Irish Railways has put up 120 of these mark 3 coaches for sale. They are not quite identical to the British ones. The Irish gauge is wider than that in the UK, 5ft 3in instead of 4ft 8 1/2 in, which means that the bogies would need to be re-gauged or possibly replaced. The carriages also have the advantage of plug doors as fitted to the Bournemouth line class 442 stock.
The electrical system is different from the British vehicles, being supplied from generator vehicles which are included in each train set.
This latter feature could prove useful as it would enable any form of traction to be used, such as, for instance, class 66 freight locomotives, without loss of the air conditioning and other on-train services; the vehicles could even operate with steam haulage and for this reason could be of interest to charter companies.
Provided that too many seats are not crammed in (not more than about 70), these are pleasant and comfortable vehicles and someone could end up with a bargain.
I wrote to my MP on two entirely separate issues recently. The first was to do with the replacement for the Inter City 125 train, which at £2.6 million per vehicle, is twice as expensive as it ought to be. The second concerned the benefits of a switch from business rate and Council Tax to a tax based on site values. In both cases, the replies were full of spurious, unsubstantiated assertions and completely flawed arguments. This is typical. You will not get an iota of sense from the government on any area of public policy at all - finance, economics, trade and employment, agriculture, housing, health, transport, energy. All junk. If you write to your MP you will invariably receive answers that are an insult to your intelligence, no matter what subject you are writing about. Of course they cannot understand statistics. They are innumerate. Whitehall is staffed with idiots with a high IQ. Look at their IT projects. And mind your purse, they will have that too.
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