London’s BRAND-NEW commuter train has one big problem…

This is the UK's newest commuter train... sort of!

I'm riding the SWR Class 458/4, a recent addition to the South Western Railway fleet, dating back to the days of South West Trains.

Travelling from Weybridge to London Waterloo through the busy train station of Clapham Junction, I'll be checking out this Class 458 refurbishment, and discussing the uncertain future of the Class 458 Juniper.

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Journey Details:
Origin: Weybridge
Destination: London Waterloo
Company: South Western Railway
Train: UK Class 458/4 (Coradia Juniper)
Accommodation: Standard Class Seat (2nd)
Distance: 30 miles / 48 kilometres
Price: £8.55 (€10.10 / $10.80)
Time: 1 hour 23 minutes, arrived 3 minutes early

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Find me elsewhere:

[arthur]

They are adverised as 'Barnes' because it is the slow service to waterloo to avoid confusion with the more direct ones

[mrvwbug]

"Refurbishment" but they can't even be bothered to give the trains a deep cleaning and replace stuff that's actually broken haha.

[GreenJimll]

"This station is pretty basic" for a station with four ticket machines, a ticket office/booking hall, takeaway coffee shop, decent waiting room and lifts to/from the footbridge. That's not my definition of "pretty basic"

[SteamboatWilley]

>Describes Weybridge as "basic".
>It has an inside, ticket barriers, a coffee stand and a library.
Yeah, that's not basic at all.

[popnozstuff]

It likely says Barnes as the destination as the Waterloo services via Wimbledon are much more direct

[tazeemhafiz-]

8:45 Well done u fixed the service from further delay

[shogun]

Privatisiation working as intended then. Introduce the cheapest possible replacement and charge the highest possible price to ride them.

[albertsunderland]

6:44 is painfully relatable as an SWR commuter... It's been downhill ever since the First/MTR takeover. Dwindling reliability, poor service quality, the half-arsed Desiro refurbishment, plans to close literally every ticket office on the network, millions wasted on fleet cascades that never happened, and the Arterio fleet is 5 years late and counting. I cannot wait for the day when First is finally stripped of their contract, and I shall be very jubilant the day that happens.

[buzzukfiftythree]

SWR, another example (like Southeastern), of a privatised monopoly on routes into and out of Waterloo. They have no competitors on most of their routes, so they charge what they like and provide sub-standard quality.

[callumradford]

They’re advertised as Barnes so that passengers for Waterloo use the mainline services instead, which are much faster. Passengers for Putney and Wandsworth Town would be faster still to traverse via Clapham Jn on the mainline services.

[neurofrank]

I always wonder how many people have been priced out of central London when I see those shiny tower blocks. When I lived in the UK thirty years ago, the approach into Waterloo was quite a bit different. I really loved the Class 442 running between Waterloo and Southampton.

[ROCKINGMAN]

How do you know it's mould? Could be stains from soap cleaning. Not necessarily disgusting. What is disgusting is the way people use them, worse still if they have no tickets!

[neiloflongbeck]

Whatever your complaints are, it's still not a Pacer, which many non-London travellers sufferred for 40 years.

[ExplorebyRail]

The train is very exciting - it even has a fungus laboratory onboard

[ZoneProfessionalGardening]

This train set with the nice livery is what you call "Putting lipstick on a pig!"

[andybianca]

"brand new" which is actually 30years old with a badly applied blotch of paint and stained carpets seems like a perfect example of the uk rail industry

[ianmcqueen]

the 458/5s weren't ever actually withdrawn. just disappearing one by one to be refurbished. you can still see a few running around today.

[izzieb]

7:03 Savage but accurate description of Staines

[thisis_mudchute]

better idea for staines: 'staines on the walls? yuck! oh, we're at stains'

[colinhill]

Route into Charring Cross via London Bridge and Waterloo East cant be beaten, you get to see Tower Bridge, St Pauls Cathedral, Houses of Parliament, London Eye and the River Thames.