European Railroad Discussion > Electrification MPV (GB)

I live in Somerset (England) not far from the main line from London to the West Country. Castle Cary, my nearest station, is a junction with all passenger trains run by First Great Western. We don't get any freight in the true sense of the word but we do get various engineers (MOW) trains and associated equipment. We also occasionally see a South West Trains class 159 so that the drivers can retain route knowledge for diversions.

This summer the railway has been catching up on various "sticking plasters" they had to apply during the floods in the winter so we've been seen a few more things like tampers etc than I might normally expect.

However, this first batch is of one of the brand new Electrification Multi Purpose Vehicles. Neither of our lines is, or is due to be, electrified so quite what they've been doing here I'm not sure. Network Rail actually call them their "HOPS" train - read more here http://www.networkrail.co.uk/news/2013/jul/Groundbreaking-factory-train-slashes-years-off-electrification-programme/

Anyway, on to pictures. One of the whole train disappearing into the distance and one of each of the end vehicles.

---

---

---

Engineers trains are shared between Freightliner, Colas and DB Schenker. The one company we almost never see is GB Railfreight.

Here we have a Freightliner class 66 leading the High Output Ballast Cleaner back towards Fairwater yard at Taunton and then the business end of the HOBC.

---

---