History

The sale of Rail Express Systems to Wisconsin Central was the initial part of English Welsh and Scottish Railway Ltd, but it was felt that the freight division should take priority in terms of new locomotives. The specification was for a locomotive capable of high speed mail and passenger running to replace the elderly and unreliable Class 47 fleet; it therefore had a 125mph maximum design speed and Bo-Bo wheel configuration. General Motors was again chosen to build the fleet. They subcontracted the work to Alstom in Spain and the Class 67 evolved from the Alstom 'Prima' design of locomotives with GM components internally.

The first locomotives were completed in 1999 with the first - 67003 - being sent to the UK for type testing. Problems occurred from the outset with faults including the locomotive being overweight preventing movement by rail. Following rectification of the initial problems, a speedy entry into traffic took place but with a limited maximum speed of 110mph because of concerns over track damage at high speed. These problems were resolved by July 2001 with the first locomotive - 67023 - passed for 125mph running. The modification - to the locomotives suspension - were implemented to the full fleet and 125mph running became a reality.

Although intended to replace the Class 47 fleet fully, many locomotives remained in traffic with EWS as cover for Class 67s with faults which kept them out of traffic for months on end. 67020 and then 67001 were used as 'Christmas Trees' at Cardiff Canton depot due to a shortage of spares. The fleet was never fully utilised.

Royal Mail ceased using EWS to operate its mail trains from late 2003 onwards until the last trains operated in January 2004 and as a result, the Class 67 fleet was left without the work for which they were designed. This led to a massive restructuring of EWS and the 67s gained new work such as operating the lighter intermodal trains to take advantage of their acceleration and higher speed, in addition to the weekend work of charters and 'Thunderbird' duties.

Current Status

The loss of the Royal Mail work left the fleet effectively spare in the week and as a result new work had to be found for these £1 million a piece locomotives. Inevitably some went for storage at Toton and Motherwell but new work was found such as the Network Rail test trains, stock moves which previously employed older classes, Thunderbird locos, introduction onto the Aberdeen and Inverness 'sleepers' and also becoming the new motive power for the Royal Train; for which the dedicated locos 67005 and 67006 were repained into Royal Claret livery. Despite this work, the locos are still not fully utilised and some still stand idle at depots for days. Currently two - 67010 and 67026 are in storage with more reported to be heading that way.