Railways Bill 2025: introducing and designing Great British Railways - general topic

[whole diary]

[Richard Fairhurst]

However, the Department for Transport said the “striking and memorable design” was developed in-house, to maximise value for money.

Just... yikes.

I recently commissioned an excellent designer to redesign parts of cycle.travel because I recognise that design is absolutely not my strength. That's for one little website/app, not for an entire nationalised railway.

Redesigning GBR^▸ (Great British Railways) in-house, with a team of people who have presumably never designed a train livery before, is reminiscent of the disaster when Marissa Mayer redesigned the Yahoo logo.

[grahame]

However, the Department for Transport said the “striking and memorable design” was developed in-house, to maximise value for money.

Just... yikes.

I recently commissioned an excellent designer to redesign parts of cycle.travel because I recognise that design is absolutely not my strength. That's for one little website/app, not for an entire nationalised railway.

Redesigning GBR^▸ (Great British Railways) in-house, with a team of people who have presumably never designed a train livery before, is reminiscent of the disaster when Marissa Mayer redesigned the Yahoo logo.

What we are talking about ... as on the gov.uk site:


Questions raised (some already in this thread) are such as
* How clean will it be kept?
* Does the logo turn around for running the other way?
* How will yellow and red striped for first class and catering fit with this?
* How will it look when multiple units are coupled and perhaps one is turned around?

[lympstone_commuter]

Hmmm - in my view, this simply illustrates how excellent the (current) GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) branding is.

[Red Squirrel]

I think the best silver linings to this cloud are:

* They saved money by assigning the design job to someone on Youth Opportunities (presumably)
* It probably won't last long
* Regions will get their own identities

[ray951]

That livery is a mess, too many colours going in too many directions. It certainly wasn't designed by professionals, more likely it was the output of a group activity at a Dft/GBR^▸ (Great British Railways) corporate away day.

And have you noticed how the colours change direction i.e. in the photo the first three carriages have the white stripe raising on the right and the 4th carriage the white stripe raises on the left. How will that look on a train with an odd number of carriages, you'll have 3 going one way and 2 the other   Maybe the 'designers' don't like symmetry.

[Western Pathfinder]

That's a mess if you ask me ,far too harsh on the eye for my taste.

[broadgage]

Not a fan of the new livery, it only looks right if the train is going forwards, and they spend half the time going the other way.

[Red Squirrel]

Not a fan of the new livery, it only looks right if the train is going forwards, and they spend half the time going the other way.

Indeed. You wouldn't see Siobahn Sharpe and her chums at Perfect Curve making that kind of schoolchild-error.

I suspect that the DfT^» (Department for Transport - about) was keen above all not to generate headlines about cost. Which may have worked; as far as I can detect the media has not reported it.

[Oxonhutch]

Not a fan of the new livery, it only looks right if the train is going forwards, and they spend half the time going the other way.

To be fair, I think GBR^▸ (Great British Railways) will be reintroducing turntables 

[grahame]

Not a fan of the new livery, it only looks right if the train is going forwards, and they spend half the time going the other way.

Indeed. You wouldn't see Siobahn Sharpe and her chums at Perfect Curve making that kind of schoolchild-error.

I suspect that the DfT^» (Department for Transport - about) was keen above all not to generate headlines about cost. Which may have worked; as far as I can detect the media has not reported it.

It's a very useful thing to have the public discuss and comment on - drawing their fire while other things that may be much more significant get passed through with less argument over them.

On the design - I was going to post that my wife could have done better - but I fear that might be faint praise.

[ChrisB]

Simon Calder on X/Twitter

Great British Railways.
Rail minister Lord Peter Hendy:
A unified operator of track and train will deliver a better passenger experience.
Fares: pay-as-you-go around key cities; on longer journeys, dynamic pricing to manage demand.
And a new GBR^▸ (Great British Railways) ticket app

Oh happy days! Dynamic Pricing = the end of the Off-peak return then....

[TaplowGreen]

Here are the new staff uniforms, matching the trains colour scheme!

[ChrisB]

Arrgh - worse than the trains!

Meanwhile, the Bill received it's second reading today, with MPs^▸ (Member of Parliament, or Mile Post (a method of measuring the railway in miles and chains from a starting point - usually London), depending on context) voting 329 to 173 in favour.

Now into Committee Stage.

[IndustryInsider]

Arrgh - worse than the trains!

Clearly a bit of AI generated slop!

[Witham Bobby]

Arrgh - worse than the trains!

Clearly a bit of AI generated slop!

I sure hope so - awful.  Never a good idea to be wearing red in any kind of operational role on the railways, I've always thought

I turned-up at Witham box one summer afternoon for late turn, and Adrian, who I was relieving, had the great railway photographer Ivo Peters with him in the box.  Ivo had brought along a friend, who was wearing a bright red shirt.  I had to ask him to stay at the back of the box, out of the view of passing drivers.  He'd been quite happily perched on the windowsill at the London end of the box - in full view

I wish I'd known more about Ivo at the time. It was several years later when I realised what a great photographer and friend of the railway that he was.  Some of the pictures he took on that day are in "Railway Elegance", which covers (mostly) Somerset and Wiltshire in the 1960s and up to the mid 70s diesel days.  Recommended.  Particularly if you like the Westbury to Bathampton line