SWR's Class 701s delayed again - operator admits introduction is "not going as planned"

There has been yet another delay to the long-overdue introduction of a £1 billion fleet of trains on South Western Railway.

Five and a half years after the Class 701 Arterio trains were due in service, only five of the 90 trains are carrying passengers.

The company now admits it is unable to give a date when the rest of the fleet will be ready. SWR says the issue is with its programme of driver training.

In a statement to RAIL the company confirmed: “The introduction of our new fleet is taking longer than we expected. We are continuing to work with our stakeholders as we seek to speed up the training programme.”

In a meeting held by Wandsworth Council this week, SWR regional development manager David Wilby admitted: “At the moment, it’s not going as we planned and as we previously said.

“The trains are here. It’s just the training to bring them into service that is taking longer than expected.”

A spokesman told RAIL: “We think we’ve got a way through.”

The first Arterio train carried passengers between Waterloo and Windsor in January 2024. Over the following 15 months, only five of the trains were used.

Last November, in a fanfare at Waterloo station attended by Rail Minister Lord Hendy, the company promised a further ten trains would be in daily use on Windsor and Shepperton services, the Hounslow Loop and to Dorking and Guildford. From June 2025 they would also run the longer journey to Reading.

At the time, SWR said that 100 of the 750 mainline drivers who will work the new rolling stock had already completed their two-week conversion course. It described the occasion as “a major milestone” and “a monumental achievement” that would “completely transform every single journey” on the suburban network.

It promised that by summer 2025, the trains would operate 80 services each weekday. Though it admitted it could be two years before the entire fleet of 750 carriages would be in service.

South Western Railway’s contract ends in a few weeks. Currently run by First MTR, all services into London Waterloo will revert to the public sector from 25 May.

Predecessor Stagecoach South West Trains had operated the very first privatised service of the modern era, from Twickenham to Waterloo on 4 February 1996.

The Class 701 trains were built by Alstom in Derby, and were ordered to replace all other suburban rolling stock on Waterloo services.

Delivery was repeatedly delayed by extensive faults, largely to do with software. Many of the trains have now spent years sitting in sidings including at Long Marston, Eastleigh and Marchwood.

The RMT union had previously held 78 days of strike action over the role of the guard on these trains. A guard will be on every service, but the driver will operate the doors on arrival at stations.

RAIL submitted a request to the Department for Transport under the Freedom of Information Act to discover the cost to the taxpayer of the delay. The DfT refused to release the cost, claiming this “would likely prejudice the commercial interests of South Western Railway and the Department.”