After a period where train design in Britain has been to a reasonably high quality, poor design seems to have returned and is a widespread feature of recent trains in Britain; board-hard and badly profiled seats lacking in lumbar support are the norm. Traditional moquette is no longer standard for seat covers, with flat weave fabrics becoming widespread. In the case of the new inter city trains these are plain and unpatterned, and show the mark and stain of every drop of spilled coffee and crumb of greasy food, looking dirty and shabby after just a few months in service.
Ugly and over-styled front ends crop up in many of the new types; perhaps the worst are the Scotrail’s porcine Hitachi class 385, and grotesque Siemens class 380, and the Siemens 700 class for Thameslink. The Hitachi trains for Scotrail are the result of trying to fit a gangway into the standard Hitachi nose, resulting in a piggy appearance and what must be a very tight space for the drivers, who refused to operate the trains, allegedly due to the curved windscreens, which distorted the view. The curved class windscreens were replaced, clumsily, by windscreens with flat glass but the real reason for the drivers’ objection was probably the cramped space. A particularly ugly feature of the Hitachi inter city trains is the clutter of equipment boxes on the roofs, which look like a row of humps when viewed from the side. It must wreck the aerodynamics and add significantly to their energy consumption and running costs.
Weird designs sometimes cropped up in the 1950s at the start of the time when steam was being phased out. That led to the establishment in 1956 of the British Transport Commission Design Panel and the appointment as consultants of such renowned firms of industrial designers as Design Research Unit (and link here) headed by Misha Black, Professor of Industrial Design at the Royal College of Art. They were responsible for such 1960s design classics as the British Rail double arrow symbol, the remarkably elegant class 52 diesel-hydraulic locomotive and the Victoria Line and related designs of tube train for London Underground.
The current crop of design howlers listed above would never have got past the scrutiny of the Design Panel. These monstrosities will be around for three decades or more. The situation reflects badly on the industry and reveals its current fragmentation; there is no overall body in a position to pull things together.
Ugly and over-styled front ends crop up in many of the new types; perhaps the worst are the Scotrail’s porcine Hitachi class 385, and grotesque Siemens class 380, and the Siemens 700 class for Thameslink. The Hitachi trains for Scotrail are the result of trying to fit a gangway into the standard Hitachi nose, resulting in a piggy appearance and what must be a very tight space for the drivers, who refused to operate the trains, allegedly due to the curved windscreens, which distorted the view. The curved class windscreens were replaced, clumsily, by windscreens with flat glass but the real reason for the drivers’ objection was probably the cramped space. A particularly ugly feature of the Hitachi inter city trains is the clutter of equipment boxes on the roofs, which look like a row of humps when viewed from the side. It must wreck the aerodynamics and add significantly to their energy consumption and running costs.
Weird designs sometimes cropped up in the 1950s at the start of the time when steam was being phased out. That led to the establishment in 1956 of the British Transport Commission Design Panel and the appointment as consultants of such renowned firms of industrial designers as Design Research Unit (and link here) headed by Misha Black, Professor of Industrial Design at the Royal College of Art. They were responsible for such 1960s design classics as the British Rail double arrow symbol, the remarkably elegant class 52 diesel-hydraulic locomotive and the Victoria Line and related designs of tube train for London Underground.
The current crop of design howlers listed above would never have got past the scrutiny of the Design Panel. These monstrosities will be around for three decades or more. The situation reflects badly on the industry and reveals its current fragmentation; there is no overall body in a position to pull things together.
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