The New London Underground S stock is now in service!

A film about the London Underground S Stock trains which entered passenger service on Saturday 31st July 2010 - although these sequences were filmed on the Monday following.

The trains represent a step change in comfort and passenger amenity, but because of the reduction in seating compared to older trains their use on the outer suburban sections of the Metropolitan Line has not been universally welcomed.

Two most noticeable new features for London are that the trains are fully air-conditioned and designed so that people can walk through them from one end to the other end. Being new they also meet the highest standards of accessibility, and have built in CCTV camera systems. Very welcome is that the doors will automatically close after 45 seconds, keeping winter heat and summer cooling in the train. Passenger push-buttons are provided to re-open the doors

The ambiance is bright, there are large picture windows, and the quality of ride is simply superb.

Regarding the seating reduction, the older A stock trains seated about 450 passengers, whilst these seat little more than 300. The intended idea is maintain capacity by running them more frequently, but this requires signalling and track upgrades which are years away, and it should be noted that when Virgin tried this on the CrossCountry railway franchise it all came to tears - because the physical infrastructure (tracks, signalling) could not cope with the extra trains. The resulting cut-backs left some services worse off with overcrowded lower capacity trains struggling to cope with passenger numbers.

It should be noted however that these trains have more seats than the C and D stock trains used on the other subsurface lines.

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Below is the timetable information for the initial service these trains are operating - 3 return trips a day - Wembley Park - Harrow On The Hill - Watford and back, running fast between Wembley and Harrow, and 'slow' for the rest of the journey.

NB: no specific journeys are guaranteed to be operated, and at some stage this info will cease to be correct, but I do not know exactly when.

Train No. 402 402 402
Neasden Depot (F) 10 25 (empty) 12 53 (empty) 14 33 (empty)
Wembley Park (pfm 1) arr 10 31 (entrain) 12 59 (entrain) 14 39 (entrain) dep 10 33 13 03 14 41
FL FL FL (fast lines)
Harrow-on-the-Hill (pfm 3) 10c40½ 13b10½ 14 47½
LL LL LL (local lines)
Northwood 10 51½ 13 22 14 58½
Moor Park 10 54½ 13 25 15 01½
Watford South Junction 10/56½ 13/27 15/03½
Watford arr 11 02 13 32½ 15 10
Pfm No. 1 2 2
dep 11 08½ 13 38½ 15 18
Watford South Junction 11/13½ 13/43½ 15/23
Moor Park 11 15½ 13 45½ 15 25
Northwood 11 18½ 13 48½ 15 28
Harrow-on-the-Hill (pfm 6) 11 30 14 00 15 40
FL FL FL
Wembley Park (pfm 6) arr 11 35 (detrain) 14 05 (detrain) 15 45½ (detrain)
dep 11 37 (empty) 14 07 (empty) 15 47½ (empty)
Neasden Depot (N) 11 43 14 13 15 54