Meerkat Musings

There's a Meerkat in all of us

The Class 91

The beautiful Class 91 locomotive. By The joy of all things – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=124666819

Out of all the trains that have carried me to various destinations down the years, my favourite is the Class 91, which hauls passenger services along the East Coast Mainline. Current operations centre mostly on the branching spur to Leeds, but some services currently run up to Newcastle as well. Introduced during in 1989 to operate the Intercity 225 services, the Class 91 is an ingenious platform. The locomotive pulls trains northbound, and then pushes southbound services, with the driver controlling the locomotive from a driving van trailer that is sculpted to look much like the loco itself. This means two things: firstly, there is no need for the loco to change ends (a time-consuming problem), and no need to build two expensive power cars.

More than that, to me the design is sleek. It looks like a powerful, fast express train. It is also a symbol of the era in which I first started to appreciate trains and train travel. Alas, like its predecessor the Class 43, the Class 91 is being phased out.

Dwindling Operations

By kitmasterbloke – https://www.flickr.com/photos/58415659@N00/53181402838/, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=143955121

The Class 91 came to complement the Class 43, and took full advantage of the electrification of the ECML. The 91s are not as noisy and as polluting as the 43s, albeit they were limited to sections of the line with overhead power. Thus, the 91s never went up to the Highlands. However, their presence allowed the shuffling of the deck where the 43s were concerned, and they were a whole new level of comfort. Well, they were to me.

The advent of the Azuma trains has seen the Class 91 be displaced. Most are now in storage, and some have been scrapped. The Azumas are modern, curvaceaous trains that represent a whole new generation of traction, complete with bi-mode power in some cases. Like them, loathe them or love them, they are the future, and the power-looking engines of the early 90s are not. Big, bold displays are out, and subtle, slender engines are in. In many ways it’s a pity, because the loss of the Class 91 isn’t the only departure of train classes I have come to rather love. Ah well, such is progress…

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