December 4, 2019 10.29 am This story is over 51 months old

New Lincoln to Sheffield trains to replace outdated Pacers

A boost for commuters and visitors

Photo: Northern

Northern will launch brand new trains to serve customers between Sheffield and Lincoln.

The trains will start to operate on the line from early this month. Further introductions will come later in December and into the New Year as its plans to deliver 101 new trains gathers pace.

A special event will take place on Wednesday, December 4 in Sheffield as one of the new Class 195s travels to Worksop and Lincoln to mark the arrival of the new trains.

The government previously confirmed in 2015 that it intended to replace 30-year-old Lincoln to Sheffield Pacer trains.

The Pacer trains are currently operated by Northern and were only meant as a short-term measure when they were initially introduced by British Rail, but some have been operating for almost 35 years across the north of England.

Northern has said a permanent goodbye to the first three Pacers to leave the network for good.

Northern recently said a permanent goodbye to the first three Pacers to leave the network for good. They have been removed and returned to owning company Angel Trains, with more to follow in the coming weeks.

Northern had a fleet of 102 Class 142 and Class 144 pacers and the first one (142 005) was tired in August 2019.

The majority of remaining Pacers will be removed from customer service by the end of the year, with only a handful remaining. All retired Pacers will be stored at a train depot in Worksop before being broken down for scrap.

David Brown, Northern’s Managing Director, said: “We’re delighted to be delivering on our commitments of removing Pacers from customer service and, at the same time, introducing 101 brand-new trains.

“Whilst pacers have served the north well, we know that they are old, outdated and not popular with our customers. For these reasons, when we won the right to being operating the franchise in 2016, we developed plans to remove them all from service.

“At least 55 of the 102 Pacers will be permanently retired by the end of this year, with the remainder all gone by May next year.

“We are transforming our business and service to customers with a £600 million investment in brand new and refurbished trains – and improvements at stations – that will provide everything a 21st Century customer expects.”