I know many of us want to see different things with GWE, whether it be route extensions further west, adding the Thames Valley branches, bringing it into the fully electrified era etc. but recognise that would require a fundamental rebuild of the route which DTG are unlikely to venture. However I thought it might be worthwhile abstracting an idea I had and put in another thread regarding a relatively simple enhancement pack which could be made. Basically we need to "Joe" the timetable, get far more services in there. Obviously we can't have Heathrow Express or Heathrow Connect (operated by BAA at the time the route is set), however an increased HST and Turbo service would be great. In order to achieve that, you would need to include a Class 165 in both 2 and 3 car variants. Another touch would be to add the Paddington to Hayes bay services which were operated by Class 387 units when these were being received new. The model already exists but would need to be reskinned and have the interior updated to GWR colours. This would really give the feeling of the intensive service that operates between Paddington and Airport Jn, which for many parts of the day has trains on a 3 minute headway with little spare capacity (one reason why the service disruption plan is so brutal when it comes to thinning out at times of perturbation). I know we already have Diesel Legends for the route but my suggestion offers a possibility of bringing something extra without major surgery to the route itself.
I would like to see the Class 66 make better use to the yards, at present nothing uses the coal unloading facility except one scenario not to mention all the empty sidings
With Class 180s added as well, we could have more variety for express services. Just need to get the old FGW livery approved for use on them. Great suggestion.
Bring it on and for Class 387/2 required layer is BML since there are Gatwick Express 387/2s on GWML around July-August 2021 The footage is from July 31 2021 UK AU NZ format is 31 July 2021
Well the 180 would require a new model built from scratch, but might be interesting - especially if the frequent failures that seemed to plague the class when on GW were modelled! The original suggestion stemmed from two relatively easy (?) additions, a reskinned 387 and the 165 for which the existing 166 already provides some of the base model.
I doubt FGW or the IP holder of the train would allow a failing unit to be modelled directly Overall I like this suggestion, and an updated timetable is always welcome, with GWE being one of the older less populated routes (probably due to an infant dispatcher back then) I would say it could do with being much busier on several fronts
