Past Operations
Connex South Eastern leased 12 508s which were freed up by controversially cutting back Merseyrail's Wirral services in 1996 (508101/105/106/107/109/113/116/119/121/129/132/133), for operation on specific Kent services. This fleet was used due to lack of Networkers (Class 466s), particularly on the Medway Valley Line and the Sheerness Line. In September 2006 new operator Southeastern announced that a cascade of rolling stock would see Class 466 units replace the 508s on the Sheerness and Medway Valley lines in the December 2006 timetable. Following this timetable change there were only six units left in Southeastern operation based at Gillingham Depot. There were five units in 'warm store' at Ashford Chart Leacon, and one unit, 508212, was heavily robbed to keep the surviving service units in operation, including the swap of its TSO coach with one from a service unit that ran into a tree on the Redhill-Tonbridge line. With the transfer of the Tonbridge to London via Redhill services to Southern, Southeastern placed its remaining fleet of Class 508s in store in December 2008.
Silverlink leased three 508s from Angel Trains in 2003 for operation on the Watford DC Line to assist its fleet of Class 313 EMUs. These were withdrawn following the delivery of new Class 378 Capitalstar units. These three Class 508/3 units were modified by Alstom Eastleigh to designs provided by Interfleet Technology to make them inter-operable with Class 313 units.
Read more about this topic: British Rail Class 508
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