There have been no trams running at all on the entire West Midlands Metro line between Library and Wolverhampton St George’s from the start of service on Friday 11th June after the complete fleet of Urbos3 trams were withdrawn from service for inspection. This came after manufacturer CAF identified a fault with the trams during routine maintenance which now needs to be thoroughly checked before the trams can start to be released for passenger service again.
In a story which has parallels to the withdrawn of all IEP trains on the national rail network last month (and let’s not forget this is not the first fleet of trams to be stood down temporarily with the most recent being Stagecoach Supertram’s fleet of Citylink vehicles), CAF reported to West Midlands Metro that they had discovered cracks on the underframe at either end of at least one tram and so the decision was taken to withdraw the complete fleet as a precautionary measure to allow full inspections to take place. West Midlands Metro were keen to stress that at no point has either passenger or staff safety been compromised.
This inevitably had the outcome that it was impossible for any form of service to operate and so West Midlands Metro released a statement apologising for the suspension of the service and advising of alternative arrangements. The often used ticket acceptances on other transport plan was soon put into action with both local bus and rail services accepting Metro tickets. This included the number 74 and 79 National Express bus service and West Midlands Railway and Avanti rail services.
The statement said that all 21 trams were to receive the inspections but there are currently only 20 of the original order of Urbos3 trams in the West Midlands as 37 remains in Spain where it has been undergoing repairs since October last year. This tram is expected to return to the UK imminently and will presumably also have to be checked either in Spain or when back.
The Wolverhampton Express and Star quoted the Managing Director of Midland Metro Ltd, Steve McAleavy: “Firstly I want to say how sorry we are for the inconvenience the suspension has caused to the many people who depend on West Midlands Metro services everyday. The Metro team have done an outstanding job during the pandemic to continue to deliver safe and reliable services, so it is a great disappointment that we have had to suspend services just when people are travelling more confidently. We have a fleet of CAF Urbos 3 trams and the manufacturer of those trams in a maintenance inspection identified some cracks in the underframe structure at either end of the tram. CAF were unable to assure us that the cracks did not represent a safety issue if we continued to operate. Our first priority is to ensure the safety of our customers and our colleagues and therefore the right thing to do was to remove the trams from service whilst inspections are carried out. The inspections have already commenced and will continue throughout the weekend and will be completed by Monday. Once the inspections have been completed we will be able to make a decision about when we can resume service. We will be keeping everyone updated via social media and will issue updates as we get more information.”
Although the comment from the Managing Director states that the inspections will be taking place over the weekend what isn’t known is what these inspections may discover. If they find that there are serious issues with several members of the tram fleet presumably Monday morning will also see severe disruption to the service. So, for now all we know is that there don’t look like being any trams on West Midlands Metro until at least Monday morning. Updates as we get them.
With this following on from more overhead problems at St Paul’s on Wednesday its fair to say it has been another week to forget for the West Midlands Metro and we can only hope the inspections do not discover more serious problems.
Strange how Edinburgh are still running as they use the same trams.