Consultation status
Conclusions published
Date of publication
Closing date
Body
The Railway Safety Regulations 1999 permits exemptions to be issued to allow operators to use MK1 rolling stock on the national network.
Most exemptions specify a barrier vehicle between the locomotive and the rake of coaches.
The barrier vehicles were defined as Mark 2 (MK 2) or Mark 3 (MK 3) and most exemptions prohibited passengers from travelling in the leading vehicles
We have consulted pdf icon PDF, 71 Kb stakeholders on the proposal to allow train operators to operate Mark 1 (MK 1) passenger rolling stock on the national network without barrier vehicles and with passengers permitted to travel in leading vehicles.
This would be subject to the following:
- provision by the operator of a suitable and sufficient risk assessment;
- each exempt vehicle that could be coupled in a rake of coaches is identified by a unique number;
- all vehicles are coupled with buck eye couplers fitted with shelf brackets;a
- all vehicles in the rake have the same buffing height (plus or minus 5mm);
- all vehicles are verified by the operator to have crash pillars of an equivalent or greater strength than the original BR design. Owners or operators should provide an engineers report of the condition of the crash pillars and body structure in general together with any evidence of structural repair or modification;
- no MK 2 or MK 3 vehicles are marshalled at either end of a rake of Mark1 coaches; and
- the maximum speed limit of a rake of MK1 vehicles should not exceed 75 miles per hour (120 kilometres per hour) for steam operation; for electric or diesel operation the maximum speed would be that of the plated speed of the coach.