A major milestones on the Midland main line has been achieved with the energisation of the newly installed overhead wires between Kettering and Wigston and the first trip for a new East Midlands Railway Aurora bi-mode unit to St Pancras.
Energisation of the Kettering to Wigston stretch took place on 28 July. Electrification work has been carried out by Network Rail and contractor SPL Powerlines. In total, 36km of new overhead cables have been installed along with more than 1,100 steel and concrete piles, 18 bridges have been altered, and three new substations installed; one, at Braybrooke, provides additional resilience to the stretch between Sharnbrook and Corby, which was completed in 2021. NR has highlighted the safety risk now the wires are live and has delivered additional training to Wigston fire service on how to safely respond to emergencies on the railway as part of its ‘Always On!’ campaign.
While the wires are energised, a programme of testing is needed before they are authorised for regular use, and a test train comprising HST power cars, Mk 3 coaches and a Class 91 locomotive was formed up at Leicester in early August for this purpose.
Electrification to Wigston follows on from the Bedford to Corby stretch and has been dubbed Key Output 1a. Network Rail has begun the process to appoint a framework contractor to electrify the remainder of the MML north of Wigston to Nottingham and Sheffield. The first section to be ‘called of’ within this framework contract, subject to funding from Government, is expected to be Syston to Trent Junction.
The Corby electrification facilitated the introduction of EMR’s Class 360 EMUs on its new ‘Connect’ service in May 2021. There are currently no trains with overhead electric capability scheduled regularly north of Kettering towards Leicester, but that will change when EMR’s Class 810 bi-modes replace its Class 222s on inter-city services. By early August three ‘810s’ were at the Rail Innovation and Development Centre at Melton for testing.
No 810001 was delivered last year, and does not have any interiors fitted. No 810004, the second unit to arrive, is also the first to have fitted out interiors. This unit, running on diesel power, became the first to traverse the full length of the MML from Sheffield to St Pancras on 22 July, subsequently completing the same sequence of test runs across the remainder of the week. The third unit, No 810003, was delivered to the RIDC on 2 August.
EMR has ordered 33x5-car ‘810s’ from Hitachi to replace the ‘222s’, financed by Rock Rail, which are expected to enter service during 2025 and 2026.
