Room at the Top

Bad news for Merseyrail: the House of Orange has fallen.  On January 1st Maarten Spaargaren gave up his position as MD of the railway company, bringing an end to the Dutch rule over Liverpool's railways.

Before Maarten, there was of course Bart Schmeink, who I ACTUALLY MET at a Christmas party Merseyrail generously invited me to once.  They didn't invite me again - hopefully nothing to do with all those JD and Cokes I knocked back, or me telling the man behind the Merseyrail map that the city centre square was "fucking shit" (I should say he agreed with me) - but I did attend Bart Schmeink's leaving do.  I arrived too early, skulked around at the edges eating vol-au-vents because that was easier than talking to people, and left without managing to speak to the great man himself.

I was happy when Bart was replaced by Maarten, because having a Netherlander ruling over Merseyrail seemed to work.  Customer satisfaction went up, punctuality went up, the trains and the stations all started looking a bit lovely.  They imported the M to Go concept from the Low Country, which worked, and the Bike and Go concept as well, which didn't quite as much.  Maarten has left Merseyrail for the sake of his children's education, which is appallingly selfish of him.  What about ME?

Now there's a man called Alan Chaplin running the company.  What sort of a name is that?  There's the correct number of vowels in it.  There's no satisfying "sch" sound.  It's far too English.  Alan is on a secondment from Northern, where he's more usually the Deputy MD, and I'm sure he's a lovely and very capable man.  I'm sure Merseyrail won't plunge into an abyss of horror but, just to be safe, I think Alan should attend work in an Ajax shirt and waving some tulips about.  While smoking a joint.

So instead I'm transferring my loyalties to Northern Rail in the "FavouriteManaging Director" category.  They don't have a Dutchman in charge there, either, but I'm willing to overlook that because they have Alex Hynes instead.  Alex is actually northern, which I like; admittedly, listening to him speak, he's not full on "ey up, down t'pit with me whippet" northern, but that's ok.  I like the idea of the rail operating company being run by someone who's actually got experience using it.  I bet some of the southern franchises are run by men who haven't left their air conditioned Jaguar since 1986.

Also, if I can be unashamedly shallow for a moment, Alex is a little bit sweet.  I like his teeth, and his ears: my fondness for Russell Tovey must have given you a hint that I have an inclination that way.  And now Tim seems to have left the Northern Twitter feed, Alex has moved to top spot in the Northern Rail Totty Stakes (apart from that guard on the Yorkshire Coast Line who was built like a small house and who caused me to have minor heart flutters).

I mean, GOOD LORD.

Another fact in Alex's favour: he is always travelling around the network.  I don't think he even has an office.  I think he just installs himself on the first train he sees and goes out and about.  Northern is such a weird franchise, and I'd hate to think he was just commuting in and out of Leeds on the frequently served, well maintained lines and thinking that was all his franchise was about.  I recently spent a couple of hours trying to work out how I was going to visit the stations between Pontefract and Goole, which get only three trains a day, one in the morning and two in the evening; a good MD knows about the backwaters and has seen them for himself.

But Alex's greatest asset?  He's as nerdy about travelling over Northern Rail as me, as evidenced by this from his Twitter feed:

We're clearly kindred spirits, Alex.  Give me a ring.  I'll buy you a pint.

Liver-y

The Colour Tsars have got in there again.  Yesterday, Maarten Spaargaren unveiled the new look for Merseyrail trains.  You'll be unsurprised to hear they're going to be yellow and grey.

The trains have been wrapped in vinyl to allow a series of designs that plug the wonders of Merseyside - or, as the Merseytravel press release puts it, "the Liverpool City Region".  That'll cause a few pursed lips in Meols.

Is that Jeffrey Archer above the knife?

The vinyl wrap is becoming more and more common as a way of livening up the exterior of trains and, incidentally, bringing in advertising revenue.  There are a number of Northern Rail trains featuring pictures of local attractions - the York skyline, items from art galleries and museums - while Merseyrail already has its Beatles Story train.  No word on whether that's disappearing.  The vinyl's also been used to enable companies to plug their product to innocent passengers.  I won't hear a word against this practice, because it resulted in East Coast's really quite amazing Skyfall train last year. 

These designs are far simpler for Merseyrail, far more abstract, which is good because you're going to be seeing them every day.  You really don't want some nightmare inducing laser printed horrorshow pulling up to the platform for your commute of a morning.  Hopefully these transfers will last better than the Merseyrail Ms of the last refurb, many of which seemed to fall off the trains and never get replaced.

The whole fleet should be finished by early next year, with a refresh of the interiors following soon after.  All this is just a stopgap to keep the trains running until they're replaced towards the end of the decade, but it's nice to see them pay some attention to keeping the existing rolling stock from looking tired.

A Train of Thought

Merseyrail want YOU.

Don't get all excited; they're not in the market for a new Chief Exec or anything.  No, Merseyrail are touting for public opinion about their trains.  A consultation has been launched to find out what people want from their trains when they get refurbished next year.

I didn't even realise they were getting refurbished, so this is quite exciting news.  I thought we'd have to continue with what we had until the new trains arrived, somewhere around the turn of the next century.  They're concentrating on five areas:

• Seats
• Internal walls
• Doors
• Fixtures (for example, bins)
• Signage

Cosmetic details, perhaps, but it's nice that they're asking.  I was pretty pleased with the last refurb - the one that gave us the purple and yellow interiors - and it was a vast improvement over their 1970s yellow and green predecessors.  Some bins would be handy, because it's quite depressing spending the whole trip back from Chester next to a Wotsits packet.  Doors between carriages on a strong hinge would be good too, so that people passing from one car to the next don't leave it open and banging for the rest of the journey.

I have drawn up a more detailed plan for the refurbishment, which Maaaaaaarten  Spaaaaaargaren is welcome to contact me about any time (click for a better view):

Key features of the new look Merseyrail train:

1. Private, locked cabin at the front of the train for my own personal use;
2. Russell Tovey serving champagne;
3. Me, on a throne;
4. All the other passengers in a walled off section at the back.

I look forward to hearing from you, Merseyrail.

If you have any ideas of your own, you can send them to Merseyrail here.  Though obviously they won't be as good as mine.

Room at the Top

Merseyrail have announced their new boss, and I for one welcome our new railway overlord.  His name is Maarten Spaargaren, and he looks like this:

I have to be honest - there was a part of me that was worried that the departure of Bart Schmeink would mean the orange influence on Merseyside would disappear.  I nervously anticipated the appointment of a "Bert Carr" or a "Sean Druckett" or a "Philomena Mellencamp" and we'd go all boringly English.  But no: with the arrival of Maarten we have a man whose name is so Dutch it should come with a free bunch of tulips and some pornography.  I couldn't be more pleased.

Sad though I am to see the great Mr Schmeink leave, I look forward to the arrival of the Spaargaren Regime at the end of the month.  I'm available for a pint of Grolsch any time, Maarten.