Route Manchester Valley Commuter: Manchester Piccadilly - Peak Forest Via Chinley & Buxton + Hindlow

Set in the early 1980s, the route from Manchester to Buxton and Peak Forest have been previously included in TSW, with Manchester to Stockport as part of Manchester Airport Commuter and Buxton to Chinley via Peak Forest having been included in the steam era Peak Forest route. The passenger and freight services over this route hosted quite the variety of traction too, with anything from 20s to 47s on freight and passenger loco hauled workings and 101s to 114s on the local DMU services. There was also the Euston services from Manchester Piccadilly, which were mostly in the hands of 87s but had a complex loco swap procedure due to the headshunts at Piccadilly and the lack of a DVT during this time period. Altogether, this route would be roughly 50 miles long


Proposed Rolling Stock

• Class 25/2 in BR Blue livery

The Class 25s were a fairly common sight around Peak Forest and Buxton during this time, with them finding themselves on the Tunstead to Northwich and Oakleigh workings, as well as trip freights from Buxton to Ashburys via Peak Forest & Chinley. This route would include new liveries for the PGA wagons (yellow) and ICI hoppers (grey) for these services

• Class 31/4 in BR Blue livery

The Class 31/4s are identical in look to the 31/1 already modelled in TSW, but they were fitted with ETH equipment for hauling more modern passenger stock such as the Mk2s, although this means they have even less power than the 31s already did due to needing to power the ETH equipment.

• Class 104 in BR Blue (White Roof) livery

Roughly 125 sets of these units were constructed for BR in 2, 3 and 4car formats, with quite considerable amounts of the Class being based at depots around Manchester (Buxton, Longsight and Newton Heath all had allocations of the class), with 15 3car sets based at Buxton for the service on this line due to the 2car sets being too underpowered (these being based at Longsight) and working on other DMU services around Manchester such as those to Blackburn, Oldham and Rochdale. The 2car units were not fitted with white roofs

Layers:
Class 40: Hauling PGA wagons on trains from Peak Forest to Pendleton as well as loco moves to/from Buxton depot
Class 45: Hauling ICI hoppers from Tunstead to Portwood and Collyhurst Street as well as loco moves to/from Buxton depot. Also appears on Transpennine workings alongside 47/4 and small chance of substitution on Intercity diesel hauled services
WCML Preston - Carlisle: Class 47/4 for Intercity diesel hauled services to/from Manchester Piccadilly (drivable to/from Stockport) as well as static stock at Buxton depot,
Class 87+Mk3s for London to/from Manchester services (drivable to/from Stockport) and static stock at Longsight depot,
Class 101 for all DMU services not allocated to 104s on the route.
FFA wagons for Freightliner services on the route hauled by 45s, 47s and 86s (most AI, some drivable Stockport to/from Manchester Piccadilly)
WCML Preston - Crewe: Mk2D/E coaches for Intercity diesel hauled services, Class 20s for static stock at Buxton depot and substitution for Class 25 on Tunstead workings, Class 47/3 for small chance of substitution for 47/4 on diesel hauled Intercity services, Class 86/4 for electric hauled Freightliner workings.