom sites in Manchester (Longsight), Wolverhampton (Oxley) and Liverpool (Edge Hill). The route used rare track on the West Coast Main Line. The charity railtour combined three live depot visits in one journey. It gave passengers a chance to observe and film maintenance locations. Public access to them is normally not available.

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“Opening our Traincare Centres to a passenger service is something we do very rarely, so Alstom’s Depot Dash was genuinely special. These sites are first and foremost operational environments, and the professionalism of our teams ensured the tour could be delivered safely while giving passengers a unique perspective on the work that keeps Britain’s railway moving,” said Christopher Mackenzie, Head of Passenger Operations at Alstom.

West Coast Main Line depots and train movements

Alstom operates five Traincare Centres along the West Coast Main Line. There, it maintains several fleets, including Avanti West Coast’s Class 390 Pendolino trains. The Alstom-built high-speed Pendolinos have been running for more than 20 years. Their routes include London, Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool, Glasgow and Edinburgh. A recent £117 million upgrade has returned the whole fleet to an ‘as new’ condition.

The railtour started at Edge Hill railway station, one of the oldest in the world. GB Railfreight locomotive No. 66701 then hauled the train to Liverpool Lime Street. From there, No. 57306 worked the service to Alstom’s Manchester Traincare Centre. Later, No. 66694 moved it from Bescot Yard to Bletchley railway station. Around 300 passengers travelled on the charter. Eastern Rail Services supplied the Mark 3 carriages.

The train ran under headcode 1Z57. Alstom’s Central Operations team oversaw its arrival and stay at each location. At Longsight, resident shunting locomotives No. 08887 and No. 09007 hauled the charter’s eight coaches. They moved them around the depot site. At Oxley, No. 08617 did the same.

Charity railtour support for Beatson Cancer Charity

The charter raised more than £3,200 for Beatson Cancer Charity. Separately, an additional donation of over £1,200 was shared among the Railway 200 charity partners.

The Branch Line Society is a UK voluntary association for railway enthusiasts. Founded in 1955, it focuses on railway infrastructure and network history. Main line, heritage and private railtours and visits remain central to its offer to members.

“Alstom’s Depot Dash offered our members the kind of access that simply isn’t available on the everyday railway. Visiting multiple live maintenance depots in one trip and travelling over such rare track made this a truly memorable railtour, and the response from our members has been exceptional,” said Kev Adlam, Fixtures Secretary at the Branch Line Society.

Last year, Alstom’s Glasgow Traincare Centre marked its 150th anniversary. The site is better known as Polmadie Depot. It also opened to the public for the first time in 25 years. The day before, the Scottish facility welcomed its first-ever passenger train. That gave railfans a rare chance to travel across depot track. The visit was also organised by the Branch Line Society. Resident Class 08 locomotives shunted the unit along multiple depot tracks. It too raised more than £3,200. That took the total to around £6,500 for Beatson Cancer Charity. It covered the two most recent Alstom railtours.

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