Yesterday, Eversholt Rail invited RailAdvent to see the unveiling of their Class 321 Swift Express Freight Train. The conversion took place at Wabtec’s Doncaster Facility and saw a Class 321 passenger train, No. 321344, previously in service with Greater Anglia, converted to carry parcels around the UK.
Mark Smith introduced us to the day and went through the history of the Class 321s, with Wabtec still overhauling Class 3XX bogies, part of a contract signed in 2008. Next up as part of the meeting was Paul Sutherland, who is Client Services Director at Eversholt Rail, who explained that the idea came around in 2019, with Class 321s about to start coming off lease and people starting to shop online more and more, more thought was put into the idea.
The Coronavirus Pandemic hasn’t changed this, and in fact, has accelerated the trend for people to be shopping online Paul says that customers want to deliver these parcels quickly and efficiently, which is where the idea of a Class 321 came into fruition.
When asked about why the Class 321 was chosen, Paul said that they were in good condition and were already ‘passed’ to be used on most of the national network, with passenger movements in Scotland, Yorkshire and Anglia, as well as empty stock movements across the East and West Coast Mainline.
The Swift Express Train can be coupled together with other Class 321s to make a consist of 4, 8, or 12.