January 2012

03.01.12

Porterbrook signs agreement for the future of Class 458s

Porterbrook Leasing has signed a contract with Stagecoach South West (SSW) to reconfigure the Class 458 fleet into 5-car units and to create 6 additional units by incorporating equipment from the Class 460 fleet which was previously used on the Gatwick Express services. The new fleet of 36 5-car units will be known as Class 458/5.

This new fleet of trains will form part of the rolling stock element of SSW HLOS solution and will deliver 10-car services on certain routes. The modification work has been contracted to Alstom who in turn will use Wabtec Rail to undertake the physical work. The total cost of the project will be almost £42m and the new 5-car units will enter service starting in the spring of 2013 and will take approximately 1 year to complete. Only 4 of the original Class 460 vehicles will remain unused however spares recovered from these vehicles will be used to support the new fleet.

Commenting on the contract, Paul Francis, Managing Director said “the deal on Class 458/5 clearly demonstrates the important role of rolling stock lessors in providing flexible commercial and engineering solutions to rolling stock provision alongside the purchase of new trains. In this case Porterbrook is investing £42m to deliver an important HLOS commitment for our customer SSW. This increased rolling stock capacity will be delivered with only three years remaining of the franchise but Porterbrook can underwrite this long term investment.”

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