West Midlands Railway Class 730s now operating in the West Midlands

[@jacobporrett]

Good to see them in the WM now.

[@Sim0nTrains]

It is great to finally see them in the Midlands

[@Desiro360]

Cool video. Nice that the 730's are entering service in the West Midlands.

[@Sim0nTrains]

Thanks Desiro360

[@josephbird978]

I can't wait for them to enter service on my local line, the cross city line

[@Theo5550]

Great video Simon! The new Class 730's look amazing and a huge improvement, can't wait to ride one myself!

[@Sim0nTrains]

Thank you, they are good units.

[@lovefive5733]

Thank you, so hopefully Northern may get more WMR 323,s once the 730,s are on the cross city line. We already have 323220 and 218 relocated to longsight train depot. I saw 323220 at Piccadilly running an Alderley Edge service .It was still in it's Wmr livery.

[@SamsVlogstrainsmore]

Nice vlog of the new class 730s now in the West Midlands despite the teething problems Simon.

[@lv-ag6129]

Nice to finally see the midlands new electric trains on passenger runs! Gotta give these a ride the time they enter service on the XCL

[@Sim0nTrains]

I have heard April as a rumoured month that they starting on the Cross City Line.

[@westmidlandstransport]

@@Sim0nTrains around April/may yea

[@TransportVloggerIan]

Looking forward to riding these things

[@ReubenAshwell]

Brilliant video Cyber, it's good to see the Class 730's are now in the west midlands. It honestly has gone off to a good start with those door problems at Walsall though. :P

[@Sim0nTrains]

Thanks Reuben, it does make the journey interesting

[@JohnnyHooverTravels]

Nice to see the 730s coming on stream around Birmingham. Next time I'm round there I'll give them a go. Thanks for the video 👍

[@Sim0nTrains]

Thanks Johnny.

[@tonygilbert2008]

Good luck getting a seat 350 much better train

[@GLovesTrains]

Great to see the 730s in the West Mids now! 😄

[@Sim0nTrains]

It is G, Thanks

[@aiden_lovestransport]

Might try the Class 730 out next week thank you for informing us 👍🏻

[@Sim0nTrains]

No worries, think there be 2 units out next week as they going to add a unit each week.

[@aiden_lovestransport]

@@Sim0nTrains Ok cheers 👍🏻

[@14inversions]

Best trains I been on since a long time back in 2021! But they feel a bit bumpy but they are so good. And inside looks spacious

[@Sim0nTrains]

The space is quite good on these trains, the narrow seats is a compromise for more standing space but they are great unis

[@westmidlandstransport]

I was on this! Nice video! Unfortunately, i was on that service, which was stuck in the tunnel! Also, dunno of you heard, but at Smethwick Rolfe Street, the cab door had a fault as well!

[@Sim0nTrains]

Thank you, I didn't hear about the cab door fault at Smethwick Rolfe Street

[@MichaelSebastianTodd]

the WMR 730s do look amazing & its great to see them in service on the Walsall to Wolverhampton route brilliant vlog

[@Sim0nTrains]

Thank you, it's great they have finally entered service in the West Midlands.

[@Rail_Focus]

Good to see they 730s finally working on the West Mids, even if things didn't quite go to plan 😅. To be honest I'm glad the 350/2s are going, but appreciate they do have more seating capacity.

[@johnwayne2896]

Great video Simon

[@Sim0nTrains]

Thank you

[@KirbyONeilDJSpeed]

Great Vid great for Birmingham very nice train, well done Sim 👍👍👍

[@lovefive5733]

Thank you for uploading this video 😊😊

[@Sim0nTrains]

Thank you and no worries lovefive5733

[@jamesdunn6636]

I WAS ON THAT TRAIN TODAY!!!! was so cool

[@arnoldspottingvideos5269]

Great video Simon. Good to see WMR 730 on the Walsall/Wolverhampton line

[@Sim0nTrains]

Thanks Arnold

[@Andrewjg_89]

Nice to see the Class 730 in service. Hopefully they should enter service on the Cross-city Line in Spring with the remaining Class 323 cascaded to Northern and some for storage.

[@shyguypromotions]

I did the same thing this morning, I got to Walsall and got off for 10 mins before heading back to new street

[@Sim0nTrains]

Sadly I had less time but still managed to do a piece of camera during a quick turn around.

[@Vanmanyo]

Nice video Si! Nice to see you at Birmingham this morning (albeit we didn't talk!). These units look as though they certainly will live up the 323s (except in their sounds perhaps!)

[@Sim0nTrains]

Thank you, they are good units

[@MrGreatplum]

Let’s hope they can sort out those teething issues - they look like good trains though! Loving Tico’s face mask too.

[@Sim0nTrains]

They putting a different unit on each day, guess it was a unlucky one

[@ReecesTrains]

Great video, Simon! These look pretty decent on the inside! Enjoyed the G reference by Tico there! The door fault was not a good start for this particular train type! During the door fault, I thought it was pretty rude when people were forcing their way onto the train without letting others off first, total disregard for those trying to alight!

[@Sim0nTrains]

Thank you, I personally think it wasn't in purpose, they possibly think that the carriage was empty in the middle and started to board the train. I know they ran great on the Bletchley to London Service but new units will have teething troubles

[@ElijahsTransport]

Great video 👍

[@Sim0nTrains]

Thank you

[@ElijahsTransport]

@@Sim0nTrains can't wait for it to run on ccl!!!

[@TheLondonTransportDroid]

Nice new trains

[@Sim0nTrains]

They are ineed!

[@Thornaby37]

I can't help thinking that class 730 saw Tico coming and decided to cause a bit of chaos of its own lol 🤣 But joking aside, that door fault doesn't look good at all

[@Sim0nTrains]

Tico always brings the Chaos lol It was quickly fixed the door fault but did hear also at Smethwick Rolfe Street that there was problems with the driver cab as well.

[@TicTacTrolleyServiceTico]

Was great to hang out with you again Cyber!

[@Sim0nTrains]

Was great to catch up with you again Tico!

[@EdgyNumber1]

XCity, Wolvo to Cov and the Chase line are really metro-type lines, so the priority is for standing space. Especially useful for going to see that football team that plays in Witton lol

[@Sim0nTrains]

That one advantage with the new trains as there more capacity to take people to Witton to watch Aston Villa but totally agree that those lines are for metro-types or suburban lines, like with the XCity, people will use it at New Street just to go to University, that isn't a long journey but sadly there not many Wolverhampton to Coventry services like they used to be.

[@TrainBoy-tf9gh]

Nice video.

[@Sim0nTrains]

Thank you

[@thebrummierailenthusiasts5329]

I’m next to try and ride it hopefully it’s gonna be running again

[@Sim0nTrains]

It will be out on the same diagrams all this week

[@thebrummierailenthusiasts5329]

@@Sim0nTrainsso it’s on all this week and is it gonna be running again for next week as well

[@RailagonBloxStudios]

I'm thinking the 730/0 on the WMR the livery is literally a Sainsburys on Rails, with the 730/1 and 730/2 having a livery that is styled as a Asda on Rails.

[@paulrobinson4597]

Hello there Simon, very informative video and you covered the main points of the new trains. My main concern about these new units are that they seem to concentrate on the amount of people standing and at the very least Passengers should at least expect to sit down especially people who are older or infirm. I think that the 350/1 and 3/4 are superior for passengers comfort and so smooth and quiet, the 350/2 are better suited to commuter services when you need extra capacity. They remind me of a slight variation of the units used on the London Overground services and they are not very nice to travel on at all.😢

[@Sim0nTrains]

350/2s are good for suburban traffic and popular with families as well with their 3+2 seating. But don't know why there less seats on the new trains, could had been a compromise in the design or they want to keep it a suburban train without the feel of being a suburban train

[@atomicfallout67minis]

I was on these new 730s and I was wondering in a few months time when the new smell wares off and ppl use it a lot more because of the open gangway design throughout the whole train would the whole train smell like the toilet like how some of the 350s toilets stink

[@robbiemorrison7085]

Doesn’t the 350/1 have 2+4 seating, or are the 100 series no longer in service?

[@Sim0nTrains]

2+4? The Class 350/1s are 2+2 seating and they are still in service, it's only the Class 350/2s which have 3+2 seating but they shall be withdrawn soon

[@robertparkin]

These trains seem to have a lot of issues, I travel from Bushey to Euston and on the six occasions it should have been a 730 three were running over 20 munutes late due to problems and Bushey was skipped. Not very good

[@alanreader4815]

I Slept on Birmingham Newstreet Station Back in 2003 Because there was maintenance work going on which meant i couldn't get back to reading.

[@Sim0nTrains]

What was it like sleeping at Birmingham New Street?

[@alanreader4815]

@@Sim0nTrains That night it was quite quiet. All the vending machines were on, So i was not without hot drink and a snack.

[@paulrobinson4597]

At least these units are not built by CAF so hopefully should be a bit more reliable??🤔

[@Sim0nTrains]

No, they built by Bombardier Transportation and Alstom, most new trains will have teething troubles

[@MrTudwud]

3 vice 4; 6 vice 8 etc., just as I predicted months ago. These new trains make no sense. We've seen 5 car trains being built that are already running 5 vice 8 and 10 vice 12 on the WCML. I've seen 3 vice 6 as well. I had this disagreement on another vlogger's post (Tornado) regarding services at Stafford and also the TfW services in the Shrewsbury area. Why are we buying units based on 2, 3 and 5 cars when 4 cars have been the norm for donkey's years on busy suburban and outer suburban routes? I know there have been 3 car EMUs around as well, but they are very rarely used on Class 1/2 routes such as London-Birmingham and London-Peterborough/Cambridge etc. Where 4/8/12 cars are the norm (and the capacities agreed with TOC Performance Personnel and the Government) why are we introducing trains with less seating capacity? In my days in Performance, "capacity" was the number of carriages and seating, not how many sheep could be packed into a rail pen.

[@Sim0nTrains]

The points raised in this comment I cannot disagree with and they are valid points. The only thing I can think off it down to Money which is why trains are being introduced with less seating capacity. Now the 5 vice 8, I dd spoke to someone at West Midlands Railway when riding the Class 196 on their very first day in service and they did say that a 5 coach Class 730 EMU and fit a 8 coach Class 350 Desiro but looking at the reduce seating on the WMR Class 730s, I don't think that is true, be interesting when they do enter service. The 6 vice 8 when the 3 coach Class 730s on the London services is only a stop gap so they could get rid of the Class 319s but think that will be going back to 8 coaches eventually. The Stafford services I thought the Crewe to Birmingham service via Tame Bridge Parkway was a bad idea to cut the service back to Stafford but that service does have one advantage and if there is disruption in the Wolverhampton area for example, you can rely on that train to get you to Crewe (That's from personal experience from a month ago) But that was also cut back to allow the 2nd Liverpool Lime Street service to run during morning and evening peak in the weekdays and all day off peak on Saturdays.

[@harryelliott4310]

WMR Class 730